April 18 in A.A. History

Today in A.A. History—April 18–22

In 1956, at the 6th General Service Conference, at the Commodore Hotel in New York City, the Conference…

    … unanimously approved of Bill’s new book [A.A. Comes of Age].

    The Conference also approved a motion…

    … asking that General Service Headquarters designate Thanksgiving Week each year as “A.A. Gratitude Week” and that this action be noted in the annual pre-Thanksgiving appeals to the groups for funds to help support worldwide services.

During the final session, Bill W. proposed consideration of four principles “that might someday permeate all of A.A.’s services,” namely “Petition, Appeal, Participation, and Decision”—foreshadowing Concepts III, IV, and V.

Today in A.A. History—April 18–23

In 1966, at the 16th General Service Conference, held at the Hotel Roosevelt in New York City, the ratio of Class B [alcoholic] trustees to Class A [non-alcoholic] trustees was changed to give Class B trustees a super-majority of two-thirds, rather than the previous simple majority. For 11 years, Bill W. had pursued this change, debating it endlessly at ten consecutive General Service Conferences. In a 1958 letter to Class A Trustee Harrison M. Trice, Bill outlined four reasons why he believed A.A. needed a majority of alcoholic trustees:

1. the increased press of work with which A.A. has no business saddling the nonalcoholic members;…
2. the increasing importance of proper determination of the A.A. policy and its administration, which the nonalcoholics have, wrongly, I think, disclaimed all ability to handle;…
3. the need for wider representation geographically of alcoholic trustees; and…
4. it is unsound psychologically for a movement of the present size and maturity to take a childish and fearful view that a majority of alcoholics cannot be trusted to sit on our most important board…

In 1977, at the 27th General Service Conference, at the Statler Hilton Hotel in New York City, the Conference approved Floor Action #3, which recommended that

    The publication of a facsimile of the first edition of the Big Book should not be undertaken, as it would destroy the sentimental value of the actual first edition.

Today in A.A. History—April 18–24

In 2021, the 71st General Service Conference was held online [right: Class A Trustee and A.A. Grapevine chair Michele Grinberg speaking from “the floor”]. With the COVID-19 pan­demic continuing into its second year, the Conference coordinators had time to prepare for the likelihood of an online format. Among the recommendations made during the Conference were:

• Change “men and women” in the Preamble to “people.”
• “A Fifth Edition of… Alcoholics Anonymous, be developed;…” “A Fourth Edition of… Alcohólicos Anónimos, be developed…”
• Revise Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions: on p. 117, replace “opposite sex” with “partner;” on p. 66, replace, “No one wants to be angry enough to murder, lustful enough to rape, gluttonous enough to ruin his health” with “No one wants to commit the deadly sins of anger, lust or gluttony.”
• On p. 12 of “Questions and Answers on Sponsorship,” change “… be of the same sex” to “… be avoided whenever a romantic entanglement might arise between sponsor and sponsee.”
• “A draft version of the book, Alcoholics Anonymous (Fourth Edition), be translated into plain and simple language…”
• Develop a process for polling the General Service Conference between annual meetings, enabling online discussion and debate, broader participation, and greater efficiency.
• Implement a three-year trial of “The Equitable Distribution of Workload Process… for the 72nd General Service Conference…”
• U.S./Canada General Service recognize online groups and encourage their participation, superseding a 1997 Advisory Action designating online groups as “International Correspondence Meetings.” Form a GSB committee to explore possibilities for participation of online groups in the U.S./Canada General Service structure.”
• Add guardianship of the Twelve Concepts to the Purpose statement of the Current Conference Charter, which already names the Twelve Steps and the Twelve Traditions.