# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1911_S135
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

13th Delegate Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States, 1911. 135

Regulations for the Elections at the General Synod.

(According to the Report of the General Synod of 1905.)

§1. Already at the first session of the Delegate Synod, the General Presidium shall appoint the committee, or election board, which is to prepare, conduct, and oversee the elections of the General Synod.

§2. All the district presidents, together with one deputy appointed by the Synod itself from each district, shall form the committee that proposes to the Synod the names of suitable persons — in double the number relative to the number of members of which a standing board or commission is composed. These persons thus selected by the nominating committee, who are to be brought to the Synod's attention and with respect to whom the Synod may strike out or add names at its discretion, shall form the candidates from among whom the Synod is to make its choice.

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

§4. The first candidate election shall be for the General President, and the second for the 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 most votes in the aforementioned primary election shall be the candidates for the office of President.

§6. Immediately after the (5) candidates for the office of President have been determined, ballots shall be printed, and at a later session the definitive election shall then be carried out through the election board.

§7. The election of the President and of 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 is to be struck, and a further vote taken among the four remaining candidates. This — striking the lowest-ranked name and re-voting — shall continue until an absolute majority is obtained.

§9. Once the election of the General President is completed, the primary election concerning the Vice-Presidents takes place — that is, the election of persons who are to be candidates for the office of Vice-President. For each Vice-President there shall be 3 candidates, namely those persons who receive the most votes in the primary election. From these candidates — 6 for two Vice-Presidents, 9 for three, etc. — the Vice-Presidents are to be elected. Here too — because an absolute ma