The gavel was pounded and a call for order was heard over the arguing senators Wednesday.

The proposal of an amendment to an amendment to a bill ignited a turbulent debate among the Government of the Student Body during its weekly meeting. As originally authored, the bill would have set aside a time during the meetings for senators to report on their constituents’ councils.

Speaker Jonathan Richardson, senior in chemical engineering, introduced the bill. He said he hoped it would encourage senators to relate their constituents’ concerns at GSB meetings.

Zaal Tonia, senior in physics, disagreed.

“We already have an open forum and closing announcements for this sort of thing,” he said.

He said the senators could not be forced into doing a better job.

“You can’t legislate competence,” Tonia said.

The majority of senators agreed with him.

Katherine Lundberg, sophomore in English, offered her impersonation of how the reports would sound.

“LAS Council just appointed a new president, and a secretary, and – who cares? Vote ‘no’ on this bill,” she said.

Trouble arose when the amendments to piled up and the rules of order governing the debate grew unclear.

The students in attendance were even more confused about what the Senate was debating.

“I really have no idea what is going on,” said Patrick Nelson, sophomore in mechanical engineering.

Nelson was part of an unusually large audience in attendance at the meeting.

Two groups of students were attending the meeting to complete assignments for classes. One of the groups was part of a University Studies 170X class and the other was from the Freshman Honors Program.

Jonathan Berrie, junior in mechanical engineering, is one of the leaders of the Honors group.

“We’ve never been to a meeting before, so we thought it would be good to introduce our freshman to the GSB,” he said.

GSB President Emily Jensen welcomed the groups in her opening address.

“It’s always great to see our students in the audience,” Jensen said.