Liberty Maven

Reports have started coming in regarding the “alternate” Nevada State Convention made up of Ron Paul patriots playing within the rules legally to elect delegates to the Republican National Convention. The first report came in a post on Ron Paul Forums, Jdayh writes:

They did not have a quorum based on the old convention, but that convention has been invalidated due to rule breaking.(see below in bold) So now they have a new quorum with full attendance.Which means it is fully legal and shall withstand the scrutiny of legal challenges that may come!!!!

There is no “former” convention, the convention NEVER recessed. The convention has always been going on. Under RONR (10th. Ed.) sec. 20, p. 222, ln. 30,

“A recess is a short intermission in the assembly’s proceedings, commonly only of a few minutes, which does not close the meeting and after which business will immediately be resumed at exactly the point where it was interrupted.”

Thus, by definition, a recess can never be used to close a meeting. Under RONR, there are two types of recess: (1) a privileged motion to recess, requiring a majority vote, or (2) a unilateral recess being declared by the chair if it was provided for in the agenda or program. On April 26th, a RECESS was not provided for in the program or agenda (even though the agenda on April 26th. may have provided for ADJOURNMENT at a particular time, completely different from a recess).

Thus, the purported recess on April 26th. would have been valid ONLY if a motion to recess was made and seconded by the convention delegates, and the motion was voted on by a majority of delegates. Even then, however, the recess could not have been used to close the meeting.

For this reason shown above they now have a new quorum that is roughly 300 (a bit more) delegates. And now business is taking place with full legality and force of law behind them. WE THE PEOPLE SHALL AND WILL PREVAIL!!!!!

The catch here is that according to the number of people at the previous day’s convention 300+ delegates is not enough for a quorum since that day there were over 1400 delegates attending. They circumvented this though, as explained in the news story from KOLO 8 in Nevada.

On Saturday, the crowd appointed Washoe County delegate Mike Weber chairman when Beers declined to show. The convention then voted to ratify most of the rules established in April, which allowed them to declare a quorom despite falling hundreds of delegates short of the previous standard.

All of the changes had at least one delegate questioning the legality of the process.

“What we’ve done is re-unite the rules,” says Tim Riley, a Washoe County delegate. “So we could lower the number because we were not able to get enough people to show up today.”

The state party will elect a separate group of delegates in July, but expects that to be challenged by Saturday’s appointees. With two sets of delegates likely headed to the National Convention in September, the final decision lies with the National Committee.

The state party sponsored Republican Convention will reconvene on July 26.

Obviously, the Republican National Committee will side with the coming July 26th results and not today’s results, but the patriots in Nevada today certainly have legal ground to stand upon to fight that decision. What I’m curious about now is will the delegates who stood up for liberty today also show up at this next so-called “official” convention?

It is exactly this type of effort that is part of restoring the Republican Party to its limited government roots. No matter the final outcome, in the future we may look back on today’s events as an important battle won in the overall war for restoring our Constitutional republic.