90 Leadership CONGRESS OF DELEGATES For the first 10 years of its existence, ACOFP was governed by an executive committee and a Board of Governors representing various regions of the country. (For more information, see “Our Founders and Early Leaders,” in Chapter 1, page 5.) By the late 1950s, many of the affiliate societies were growing larger, and the need for dialogue and consensus among the various societies was becoming vital. ACOFP needed more than an executive branch and a constitution to do the business of the corporation. The leaders believed the most logical approach would be to form a legislative body that could represent the delegated powers of the membership and the chartered state societies. The Committee on Bylaws and Manual of Procedure was charged with consulting with AOA legal counsel Milton McKay, Esq., to formulate changes to the constitution and bylaws that would create this representative body of ACOFP. This committee was made up of J. R. Forbes, DO, FACOFP, chair, Lester. A. Nowlin, DO, FACOFP, and Albert. J. Schramm, DO, who was both an ACOFP member and the newly appointed ACOFP executive secretary. On June 11, 1960, the committee members filed a report to the membership, the Board of Governors, and the AOA containing the changes that would create the Congress of Delegates. The name Congress of Delegates was intentionally selected to avoid confusion with the governing body of the American Osteopathic Association, known as the House of Delegates. Much of the organizational structure and meeting protocols of this newly created governing body would mirror that of the AOA House of Delegates. Included with the committee’s letter to the AOA attorney was a request to amend ACOFP’s constitution and bylaws to reflect the needed changes to begin operations of this most important representative body. These changes are listed below. A. The Congress of Delegates shall be the legislative body of the college, shall represent the delegated powers of the membership and of the chartered state societies in the affairs of this college, and shall perform such other functions as are defined by the bylaws. B. The Congress of Delegates shall consist of delegates elected by the chartered state societies, ACOFP and other authorized units, and such other members as provided by the bylaws, but only the delegates of chartered state societies shall have the power to vote. The president of each said state society shall head the delegates of his/her state society. Each said state society shall be entitled to one delegate (the president or successor) and one delegate for every 30 (or fraction of Members of the Florida delegation at the ACOFP Congress of Delegates.
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