Verhovayak Lapja, 1951 (34. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1951 / Verhovay Journal
PAGE 4 Verhovay Journal February 21, 1951 Verhovay Journal Journal of the Verhovay Fraternal Insurance Ass'n. OFFICE OF PUBLICATION 7907 West Jefferson Ave. Detroit 17, Mich. PUBLISHED MONTHLY BY THE Verhovay Fraternal Insurance Association Managing Editor: JOHN BENCZE Editor: JOHN SABO Editor’s Office: 436—442 FOURTH AVENUE PITTSBURGH 19, PA. Telephone: COurt 1-3454 or 1-3455 All articles and changes of address should be sent to the VERHOVAY FRATERNAL INSURANCE ASSOCIATION 436—442 FOURTH AVENUE PITTSBURGH 19, PA. SUBSCRIPTION RATES: United States and Canada ....................................... $1.00 a year Foreign Countries ....................................................... $1.50 a year Entered as Second Class Matter at the Post Office at Detroit, Michigan under the Act of March 8, 1879. OFFICIAL COMMENT THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS, THE NATIONAL OFFICERS AND THE SHIP OF STATE Did it ever occur to you that your membership in the Verhovay Fraternal Insurance Association makes you not only the insured but also the insurer? We fraternalists enjoy the benefits / offered by our society and at the same time have the privilege of administering our affairs. We work together as one large family, not for profit, but for the best possible protection at the lowest possible cost. Our society has close to sixty thousand members. It is inconceivable that all these members actually operate the society. Therefore we operate under a representative form of government. Each branch with at least 25 members elects a delegate to the District Sessions at which sessions the national delegates are elected to the National Convention which is held every four years. The National Convention is our supreme governing body, and the national delegates represent the sixty thousand members as the insurers. It is their duty to review the record of the society for the last four years and to chart a course for the next four years. One of the most important duties is the review of the By-Laws for the sake of necessary modifications. It is at the National Convention that many changes required as a result of new rulings and requirements of the insurance departments and the changing, economy are made. The modifications to the By-Laws are based on the conditions existing at the time of the Convention. It is quite possible that in the four year period after the convention some unforeseen development for which the convention did not make provision could arise. Naturally, this is not the fault of anyone because we are not prophets, consequently we cannot foretell events. Before the delegates adjourn, however, they elect a Board of Directors from among the delegates who meet twice a year to review the course followed by the Association for the last six months and to make certain that the course will be successfully followed for the next six months. They also are assigned the task of dealing with developments which could not be foreseen at the time of the convention. The delegates also elect officers who administer the ship-of-state (the Society) on a full-time basis. These men are at the helm of the ship every moment, and they must periodically report to the Board of Directors how the ship of state is sailing. It is the duty of the Board of Directors and the National Officers to see to it that the ship of state has a successful voyage and that the port of destination, the next National Convention, is safely reached. If any unforeseen- development occurs and the By-Laws adopted at) the convention does not provide for the safe passage of the ship through the unforeseen troubled waters it is ever more the duty of the Board of Directors and the National Officers to see to it that the ship of state continues calling forward successfully. In an emergency the Board of Directors can take whatever steps they find necessary — even changing or adding to the By-Laws — to safeguard the Association. The most important thing is the safety of the ship and the members sailing on the ship. Digressing for a moment let us cite the following parable. A large ocean liner carrying thousands of passengers embarked from the United States for a port of debarkation somewhere in Europe. When the ship started its voyage everything was checked and provided for. In the middle of the Atl?/ntic news of unexpected impending danger was received. If the course previously laid out at the start of the voyage were followed the ship would run into such a terrific storm that the safety of the ship and her passengers would be at stake. The situation required emergency action so the officers agreed with the Captain that the course of the ship would have to be changed at once, this despite the fact that at the start of the voyage a certain route was mapped out and of which route the passengers had full knowledge. The primary thing was the safety of the ship and her passengers. The course was changed and the ship safely sailed around the storm and thereafter proceeded back to her regular course for the successful completion of her voyage. This emergency action, saved the ship and her passengers. If the officers would have foolishly decided to stay on the course because that was the course that was laid out at the beginning of the voyage they would have sailed right into the midst of the terrific storm and would have needlessly risked the safety of the ship and the passengers. Who from among the passengers would have been foolish enough to run to the Captain or any of the other officers of the ship to complain that his rights as a passenger were being violated because the ticket he purchased called for a pre-established course? You can rest assured that not one such passenger would have been found aboard that ship! Recently in our Association some question of fear has crept into the minds of a few of our members about the course followed by our ship of state — our society. There are a few7 members who have doubted that the Board of Directors had the authority to create a position of Field Manager, a position of much responsibility and a position which requires a lot of traveling. These members insist that the Board had no right to create such a position because it was not provided for in the By-Laws adopted at the National Convention of 1947. As the insurers, should we members deny to our Board of Directors the right to make changes when changes are absolutely required? Would it be to our, the insureds’ interests, to seek passage on a ship whose officers had their hands tied and who as a result could not guarantee our safety? Most assuredly as insurers and insureds we should insist and do insist that the hands of the men who operate our society be not tied. The men who are today at the helm of the ship were elected to those positions by our delegates and they have the confidence of the majority of the delegates and the members, and they know v/hat is best for the members. The Association should long ago have created the position of Field Manager — Chief Organizer. Every successful insurance organization has had such a position for many years. In today’s highly competitive insurance field it is absolutely necessary to have a qualified insurance expert head the field promotion program. The job of setting up a capable and trained field force who will secure for us, as the insurers, the necessary number of new members each year and who will do a good job in retaining the members already on the rolls is a big one and it requires a qualified insurance man who can devote all of his time to the job. It is a job which requires a man' with insurance ability, salesmanship, diplomacy, endurance, aggressiveness and general know-how. We know that we now have that man in Henry F. W. Rettmann. It is unfortunate that previously the duties of a field organizer were assigned to the National President because we all know how burdened a National President can be with his official duties. To properly fulfill his duties as National President and at the same time properly take care of the duties of a Field Organizer is impossible and it was with this in mind that National President John Bencze requested the Board of Directors to create the much-needed position of Field Manager. He realized that for the good of the Association a full-time qualified insurance man would be necessary to head the Promotion Department. Like in the parable above written the Board of Directors at the request of the National President took this emergency step and we believe that the future years w’ill reveal how wise it was for the Board of Directors to do so. Another question in the minds of some of our members is the one pertaining to the appointment of full-time field men to head organizing districts made up of one, two or more branches. Some of these members state outright that the Board of Directors and the National Officers had no right to create such districts and had no right to appoint full-time men to them. For the record’s sake, and for the easing of the minds of those few members, we emphatically inform our members that the delegates at the last National Convention did give the Board of Directors the right to form organizing districts and it further gave them the right to appoint branch-approved full-time men to head these districts — (see Amendment section 21-B, page 11 of Amendments) . The Board of Directors realized that in order to get cap(Continued on page 5)
