Guide to the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America General Board Records

Descriptive Summary

Title

National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America General Board Records

Inclusive Dates

1950-1972

Call Number

NCC RG 3

Quantity

13.00 cubic feet (13 boxes)

Language

Materials in English

Restrictions on Access

Open for research

Repository

Presbyterian Historical Society, 425 Lombard Street, Philadelphia, PA 19147-1516 USA

Biographical Note / Administrative History

Administrative History

According to the 1963 revision of the NCC Constitution, "The governing body of the Council between meetings of the General Assembly shall be the General Board which shall have the full power of the Assembly except the power to amend the Constitution or to elect communions to constituent membership in the Council." (Art. VIII Sec. 1). The General Board was composed of representatives of member churches on a proportional basis and some of the members of the governing bodies of the various Divisions of the NCC, and certain other minor categories (see the section on membership in the constitution, Art. VIII Sec. 2 in the later versions). Meetings were held from twice to four times a year. One of the most important and time-consuming tasks of the General Board was the issuing of pronouncements on various issues and establishing procedures for the publication of statements by subordinate bodies of the NCC (see By-Laws, Art V Sec. 10).

The General Board had a number of committees under it, some on a permanent and others on a temporary basis. Three Standing Committees were constitutionally required to report to the General Assembly through the General Board. Namely, Constituent Membership, Constitution and By-Laws, and the Program and Arrangements Committee for the General Assembly. Other Standing Committees reported to the General Board alone. In the various versions of the By-Laws the number of Standing Committees varies from five to eleven. In this Record Group material from the Standing Committees follows the material from the General Board itself, and begins in Box 5. The Committees appear in the order they are given in the By-Laws (Art. VI). There is no material from the Legal Committee. Since the Committee of Ministry to Service Personnel was a functional committee later associated with a Joint Commission of the Council, its records are found with the Joint Commission. The Business and Finance Committee had subordinate committees reporting to it. Material is especially full for the Constitutions and By-Laws Committee, the Nominating Committee and the Policy and Strategy Committee. The records of the Nominating Committee include biographical data sheets on persons elected to the various bodies of the Council.

The General Board had the power to constitute other committees (By-Laws, Art. III). There were many of these, existing for varying lengths of time, some of them subordinate to existing committees. No effort is made to differentiate them, and they are filed alphabetically beginning in Box 10. Of general interest are the relatively complete files of the Committee of Ten on Headquarters Location, which proposed the establishment of the Inter-Church Center in New York, and the Task Force on Options, which proposed the radical restructuring of the Council after the turbulent Detroit General Assembly in 1969. Also of interest is the Committee on the Maintenance of American Freedom, which in the early Fifties struggled with the issues of Communism and anti-Communism and proposed that an ideological test for employment on the NCC staff be applied. The General Board did not adopt this proposal.

In the restructuring of 1972 the functions of the General Board and those of the General Assembly were merged in a very large Governing Board which meets semi-annually.

Collection Overview

The degree of completeness of the materials in this Record Group varies widely from one body to another. The General Board's Minutes for 1967, 1971 and 1972 are missing, as are the Nominating Committee Minutes for 1960 and 1963. Some committees are represented only by a few items from a single year.

Administrative Information

Processing Information

The archives of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America were processed in 1980-1984 through two grants awarded to the Presbyterian Historical Society by the National Endowment for the Humanities. Work under the first grant was performed by Dr. Alan Thomson and under the second grant by Donald L. Haggerty.

The archives of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America have been dated from 1950 to 1972; however, there is material dating from before and after this time period. Documents from the predecessor organizations date from as early as 1839. There is also a small amount of material found in the files from as late as 1975. The year 1972 was selected as a cutoff date for the archives because of the major reorganization which the NCC underwent at this time. The archives are arranged in the following record groups:

NCC RG 1: Planning Committee for the NCC, 1941-1951
NCC RG 2: General Assemblies, 1952-1972
NCC RG 3: General Board, 1950-1972
NCC RG 4: General Secretary, 1950-1973
NCC RG 5: Deputy General Secretary, 1947-1975
NCC RG 6: Division of Christian Life and Mission, 1945-1973
NCC RG 7: Division of Home Missions, 1950-1964
NCC RG 8: Division of Overseas Ministries, 1914-1972
NCC RG 9: Division of Christian Education, 1897-1974
NCC RG 10: Division of Christian Unity, 1935-1973
NCC RG 11: Office of Administration, 1938-1973
NCC RG 12: Assistant General Secretary for Executive Operations, 1950-1966
NCC RG 13: Washington Office, 1951-1966
NCC RG 14: Office of Planning and Program, 1943-1973
NCC RG 15: Department of Information, 1951-1974
NCC RG 16: Broadcasting and Film Commission, 1923-1974
NCC RG 17: Special Topics, 1951-1970
NCC RG 18: Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America, 1894-1952
NCC RG 19: International Council of Religious Education, 1839-1953
NCC RG 20: Missionary Education Movement of the United States and Canada, 1901-1952
NCC RG 21: National Protestant Council of Higher Education, 1911-1951
NCC RG 22: United Stewardship Council, 1917-1950
NCC RG 23: Inter-Council Field Department, 1935-1950
NCC RG 24: Association of Council Secretaries, 1915-1971
NCC RG 25: Church Executive Development Board, 1960-1974
NCC RG 26: Home Missions Council of North America, 1903-1951
NCC RG 27: Foreign Missions Conference of North America, 1887-1951
NCC RG 28: Scrapbooks, 1915-1963

Catalog Note
In the society's electronic catalog, all 28 NCC record groups are cataloged together as the records of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America.

Collection Inventory

Box	Folder	Description

1	1	Guide to NCC RG 3
1	2	NCC General Board (GB): Minutes, 1950-1951
1	3	Dockets, 1951
1	4	GB Minutes, 1952
1	5	Dockets, 1952
1	6	Dockets, 1952
1	7	GB Minutes, 1953
1	8	Dockets, Jan.-March, 1953
1	9	Material for Meetings, May-Nov. 1953
1	10	GB Minutes, 1954
1	11	Dockets, 1954
1	12	Dockets, 1954
1	13	Dockets, 1954
1	14	GB Minutes, 1955
1	15	Dockets, 1955
1	16	Dockets, 1955

2	1	GB Minutes, 1956
2	2	Dockets, 1956
2	3	Dockets, 1956
2	4	GB Minutes, 1957
2	5	Dockets, 1957
2	6	Dockets, 1957
2	7	Dockets, 1957
2	8	GB Minutes, 1958
2	9	Dockets, 1958
2	10	Dockets, 1958
2	11	GB Minutes, 1959
2	12	Dockets, 1959
2	13	GB Minutes, 1960
2	14	Dockets, 1960
2	15	Dockets, 1960
2	16	GB Minutes, 1961-1962

3	1	Dockets, 1961
3	2	Dockets, 1961
3	3	Docket, GB Meeting, Feb. 1962
3	4	Docket, GB Meeting, Feb. 1962
3	5	Docket, GB Meeting, June, 1962
3	6	Docket, GB Meeting, Dec. 1962
3	7	GB Minutes, 1963
3	8	Material for GB Meetings, Nov & Dec, 1963
3	9	Material for GB Meetings, Oct. 1963
3	10	Docket, GB Meeting, June 1963
3	11	Docket, GB Meeting, Feb. 1963
3	12	Docket, GB Meeting, Feb. 1963
3	13	GB Committees, 1963-1966
3	14	Gen. Secretary's Reports to GB, 1955-1963
3	15	Gen. Secretary's Reports to GB, 1955-1963, including “Twelve Years in Retrospect”

4	1	GB Minutes, 1964
4	2	Docket, GB Meeting, Dec. 1964
4	3	GB Minutes, 1965
4	4	GB Minutes, 1966
4	5	Members of GB and GB Committees, 1966-1969
4	6	Material for GB Meetings, 1967
4	7	GB Minutes, 1968
4	8	Material for GB Meetings, 1968
4	9	GB Minutes, 1969
4	10	Materials for GB Meetings, 1969 (includes NCC Constitution, By-Laws, and Standing Rules)
4	11	Materials for GB Meetings, 1969
4	12	GB Executive Committee Meetings, 1969
4	13	GB Minutes, 1970
4	14	Materials for GB Meetings, 1970
4	15	Materials for GB Meetings, 1970
4	16	Materials for GB Meetings, 1971 (includes minutes for June and Sept. meetings)
4	17	Materials for GB Meetings, 1972
4	18	General Assembly and GB Actions, 1950-1960
4	19	General Assembly and GB Actions, 1950-1960
4	20	General Assembly and GB Actions, 1950-1960

5	1	General Assembly and GB Actions, 1950-1960
5	2	General Assembly and GB Actions, 1950-1960
5	3	GB Resolutions and Policy Statements, 1963-1967; 1972
5	4	Constituent Membership Committee: Minutes, 1956-1957
5	5	Membership of Cumberland Presbyterian Church in NCC, 1965-1968
5	6	Committee Matters, 1963-1972
5	7	Constitution and By-Laws Committee: Minutes, 1951-1953
5	8	Minutes, 1954-1960
5	9	Reports to GB, Jan.-Sept. 1952
5	10	Reports to GB, Dec. 1952-1955
5	11	Reference Materials, 1953-1954
5	12	Reference Materials, 1955-1957
5	13	Reference Materials, 1955-1957
5	14	Reference Materials, 1957-1960
5	15	Reference Materials, 1957-1960
5	16	Files of By-Laws, 1960-1963
5	17	By-Laws: Division of Christian Life and Work

6	1	By-Laws: Div. of Foreign Missions; Div. of Home Missions
6	2	By-Laws: Central Departments, etc.
6	3	Committee Files, 1964-1966
6	4	Drafts of Revised Constitution, 1963-1965
6	5	Drafts of Revised By-Laws, 1963-1965
6	6	Drafts of Revised By-Laws, 1963-1965
6	7	Drafts of Revised By-Laws, 1963-1965
6	8	Program & Arrangements Committee for the General Assembly: Minutes, 1952-1954; 1959
6	9	Business and Finance Committee: Minutes, 1951-1956
6	10	Business and Finance Committee, Minutes, 1957-1959
6	11	Material for Meetings, 1953-1955
6	12	Material for Meetings, 1953-1955
6	13	Material for Meetings, 1951-1952
6	14	Material for Meetings, 1951-1952
6	15	Executive Committee Reference Files, 1951-1952

7	1	Executive Committee Reference Files, 1951-1952
7	2	Committees Reporting to Business and Finance Committee: Accounting and Auditing Committee, Membership Matters, 1963-1964
7	3	Investment Committee, Membership Matters, 1963-1964
7	4	Nominating Committee: Reports to GB, 1951-1955
7	5	Nominating Committee: Reports to GB, 1951-1955
7	6	Nominating Committee Records, 1951-1952
7	7	Nominating Committee Records, 1951-1952
7	8	Nominating Committee, Minutes & Reports, 1956-1959
7	9	Nominating Committee: Verbatim Minutes, Jan.-May 1960
7	10	Nominating Committee Materials, 1960-1962
7	11	Nominating Committee Materials, 1963-1964
7	12	Nominating Committee Materials, 1965
7	13	Nominating Committee Materials, 1966
7	14	Nominating Committee Materials, 1967
7	15	Nominating Committee Materials, 1968
7	16	Nominating Committee Materials, 1969

8	1	Nominating Committee Materials, 1969
8	2	Nominating Committee Materials, 1970
8	3	Nominating Committee Materials, 1970
8	4	Nominating Committee Materials, 1971
8	5	Nominating Committee Materials, 1972
8	6	Nominating Committee Procedures, 1961-1967
8	7	Nominating Committee Procedures, 1968-1972
8	8	Nominations to Governing Board, 1972
8	9	GB Attendance Record, 1955-1966
8	10	Denominational Membership & Allocation Figures, 1971
8	11	Biographical Information Forms on Members of Boards & Committees - A
8	12	Biographical Information Forms - B
8	13	Biographical Information Forms - C
8	14	Biographical Information Forms - D
8	15	Biographical Information Forms - E, F
8	16	Biographical Information Forms - G
8	17	Biographical Information Forms - H
8	18	Biographical Information Forms - I, J, K
8	19	Biographical Information Forms - L
8	20	Biographical Information Forms - M
8	21	Biographical Information Forms - N, O
8	22	Biographical Information Forms - P
8	23	Biographical Information Forms - R

9	1	Biographical Information Forms - S
9	2	Biographical Information Forms - T, U, V
9	3	Biographical Forms - W-Z
9	4	Personnel Committee, 1951-1956; 1963-1964; 1967-1970
9	5	Committee on Program & Field Operations, 1954-1964
9	6	Public Interpretation Committee, 1963-1964
9	7	Policy & Strategy Committee: Minutes, 1953-1954
9	8	Minutes, 1955-1957
9	9	Minutes, 1958-1961
9	10	Minutes, 1962-1964
9	11	Actions Taken by Committee on Policy & Strategy (arranged alphabetically), with Index, A-C
9	12	Actions, D-G
9	13	Actions, H-P
9	14	Actions, R-W
9	15	Committee Papers, 1953-1954
9	16	Committee Papers, 1955
9	17	Committee Papers, 1956

10	1	Committee Papers, 1957
10	2	Committee Papers, 1958
10	3	Committee Papers, 1959
10	4	Committee Papers, 1960
10	5	Committee Papers, 1960
10	6	Committee Papers, 1961
10	7	Committee Papers, 1961
10	8	Committee Papers, 1962
10	9	Committee Papers, 1962
10	10	Committee Papers, 1963
10	11	Committee Papers, 1964
10	12	Committee Papers, 1964
10	13	Committee of Reference, March 1952-June 1953
10	14	Committee on Appraisal of Programs & Budgets, 1952-1953
10	15	Committee on Appraisal of Programs & Budgets, 1952-1953
10	16	British-American Preachers Exchange, 1963-1964

11	1	Committee of Ten on Headquarters Location: Roster; Correspondence, Nov.-Dec. 1954
11	2	Recommendations to GB, Sept. 1954
11	3	"The Case for New York", 1954
11	4	Reports to General Board, 1954
11	5	"Barry-Kincheloe Report", 1954
11	6	Committee Meeting, July 1954
11	7	Correspondence, April-May 1954
11	8	Minutes, March-May 1954
11	9	Meeting with Denominational Representatives, March 1954
11	10	Correspondence, Jan.-March 1954
11	11	Letters Favoring Columbus, Ohio, 1954
11	12	Letters Favoring Other Locations, 1954
11	13	Minutes, 1951-1953
11	14	Committee Meetings, March & September, 1953
11	15	Correspondence, 1953
11	16	Meetings with Denominational Leaders, 1953
11	17	Miscellaneous Documents, 1953
11	18	Meetings with Denominational Leaders, 1952
11	19	Committee Meetings, 1952
11	20	General Correspondence, 1952
11	21	Meetings, Nov. 1951
11	22	Cities Bidding for NCC Headquarters Location, 1951-1952
11	23	General Correspondence, 1951
11	24	General Correspondence, 1950
11	25	Correspondence, 1946-1949
11	26	Joint Committee on Relations between NCC & US Conf. for WCC, 1963-1964
11	27	Planning and Program Committee: Minutes & Material, 1965-1967

12	1	Planning & Program Committee: Minutes & Material, 1968-1971
12	2	Special Committee on Policy Statements, 1966
12	3	Committee on Procedures for dealing with Statements Involving Technical Problems, Nov. 1951-March 1952; n.d.
12	4	Special Committee on Structure & Function Papers, 1961
12	5	Committee Papers, 1962
12	6	Committee Papers, 1963
12	7	Committee Papers, 1963
12	8	Committee Papers, 1964
12	9	Committee Papers, 1964
12	10	Committee Papers, 1966
12	11	Subcommittee on Program Needs (Structure & Function)
12	12	Study & Adjustment Committee: Minutes, 1956; 1957; 1959
12	13	Committee Material, 1954
12	14	Committee Materials, 1953
12	15	Task Force on Options Confronting the Council: Papers, Jan.-March 1970
12	16	Committee Papers, March-June 1970
12	17	Committee Papers, March-June, 1970

13	1	Committee Papers, June-Sept. 1970
13	2	Committee Papers, June-Sept. 1970
13	3	Committee Papers, Sept. 1970-Feb. 1971
13	4	Committee Papers, Sept. 1970-Feb., 1971
13	5	Committees, Miscellaneous, Dec. 1950-Sept. 1954; n.d.
13	6	Denominational Support Committee, April-Oct. 1952; n.d.
13	7	Educational Program Committee, Nov. 1951-Jan. 1952
13	8	Message for the General Assembly, Committee on, Sept. 1952-Jan. 1954
13	9	Policy and Procedure Committee, May 1953-Sept. 1954
13	10	Program and Arrangements for the General Assembly, Nov. 1951-March 1954
13	11	Recognition of Services Committee (Cavert, Samuel M.), Nov. 1953-March 1954
13	12	Reorganization of Joint Department of Religious Liberty, Nov. 1952-Jan. 1953; n.d.
13	13	Status of Women in the Churches Committee, Sept.-Dec. 1953

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Guide to the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America General Board Records