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More
Than one Club in a Community?
Yes!
Says
Stanley Leverton
Past
President, Rotary Club of London, England
Return to London #50
 I AM in entire agreement
with the formation of more than one Rotary Club in a large community,
but I am unalterably opposed to breaking up any large Club to gain that
end. To interfere with the size, the prestige, and the collective
strength of the large and influential Clubs, which have contributed so
much to Rotary's success, would be seriously to weaken our movement.
But we want to extend
our Rotary fellowship further; we want more Clubs and more Rotarians.
Thus let us prepare to amend the Constitution of Rotary International to
permit the formation of additional Clubs in large cities without
interfering with the existing territory or membership rights of the
Rotary Clubs already founded therein.
Now this is a new
thought. If realized, it would create a new situation: a large Club
operating in an area within which other Clubs would be functioning, each
of the latter, however, possessing its own definite territorial limits.
Simply a practical and useful method of employing territory to its
greatest advantage. Surely the happy sharing of the potentialities which
any territory might hold for Rotary is in strict accordance with the
Rotary spirit. But I shall be told that this plan would create two kinds
of Rotary Clubs and two kinds of Rotarians. Frankly, I do not believe
it. Yes, here and there one might find a Rotarian who would flatter
himself upon belonging to the founder Club rather than one of the
younger clubs in his town. But his kind would be rare. Certainly the
progress of Rotary must not be checked on his account.
Adopted, the plan would
give present members a choice of remaining in the founder Club or
joining one of the additional Clubs. Many would remain, and so you would
have members in the original Club coming from areas in which new Clubs
had been formed. That is just what has happened, in fact, in London, and
the procedure has never given the slightest difficulty at any time
during its 15 years of existence.
Today, when there is a
classification vacant in the Big Town Club and two or more excellent men
are anxious to fill it, one is elected and the others rejected The
rejected are kept out of Rotary, perhaps for all time? Tomorrow, under
this plan, they would have the opportunity of joining a daughter Club
established in the locality wherein their businesses are situated.
Indeed, the plan would admit many thousands of excellent men into our
movement who at the moment must be kept out—men for whom Rotary has
great need today. At the same time it would keep Rotary's dominating and
vital feature, the single-classification principle, in any given Club.
The very usefulness of
Rotary in a big town will be materially increased under this plan. If a
Club has done good community or social work already, how much greater
can that work become if the parent Club can call to its aid certain of
its children who have set up homes of their own in other parts of that
town. Each Club would be an entirely self-contained and
self-administrated unit, however, and such joint action can be temporary
or permanent according to local desires.
The same argument
applies to Vocational Service Work. For ten years I was the only
representative of my classification in Rotary out of a population of
8~/2 million. Today there are nearly 40 of us. These men are no longer
my competitors in business; they are my friends in Rotary—and
collectively in our professional organization, believe me, we count for
something.
I do not blame the big
Clubs if they refuse to let go until they are satisfied that the Club,
which they have taken such pains to build, will remain unmolested. But I
sincerely believe their opposition will disappear if they can be shown a
plan that would not interfere with their prestige and their territory.
The plan proposed here leaves them alone. They could carry on as at
present. |
Although extension in
London has proceeded in a different manner from that suggested here, it
has achieved the same end–and has been a success from every point of
view. It is that fact, no doubt, which has led the London Club to
endorse the opinion stated here. Today we have 65 healthy Rotary Clubs
embracing 3,000 members in the London area, and I believe that the
success, which London has found, could be shared by many other large
towns. A start could be made in towns with a population of, say, half a
million. How many such are there in the United States? These towns have
one Club only–one Club in a town of 500,000 people! In how many towns of
10,000 people–or even of 1,000 or 500 people–are there excellent Rotary
Clubs? And a large number of towns have over half a million; but each
has only one Rotary Club. Suburbs of some of these cities have their own
Rotary Clubs, but, even so, there remains an enormous territory and
population that has but one Club.
Now, am I unreasonable
when I say that Rotary is not enjoying a fair deal in these large
cities? Rotary has given members of these big Clubs much happiness and
has made their lives richer. Now in a spirit of unselfishness, they can
make it possible for hundreds more in their respective cities to join
their ranks and participate in that joy. But some will say, "It will
make Rotary cheap." Things of real worth can never be made cheap,
however much you multiply them.
Do not be led away by
the claim that all the "big men" would want to join the founder
Club–they wouldn't. If a man's activities are mostly in one part of a
large town, be they business, civic, or social, that man will
invariably, if he has the option, join the Club in that part wherein his
interests lie, where his friends congregate, and where he will find the
greatest measure of good fellowship. We have many men of outstanding
qualities in the Clubs of Greater London who would not join the London
Club even if they were given the opportunity.
The Constitutional
change necessary to effect this proposal would be a relatively simple
matter, requiring an amendment of Article IV, Section 2, which defines
the "location" of a Rotary Club. And details and difficulties which may
never arise are hardly worth any worry. Rotary demands larger
representation in large cities throughout-the world than it has at
present. I believe that somewhere down this avenue of thought will be
found the solution of a very difficult problem. It may well be that,
when men have given further consideration to this matter of the
development of Rotary in our large towns, a better plan than this can be
evolved. If so, I shall be the first to lift my hat to the man who
thinks of it. But I do most strongly hold the view that some real effort
must be made to give the large towns a fairer deal.
If the London Club had
not made such an effort in the past, we should today be the only Rotary
Club serving a population as large as the whole of Canada. That would
have been unfair to London–and unfair to Rotary.
 Leverton
and his three Rotary sons from the September 1960 issue of
The Rotarian.
Wolfgang Ziegler |
