"Well, the amendment vote surprised me, that the "Yes" side did so well. It got 59% of the vote -- a tremendous margin of 59% v. 41%!"

I'm surprised the amendment failed.

"It was a great victory, despite great odds. It didn't get the required 66.66% of the vote. But of the 350 valid ballots, the "Yes" side won 55.4% of those votes. If you add in the 129 ballots sent to Gene Trimble by mistake (where the "Yes" side won 68% of the votes), the "Yes" side won 59% of the entire vote -- 282 out of 479 votes. (The President vote got more total votes -- 717 altogether, also for reasons below.) In a well run election the "Yes" side would have gotten well over 66%. And 55.4% (or 59%) is a landslide in most elections."

Constitutional amendments require a 2/3rds majority. Such an election is NOT like most elections.

"(For those new to the Club and the BB, this is the story -- the current Board of the Club, last year, ended the long-standing by-law rule that required individual Chapter members (about $5 per year dues to their Chapter) to be National members ($20 per annum dues to the National) as well. The Amendment's goal was to reverse the Board and restore the rule.)"

I am a member of one Chapter that has dues of $5 per year, Slabfree. Other than that Chapter, I'm not aware of any other Chapter who's dues are that inexpensive.

"Wait till next year. Morally speaking, everything considered (see below), the new officers should change the by-laws to make national membership required for Chapter members after one year in the Chapter. But don't hold your breath."

Given that the general election didn't adopt the amendment, I wouldn't expect the new board to make such a move. There was no mandate in the amendment voting results to do so.

"HERE ARE THE WAYS THE CLUB LEADERS, IN EFFECT, RUINED THE AMENDMENT VOTE AND STILL HAVE NOT APOLOGIZED FOR THESE IRREGULARITIES. THE MEMBERS WERE NOT TOLD WHAT THE AMENDMENT WAS ABOUT AND WERE GIVEN ARGUMENTS FOR JUST ONE SIDE (THE "NO" SIDE):"

The amendment spoke for itself! If you felt that it needed extra explanation, it wasn't written in a form that would give your side the advantage of standing on its own as reasonable to everyone who read it!

"¶ The Amendment ballot, on the front side, didn't say what the vote was about. There was no name for the Amendment and no synopsis of what it was about. It just asked for a Yes or No vote."

There wasn't room for everything on one side of one piece of paper.

"¶ The front side of the ballot didn't say there was pertinent information on the reverse side of the ballot. A club member would have to take it upon himself to look on the reverse side. (And a number of members said their copy of the ballot had nothing printed on the reverse side.)"

If they didn't look on the reverse side of the ballot, chances are they didn't vote at all. A number of members said their copy of the ballot had nothing printed on the reverse side? How many? Did they go ahead and vote for something that they hadn't read?

"¶ On the reverse side of the ballot,at the top, the case was made for voting "No", and in describing the Amendment they failed to mention a crucial element of the Amendment -- that a new Chapter member need not join the National right away, but a year later when he renews his Chapter membership."

...being that I didn't copy my ballot, I can't quote what was said in introduction to the amendment, but what I remember is an explanation of what lead up to the amendment proposal. That in and of itself is hardly a case for voting "No".

"¶ while a case was made for the "No" vote (see above), No case (rationale) was given for the "Yes" vote. (Even totalitarian countries wouldn't do that.)"

The amendment should have spoken for itself! If people didn't vote for it, they didn't want it enacted.

"¶ Perhaps worst of all, while the Amendment was submitted to the Club accurately by Marv Weaver, the powers that be botched the wording of the Amendment (on the reverse side of the ballot) to make it unintelligible and wrecking the crucial clause in its favor -- that newbies could join the Chapter for a full year before being forced to join the National. They left out the key word "year." The botched sentence said, "members of a chapter need not be Club members when they join a Chapter, but they must be Club members within one of their joining any Chapter......""

True, a word was left out. But given the sentence that said word was missing, I don't believe that the omission was vital enough to invalidate the ballot. Your fervor over this matter appears to suggest that either the omission was intentional, or failure to change the election by mailing corrected ballots was intentional tampering by somebody. Be very careful about what you say Robert....

"¶ The above wouldn't be so bad if the Club's "Casino Chip and Token News" (the loose ballots came with this magazine) had any information about the Amendment. This is the first Amendment in the Club's history (I believe) and created much interest in the internet Bulletin Boards, but this news magazine didn't bother to cover it. I had forwarded the editor information about the issue. (There was just one small paragraph about it in the magazine in the "President's Letter," and even there no mention was made of the crucial one year trial period where a newbie could be a Chapter member and not a National member ."

It wasn't the first Constitutional Amendment put to the vote of the general membership. I've only been a member since 1997, and voted on another amendment regarding the process for nominations for CCGTCC office. ....I seem to remember you were involved in that flap too.

"¶ Marv Weaver, who submitted the Amendment, was promised that his
Letter to the Editor would be printed in that issue, but they forgot to do so!"

The editors explained to you why that didn't happen if I remember correctly.

"¶ Their was no envelope for the Amendment ballot, just an address at the bottom of the page. 129 members (who voted 68% for the Amendment) wasted their vote by sending it in the same envelope that was provided for the Officer ballots. Why was there not an envelope for the Amendment? (And it would have been smarter to have one Officers-Amendment ballot on one page with one return envelope.)"

We aren't children. I deal with the general public everyday, and am sometimes amazed at the lack of comprehension that many people exhibit. If you or anyone else wants to propose an amendment to the CCGTCC constitution, and it is put up for a vote of the entire membership, a ballot is all that is required to be sent to every member. There is already added cost to the general membership by printing and including the ballot in every member's magazine. If you feel sooooo strongly about such an amendment in the future, perhaps you would like to foot the bill for the added costs of additional pre-printed envelopes.

"¶ Another shocking aspect of this is that for six months I tried to get the Club officials to get the Chapter membership rosters (which they must get under the by-laws) so we could compute this vital statistic -- the percent of Chapter members who are not National members. (Also, the National could write these people, gently asking them to become National members.) I said I would do this work if they didn't have the time to. I was stonewalled for months. They said they asked for the lists. They kept putting me off. They never told me they obtained all the lists, and I gather they never did get these lists. In February they told me that the Chapters need only submit the names of National members! That is not true and is shameful. My main argument in favor the Amendment is that, without it, many new and renewing Chapter members will opt for the cheap Chapter dues, and buy and trade chips locally in person and forgo the National dues. Think of it. Chapters can build themselves up with cut-rate chapter dues payers by rummaging through the national membership list, but won't give their membership list to the National. So we have empire-building chapter leaders enlarging their treasury and membership at the expense of the National."

....for some strange reason, I couldn't envision you "gently asking". Your agenda was and is clear. Join under your terms or go away.

"¶ It is amusing that the three candidates for President all came out against the Amendment in front of the Atlantic City Chapter, yet said nothing about the Amendment in the Jan-Feb-March issue of the Club magazine (the issue the ballots came with)."

.......did it occur to you that they might have wanted to let the amendment fly on its own with people who weren't privy to the controversy preceding its submission?

"¶ Another wonderful thing the Club did was to distribute many freebie issues of the newsletter to advertise the Club (that is fine) with Officer and Amendment ballots inside (not so fine)."

DEFINE MANY! Using loose terms damages any credibility for thinking people.

"¶ One club official mistakenly said Chapters could vote with the ballots inside the Chapter copy of the newsmagazine. I doubt that had much, if any, affect on the vote since membership numbers were required on the Amendment ballots, but not the Officer ballots!"

......it had no affect. You posted a note a couple days ago in anticipation of your pet amendment losing to avoid the perception of sour grapes. You should have left it at that, because your grapes went way sour in this post. Brewing vinegar will give you ulcers Robert.

Bob