How Many Votes Required to Remove Chairman?

By Paul Yeager

It seems to me that the NCGOP 2015 Plan of Organization is pretty clear on this:

7. Vacancies and Removals
a. Any Member of a Committee organized under this Plan may be removed either:
1. By a 2/3’s vote of the respective Committee after being furnished with notice of the charges against him, signed by the lesser of (i) 50 Members or (i) one-third of the Members of the respective Committee.

Astute readers will note that it says “2/3’s vote of the respective Committee”, not a 2/3’s vote of those present and voting, or 2/3’s of the quorum present.  The latter phrase occurs in Article VI paragraph C.2:

When monies are raised and expenditures authorized by other than the State Central Committee or the State Executive Committee on behalf of any candidate for state or national
office, the Party shall not be held liable; except, however, that the State Executive Committee, by 2/3 vote of a quorum present, may assume any portion of such debts it deems advisable.

It would seem that if they used the phrase “of a quorum present” as they did above, and did not use the same phrase when describing the procedure for removal of a committee member, they intended for removal to require a 2/3 vote of the entire committee.

Why should you care?  While it seems that the PoO is pretty clear on this, it appears that rules are being proposed for the 4/30 meeting requiring as little as 2/3 of the Executive Committee members present and voting to remove the Chairman.  There may be a huge difference between 2/3 of the entire NCGOP Executive Committee and 2/3 of the quorum present.

What other evidence is available?  Well…

When Haywood County had an effort to remove their Chairwoman in 2014, the question of how many must vote to remove a Chairperson was apparently evaluated by the NCGOP General Counsel, The NCGOP Executive Director, and two different NCGOP officials sent to moderate meetings on the issue of removing the Chairwoman.  They all apparently concluded that a 2/3 vote of the entire Haywood County GOP Executive Committee was required to remove the Chairwoman, not merely 2/3 of the quorum present.

Leo Phillips, who was at the time Cherokee County GOP Vice Chairman, was one of those sent to moderate.  He said:

…according to the North Carolina Republican State Plan, it says… you need a quorum to have this meeting of twenty five percent, which clearly we have at this point.  Twenty five percent of 29 is what number we’re looking at.  Because when you go further on that rule, it will say that it requires… 2/3… to remove someone of the total Executive Committee.  You have 29 members in your Executive Committee

This message was reiterated a few seconds later.

Now of course I don’t expect you to take my word for it.  You can hear the audio (which is more than I transcribed above) and hear for yourself.  https://youtu.be/rSAVXQcU4vM

A later version includes more audio reiterating that 20 votes, or 2/3 of the entire HCGOP Executive Committe, is required to remove the Chairwoman is here: https://youtu.be/pjo4sFt3ngI