In this vote, the House voted 196 to 219 against a motion to commit with instructions (send to committee for further consideration and/or amendment; a motion to commit with instructions is often a minority party's last effort to try to amend or kill the legislation in question) H. Res. 5, the Republican-drafted resolution establishing the rules that would govern the House of Representatives in the 109th Congress. (Each two-year period beginning in January following congressional elections the previous November is considered a "Congress.") These rules must be re-adopted every two years when a new Congress begins. H. Res. 5 contained a number of significant changes from the rules that governed the 108th Congress, including the creation of a Committee on Homeland Security, the introduction of the concept of a "provisional quorum" (provisional majority required in order for Congress to vote and otherwise conduct certain business) in the case of catastrophe and changes in ethics-related provisions designed to make it easier for the committee with oversight responsibility for internal ethics questions to dismiss complaints against House members. Louise Slaughter (D-NY) offered this motion on behalf of Democrats to "prohibit Members from negotiating lucrative job deals that capitalize on their committee membership" and to "guarantee that Members have at least 3 days to read a House report [from a committee] before voting on it." The latter provision, she argued would prevent bills from being "rushed to the floor" without members having had the chance to read them, as well as guard against staff slipping "outrageous provisions" into bills at the last minute. Republicans countered that the package of rules in its entirety would uphold a very high ethics standard for the House, and in order to demonstrate their support for the package as a whole, they voted against the motion. Thus, consideration of the Resolution and the Republican-drafted rules package proceeded without the above-mentioned provisions, thus ensuring that these ethics safeguards would not be among those governing House conduct for the next two years.