SBC messengers urged to draft motions, confirm they are in order ahead of time

Messengers attending the 2022 Southern Baptist Convention Annual Meeting will tackle a long list of convention business June 14–15 in Anaheim, California.

Steven Bates, chairman of the committee on order of business and a member of First Baptist Church Winnfield, Louisiana, said the committee is anticipating needing a lot of time for messengers to address issues.

“I don’t know how much discussion there will be,” he said. “Our committee in drafting the agenda has set aside an hour for the (Sexual Abuse Task Force) report and any discussion. If that is not ample time, then someone must make a motion to get additional time and the agenda can be modified. The problem is we have so many things that must be dealt with that this could push things back some.”

The agenda allows for an hour (Tuesday at 1:45 p.m. to 2:45 p.m. Pacific time) for Bruce Frank, chair of the task force and pastor of Biltmore Baptist Church in Arden, North Carolina, to deliver the report and answer questions from messengers. It also allows for two 20-minute slots for motions to be introduced — one prior to the task force report at 10:10 a.m. and one after the report at 4:55 p.m.

Limited time to make motions

“The time for making a motion is only 15 to 20 minutes long,” he noted. “It’s limited on how much time we have for debate and motions brought to the floor have to have someone speak for and against said motion. If time runs out, it may just be one for and one against.”

As far as preparing motions to present, Bates suggests messengers work on them ahead of time and have them written down. Parliamentarians also are on hand to assist messengers in understanding how to properly draft their motions (while maintaining proper boundaries to avoid influencing the point of the motion).

“Once motions are made, they are brought to our committee, with the help from our legal committee and parliamentarian we will determine if said motion can be debated on the floor, referred or ruled out of order for any reason,” Bates said.

“Every part of the agenda is timed out and there is an official timekeeper to make sure it is kept,” Bates added. “The problem is if we didn’t limit the time for motions, we would spend all our time just taking motions. There would be no more time left to conduct the business of the convention.

“There will be a parliamentarian on stage and others stationed at different microphones to assist with questions that arise.”

Full details of the agenda for the annual meeting can be found here, and to learn the protocol for making motions at the annual meeting, read the information from the annual meeting website here.

To follow stories related to the sexual abuse investigation, check out the archive of articles here.