Standing Rules of the Senate
RULE XXII
PRECEDENCE OF MOTIONS
1. When a question is pending, no motion shall be received but
To adjourn.
To adjourn to a day certain, or that when the Senate adjourn it
shall be to a day certain.
To take a recess.
To proceed to the consideration of executive business.
To lay on the table.
To postpone indefinitely.
To postpone to a day certain.
To commit.
To amend.
Which several motions shall have precedence as they stand arranged;
and the motions relating to adjournment, to take a recess, to proceed to the
consideration of executive business, to lay on the table, shall be decided without
debate.
2. Notwithstanding the provisions of rule II or rule IV or any
other rule of the Senate, at any time a motion signed by sixteen Senators, to
bring to a close the debate upon any measure, motion, other matter pending before
the Senate, or the unfinished business, is presented to the Senate, the Presiding
Officer, or clerk at the direction of the Presiding Officer, shall at once state
the motion to the Senate, and one hour after the Senate meets on the following
calendar day but one, he shall lay the motion before the Senate and direct that
the clerk call the roll, and upon the ascertainment that a quorum is present,
the Presiding Officer shall, without debate, submit to the Senate by a yea-and-nay
vote the question:
"Is it the sense of the Senate that the debate shall be brought
to a close?" And if that question shall be decided in the affirmative by
three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn -- except on a measure or
motion to amend the Senate rules, in which case the necessary affirmative vote
shall be two-thirds of the Senators present and voting -- then said measure,
motion, or other matter pending before the Senate, or the unfinished business,
shall be the unfinished business to the exclusion of all other business until
disposed of.
Thereafter no Senator shall be entitled to speak in all more than
one hour on the measure, motion, or other matter pending before the Senate,
or the unfinished business, the amendments thereto, and motions affecting the
same, and it shall be the duty of the Presiding Officer to keep the time of
each Senator who speaks. Except by unanimous consent, no amendment shall be
proposed after the vote to bring the debate to a close, unless it had been submitted
in writing to the Journal Clerk by 1 o'clock p.m. on the day following the filing
of the cloture motion if an amendment in the first degree, and unless it had
been so submitted at least one hour prior to the beginning of the cloture vote
if an amendment in the second degree. No dilatory motion, or dilatory amendment,
or amendment not germane shall be in order. Points of order, including questions
of relevancy, and appeals from the decision of the Presiding Officer, shall
be decided without debate.
After no more than thirty hours of consideration of the measure,
motion, or other matter on which cloture has been invoked, the Senate shall
proceed, without any further debate on any question, to vote on the final disposition
thereof to the exclusion of all amendments not then actually pending before
the Senate at that time and to the exclusion of all motions, except a motion
to table, or to reconsider and one quorum call on demand to establish the presence
of a quorum (and motions required to establish a quorum) immediately before
the final vote begins. The thirty hours may be increased by the adoption of
a motion, decided without debate, by a threefifths affirmative vote of the Senators
duly chosen and sworn, and any such time thus agreed upon shall be equally divided
between and controlled by the Majority and Minority Leaders or their designees.
However, only one motion to extend time, specified above, may be made in any
one calendar day.
If, for any reason, a measure or matter is reprinted after cloture
has been invoked, amendments which were in order prior to the reprinting of
the measure or matter will continue to be in order and may be conformed and
reprinted at the request of the amendment's sponsor. The conforming changes
must be limited to lineation and pagination.
No Senator shall call up more than two amendments until every
other Senator shall have had the opportunity to do likewise.
Notwithstanding other provisions of this rule, a Senator may yield
all or part of his one hour to the majority or minority floor managers of the
measure, motion, or matter or to the Majority or Minority Leader, but each Senator
specified shall not have more than two hours so yielded to him and may in turn
yield such time to other Senators.
Notwithstanding any other provision of this rule, any Senator
who has not used or yielded at least ten minutes, is, if he seeks recognition,
guaranteed up to ten minutes, inclusive, to speak only.
After cloture is invoked, the reading of any amendment, including
House amendments, shall be dispensed with when the proposed amendment has been
identified and has been available in printed form at the desk of the Members
for not less than twenty four hours. |