Quorum

views updated May 29 2018

QUORUM

A majority of an entire body; e.g., a quorum of a legislative assembly.

A quorum is the minimum number of people who must be present to pass a law, make a judgment, or conduct business. Quorum requirements typically are found in a court, legislative assembly, or corporation (where those attending might be directors or stockholders). In some cases, the law requires more people than a simple majority to form a quorum. If no such defining number is determined, a quorum is a simple majority.

A quorum also might mean the number of members of a body defined as competent to transact business in the absence of the other members. The purpose of a quorum rule is to give decisions made by a quorum enough authority to allow binding action to be conducted.

In both houses of Congress, a quorum consists of a simple majority of members.

quorum

views updated May 17 2018

quorum justice of the peace whose presence was necessary on the bench, later gen. XV; fixed number of persons whose presence is necessary in the transaction of business XVII. g. pl. of L. quī WHO; taken from the wording of commissions designating such persons, quorum vos … duos (etc.) esse volumus of whom we will that you be … two (etc.).

quorum

views updated Jun 11 2018

quo·rum / ˈkwôrəm/ • n. (pl. quo·rums ) the minimum number of members of an assembly or society that must be present at any of its meetings to make the proceedings of that meeting valid.

quorum

views updated May 21 2018

quorum originally, a select body of justices of the peace, every member of which had to be present to constitute a deciding body. Later, the minimum number of members of an assembly or society that must be present at any of its meetings to make the proceedings of that meeting valid.

Recorded from late Middle English, the word comes from the text of commissions for committee members designated by the Latin words quorum vos…unum esse volumus ‘of whom we wish that you…be one’.

Quorum

views updated May 11 2018

Quorum

the number of members of a body or committee who together are authorised to transact business; justices collectively ; a select company.

Examples : quorum of the Shire (justices collectively ), 1455; of peers; of surgeons, 1747.