184. A motion to amend, as has been seen, may be itself amended. It stands in the same degree only with the previous question and indefinite postponement, and neither, if first moved, is superseded by the other.
185. But this motion is liable to be superseded by a motion to postpone to a day certain; so that amendment and postponement competing, the latter is to be first put. The reason is, that a question for amendment is not suppressed by postponing or adjourning the principal question, but remains before the assembly, whenever the main question is resumed; for otherwise, it might happen, that the occasion for other urgent business might go by and be lost by length of debate on the amendment, if the assembly had no power to postpone the whole subject.
186. A motion to amend may also be superseded by a motion to commit; so that the latter, though subsequently moved, is to be first put; because, “in truth, it facilitates and befriends the motion to amend.”
187. The effect of both a negative and an affirmative decision of amendments has already been considered (94 to 127).
18. It is commonly said, that a motion to adjourn is always in order, but this is not precisely true. The question of adjournment may be moved repeatedly on the same day; yet, in strictness, not without some intermediate question being proposed, after one motion to adjourn is disposed of, and before the next motion is made for adjourning; as, for example, an amendment to a pending question, or for the reading of some paper. The reason of this is, that, until some other proceeding has intervened, the question already decided is the same as that newly moved.
19. It is quite common, when the business of a deliberative assembly has been brought to a close, to adjourn the assembly without day. A better form is to dissolve it; as an adjournment without day, if we regard the etymology of the word adjourn, is a contradiction in terms.
20. “A motion to adjourn and a question of privilege, take precedence of a motion for the orders of the day.”—Ed.
22. “A motion to suspend the rules is not debatable.”—Ed.
23. In the house of representatives of Massachusetts, as the effect of a negative decision of the previous question is not to remove the principal question from before the house, that question is still open to postponement, commitment, or amendment, notwithstanding such negative decision.