# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1899_S138
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

138 Proceedings of the 24th General, or

Regulation of the Elections Concerning the General Synod.

Resolved, that the following proposal be adopted:

§ 1. Already at the first session of the Delegate Synod, the Committee,
or Election Board, which is to prepare, conduct, and oversee the elections
of the General Synod, shall be appointed by the General Presidium.
(See the report of the Delegate Synod of the year 1896, p. 135.)

§ 2. All District Presidents, together with one deputy to be appointed
by the Synod itself from each District, shall form the Committee that
proposes names of suitable persons to the Synod, in double the number
required for the members of which a standing board or commission is
composed. These persons thus proposed, from whom the Synod may
strike or to whom it may add names, at its own discretion, shall form
the candidates from whom the Synod is to make its choice.

§ 3. Such nomination of candidates shall take place with respect to
all standing synodical boards, or officers, respectively, with the
exception of the President and the Vice-Presidents, for which offices
just named the Synod itself elects the candidates without any prior
nomination (preliminary election).

§ 4. The first election of candidates shall be for the General
President, and the second for the two General Vice-Presidents; the
latter, however, shall take place only after the election of the
General President has been decided.

§ 5. Those five persons who receive the greatest number of votes in
the aforementioned preliminary election shall be the candidates for the
presidential office.

§ 6. Immediately after the (5) candidates for the presidential office
have been determined, ballots shall be printed, and the definitive
election shall then be carried out by the Election Board at a later
session.

§ 7. The election of the President and the Vice-Presidents must
result in an absolute majority, while for all other elections a simple
majority suffices.

§ 8. If the first ballot does not yield an absolute majority, the
name of the candidate with the lowest number of votes shall be struck,
and a new ballot taken among the four remaining candidates. This —
striking the lowest-voted name and re-balloting — shall continue until
an absolute majority is attained.

§ 9. Once the election of the General President is completed, the
preliminary election concerning the Vice-Presidents takes place, that
is, the election of persons who are to be candidates for the office of
Vice-President, a. in the East and b. in the West. Those six — three
in the eastern and three in the western