“We’re tabling the motion.” – New Yorker Cartoon
Tabling an item at public meetings.
Does it really mean what people assume ?
What does it mean to “Table” an item, at meetings?
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
In parliamentary procedure, a motion to table has two different and contradictory meanings:
- In the United States, to table usually means the to lay [the topic] on the table or to move for postponement of consideration; a proposal to suspend consideration of a pending motion. Much less often, it means a motion to “put on the table”: a proposal to begin consideration (or reconsideration), a usage consistent with the rest of the English-speaking world.
- In the rest of the English-speaking world, such as the United Kingdom, to table means to move to place [the topic] upon the table (or to move to place on the table): a proposal to begin consideration (or reconsideration) of a proposal.Both the American and the British dialects have the sense of “to table” as to lay [the topic] on the table or to cause [the topic] to lie on the table. The difference is the idea of what the table is for, that of a shelf off to the side, or an active work bench.
- The British meaning has the sense of the table as being an active work bench, with the topic being the centre of attention, considered and discussed by all until it can be resolved, at which point it is taken off the ‘table’. This comes from the use of the term to describe physically laying legislation on the table in the British Parliament; once an item on the order paper has been laid on the table, it becomes the current subject for debate.
- The American sense is that the table is like that of a shelf, archive, or long-term storage device, where the topic has been disposed of by sending it to the ‘table’ and leaving it there.
What does it take to remove the item from the Table and revive?
Two distinct and different motions:
