Documents in Negotiated Texts

Throughout the platform round icons are events relating to individuals and their right to have an opinion in particular debates:

Person joining a committee

Person leaving a committee

Person elected to a position

Roll-call

Parchment-coloured, square icons relate to the creation and amending of documents:

Create a new proposal

Create a new document that is a line-by-line revision of another document (noted by the pen icon in the corner)

Document amendment proposed

Document taken from another committee (note arrow in corner)

Amendment taken from another committee

Debate a proposal

Documents that have an explicit subtype can be displayed with a slightly different icon:

Legislative text

Formal Resolutions

A message to be sent elsewhere

A petition to be considered

Rules and Orders of Business

Diamond-shaped, purple icons relate to decisions taken:

Drop a proposal

Refer a proposal to another committee

Adopt a proposal

Other vote (continue debate)

Reject a proposal

Postpone a debate

Blue, hexagon-shaped icons relate to 'procedural' proposals that do not directly alter text but affect how a committee does its work (and are usually used only for transient things, such as a point of order.)

Procedural motion

Procedural motion with sub-decisions

Debate on a procedural motion

Documents

The output of most negotiations is a document or set of documents. In the course of producing these, many interim drafts will be created. Documents and drafts that are created and amended during the negotiations process are, themselves, drafts of the final text that the negotiations process will eventually create.

In a formal process of debate, almost all proposals are written down in some form. The Quill Platform provides a kind of 'track changes for historians' that allows you to explore exactly what was being discussed at any moment.

What can I do with Quill?

On the Quill Platform, documents can be:

Created / Introduced for discussion
Have amendments proposed
Passed from one committee to another

Members of negotiations can:

Introduce new text for discussion
Debate a specific proposal
Make a decision on a particular proposal

They can also decide to:

Adopt a proposal
Reject a proposal
Refer a proposal to another committee for discussion
Postpone a decision on a proposal

We also note within the model when they:

Take a vote on a proposal that neither means it is adopted nor rejected -- typically having the effect of keeping a proposal under discussion
Drop a discussion of a subject without a formal vote

Exploring the Constitutional Convention through the Quill platform

The Quill platform provides a variety of tools to explore the documents of the Convention. For example: