Bill W. at the International Convention – 1950

Good afternoon, and welcome. Could I ask that we all join in a moment of silent prayer, and would you all rise please? This is the A.A. conference meeting. In opening it, I should like to read the definition so ably given on the second page inside the cover of our monthly publication, The Grapevine. Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength, and hope with each other that they may solve their common drinking problem and help others to recover from alcoholism. The only requirement for membership is an honest desire to stop drinking. AA has no dues or fees. It is not allied with any sect, denomination, politics, organization, or institution. It does not wish to engage in any controversy, neither endorses nor opposes any cause. Our primary purpose is to stay sober and help other alcoholics to achieve sobriety. The AA program is incorporated into 12 steps. the AA Book of Experience, Alcoholics Anonymous and other literature including The Twelve Points of Tradition If there are any members of the press present could we again ask their cooperation in respecting one of our most important traditions that of anonymity And a little note as a reminder please no smoking inside the auditorium. Thank you for cooperating. You will hear this afternoon from several members of Alcoholics Anonymous from varying points throughout this country. Each will discuss two of the traditions, briefly and simply, and thereafter a summation of the proceedings. Could I therefore at this time introduce our first speaker who will discuss Traditions 1 and 2, Owen from Dallas, Texas. Good evening, everybody. First, I'll read the first tradition. Our common welfare should come first. Personal recovery depends upon AA unity. I couldn't help but think just a second ago when I was going through a little moment of silent meditation how different it was maybe four and a half years ago when i first came into AA. How different my little meditation was just that second ago. How I offered up a little quickie that this convention would be good for everybody, that everybody would take home with them the message that it intended for them to get. In other words, I was thinking of everybody and how different that was out of my moment of meditation of maybe four and a half years ago When I first came into AA, and believe me, I can't help but feel like that might be a weakness of maybe all of us. We did send up priors of all descriptions, most of them rather hollow, but maybe we asked for a little bit more just for ourselves. The AA tradition, as I understand number one, is that Alcoholics Anonymous be all question of a doubt must be number one because without it you and I certainly wouldn't be here and certainly not in attendance at this fine convention. We are only a part. We must forget our big I's. We must forgive everything, but that AA must be given a green light and AA must be assisted. And we must be, as I see it, a little bit jealous of what Alcoholics Anonymous and what Alcoholics As A Group, each of our groups mean to us as a whole. We must forever keep it simple. We must keep it clean and unorganized and fair to every member. Number two, for our group purpose there is but one ultimate authority, a loving God as he may express himself in our group conscience. Our leaders are but trusted servants. They do not govern. We all know that there are no big shots in AA. We all now that each of us, as a member of AA, understands AA in his own way. We come to Cleveland and I have seen a lot of people that I admire with their long years of sobriety. I do like to see their grace and their ease in the manner in which they conduct themselves. if I don't watch myself, I will become maybe a little bit jealous of a lot of them. That is not the AA way. Rather, I respect them and I'm glad to see such fine guys and girls that came in ahead of me and paved the way for this thing that I know is my salvation today. Number one, Alcoholics Anonymous, and then I'll put myself in there. I'll get what I can out of the program, always keeping in mind that if I don't put AlcoholicsAnonymous first, that if i do not listen and heed well to those that have made a success, a personal success out of the way in which they handled the AA program, then I have urged some place. I want Alcoholics Anonymous to always be number one in my life. And a long time ago, it wasn't. Thank you very much. Thank you, Olin. for our second speaker, who will discuss Tradition 3 and 4, Dick from Cleveland, Ohio. Good afternoon, folks. Traditions are the result of experience, are the results of habits and precedents. They're historic. Traditions are the end result of what has proceeded, which in the long run prescribes future conduct. And my assignment is just that three recalls some of the earlier days in AA when we find And here established a tradition which says the only requirement for AA membership is a desire to stop drinking when, at the outset, there was great curiosity as to whether men who had been approached and had decided to come along were eligible for membership. In many cases, committees were formed to look the brother over and see if he qualified, see if she was eligible. After which he would probably in rare cases, which has been true, was put on a probationary period for some time. After he had matriculated, gone through the primary classes and then been able to recite his lessons, he was then given a badge or a grip. In AA, and just in passing, sometimes it would be a good idea for some of the elder statesmen to stop and ponder whether they could have passed the test they were imposing on other people. Probably not. Today, the only requirement for membership in AA, which has been established through precedent and historical endeavors, lies wholly and solely within himself or herself. If one wants to join a lodge or a club, they go there with an affirmation of the fact that they want to join. Certainly, who are we to question a man or woman who comes to us with probably one of the most destructive habits on earth and asks our help by merely signifying that he too wants to go along with us? Thus, I think that tradition number three is not hours to question, but to welcome. Number four says each group should be autonomous, except in matters affecting other groups of AA as a whole. Rather, in Cleveland we have had autonomy. Some years ago some efforts were made there to propose the opening of downtown Central Austin, which meant bringing that idea before the entire membership for approval and, incidentally, a little money. And the gentleman who was trying his best to spread the cause was denied the privilege of talking to his fellow members in several of the Cleveland groups. Now there is autonomy. The printed material was prepared. Some of the groups would not allow it displayed or to be given to their followers. There's autonomy. But nevertheless, again, small measure of history was being born weren't, because the very epitome of economic peace, could not prevent their members from interchanging. Not a word got around any of them. And the office was opened, and it served seven successful years. It performed a tremendously vital service here in Cleveland. You see, the activity was for all of Cleveland. A few members decided it shouldn't be, but the will of the entire membership finally was felt and heard and resulted in a successful endeavor. Now everything that has gone before which has created everything we do, this meeting every other meeting. Everything we do is based on some precedent by now, 15 years' worth. Hence, perhaps we are ready to recognize that traditions have become habit. Thank you, Dick And now to discuss the fifth and sixth traditions Gene from Toledo, Ohio Mr. Chairman and friends I will read first The fifth tradition. Each group has but one primary purpose, to carry its message to the alcoholic who still suffers. Well, of course, the message referred to here, as you know, is the message of our program of recovery, the 12 Steps of AA. The Twelve Steps contain the substance of Alcoholics Anonymous, the spirit of Alcoholic Anonymous. Perhaps what we are discussing this afternoon has more to do with the form than the substance. But as you know, in all human endeavors, it is necessary to have a vehicle, an instrumentality, an organism of some sort through which an activity, particularly one of a spiritual nature, may be conveyed. You know they played a trick on me this afternoon and told me that I was restricted to five minutes, and I would say that that's a hell of a trick to play on a lawyer. Especially when we're all talking, even after 15 years, about a subject on which none of us profess to be authorities. I'm reminded a little of the story I heard the other day about the weekly meeting of the Boy Scout Troop, in which the boys were to report on their good seats for the week, and one of them got up before the scoutmaster, and he said, Johnny and Phil and Terry and I helped an old lady across the street. The scoutmaster said, well, how come it took three of you? Well, Johnny said the old lady didn't want to go. And perhaps That is quite apropos of what we are discussing here. I remember in my early reading of the big book, something stood out in Bill's story about the destruction of self-centeredness, the abnegation of self, which he found necessary in order to recover from alcoholism, and which the good Dr. Silkworth said he tried to bring about, the change he triedto bring about in those who came to him. And so I'm suggesting this afternoon, in my view of the subject of the traditions and particularly this one, that each of us individually and each ofus in our groups must stand ready to renounce self to be willing to abandon that which seems to be fallacious and which might be detrimental to the greater good of all. Each group has but one primary purpose to carry its message to the alcoholic who still suffers. Well, you ask me what other purpose could there be? Well, we all know very well the seductive detours that may be offered to any AA group. There are many ramifications of AA, many of which have merit. For instance, the cultivation of social life and activity in itself is a laudable thing. We have long since had our customs, you might say, of anniversaries, perhaps group anniversities, summer picnics. And in our own community we have AA's frolic and fun of all decent kind. But I think we can recognize that that phase of our activity might be overemphasized. A group, a particular group, might very well gain a reputation as a bunch of good fellows who throw good parties. But wouldn't it be a better test of the success of that group to measure their growth in alcoholic souls that are helped toward recovery through the activity of that groups? Sometimes I think the word spiritual is misleading to some of us in AA. We treat it as synonymous with the word religious, and I don't believe it is. I'm merely suggesting it's my opinion that we would have a better understanding of the word Spiritual if we were to apply it to everyday life. There are positive, good spiritual characteristics, and there our negative ones. In our own circles, we'll speak of someone as being, there's a fellow who's loyal. There's a fella who's devoted. There is a man who's energetic. Of a soldier, he's a brave man. Of worker, he's industrious. He's on the job. He capable. And all of those adjectives that I have used denotes and connotes spiritual qualities. The opposite of those things we all know. They may be vices, they may be even some of the deadly sins. And so I think when we speak of our groups as being spiritual entities, we can understand them better in that light when we say that the only excuse the group has for its existence, for its continued operation, and the only measure of its effectiveness is carrying the message. And the message is the content and the understanding of the 12 steps of recovery. On the sixth tradition, which I will read, an AA group ought never endorse, finance, or lend the AA name to any related facility or outside enterprise. let problems of money, property, and prestige divert us from our primary spiritual aim. Well, there again I speak of those green pastures that are so tempting. What are these diversionary activities? Well, I can mention a few of them which are obvious, and they would be hospitals, for instance, Clubs, drying out places, educational enterprise, literature perhaps, the authorship of literature. All of these things again may be offshoots of the growth of knowledge and the eagerness for public information about this problem with which we deal. I can recall in our own community, seven years ago, we had no facilities whatever for hospitalization. Rarely some individual might be taken to a general hospital because his doctor was on the staff there and had an in. But for the ordinary run-of-mind junk, there was just no place we could take him except into our homes. And I remember in one stage of our development, we had, one of our members had a friend who was manager of a fairly good hotel in Toledo. And they were very generous with us. And we at one time had as many as four and five patients at a time in rooms in that hotel. And we AAs were alternating on shifts to help these drunks get sober. They said that when you walked into the lobby of the Willard, you could smell the Peralta. Now, that went on for a little while. Well, then all of a sudden, it seemed like the Lord sent us a great benefactor. You know, we in AA sometimes, I think, we become almost superstitious about what Providence will do for us. But that's another story. I think Providence has been with us from the beginning of time. It took a long, long time, but there's no question that, in my mind, of the divine origin of AA. But this man, as I say, seemed to have been sent from heaven. He was a drunk, and he was a man of means and rather high standing in the community. in a recent business transaction he had acquired his building for which he at that moment had no use now he came into aa and i can remember hearing him in his second or third meeting he just caught fire he picked up that book and uh he said why i could have written that book Well, he might have, but he didn't. He said, I remember another peculiarity about him. You know, we always harped on the first drink, but he said that was a bad one for him. He proposed that he would set up a... And we in our group were about to undertake that. We were going to run that hospital. Now, please understand me, folks. As far as I know, there are, and may be, a number of groups throughout the country that do conduct some kind of hospital facility. But I'm telling you that the only thing that saved us from what would have been a colossal error was the hand of Providence. Because, number one, our great philanthropist didn't get along very well with this program. I guess it was that second drink. Number two, he passed to another life the following summer. I think this was a period of five or six months. So we didn't go to the hospital. We didn't even get our hospital. Now, the point is that I, at that time, would have been very, very... I would have gone very, Very eagerly for a hospital that would have Been run by our group. And I'm convinced that it was... Suppose we'd gotten into it at that Time. And here our poor friend, our poor misguided Friend misses the boat and Then ups and dies on us and leaves us with his estate to deal with And an alcoholic hospital running in a piece of property that has To be liquidated. It's just an illustration. But it is, as Dick has said, tradition is something that, like everything else we've gotten in AA, it seems like we had to get us the hard way. We got it through trial and error. And the things that are suggested here today are things that ARE suggested for the greater good of all. And as a lawyer, I can assure you that the substance of our activity, the spiritual content of it is in our 12 steps and in our carrying those 12 steps to other alcoholics. But in corporate activity, and I mean by that any form or ramification of business activity, anything that involves money, it does seem the better part of wisdom, not alone in the experience of Alcoholics Anonymous, but I can assure you from the standpoint of a lawyer, to let those enterprises stand on their own feet, detached, segregated, separated from AA. There are a lot of good things that can be done in the field of alcoholism, and with many of them, and perhaps most of them— I believe we are in hearty accord— but most of whom we shouldn't touch. We may cooperate. We may sustain by our cooperation. But it would be much better if we didn't try to manage, in my humble opinion. Let us be devoted to the real purpose of Alcoholics Anonymous, the real focus of our home groups, and my real purpose and yours in life. There has been entrusted to us a tremendously powerful message for human good. and let us be singly, unitedly devoted to carrying that message. Thank you. Thank you, Gene. And now to discuss Tradition 7 and 8, Fred Florida. Mr. Chairman and friend, tradition number seven, every A.A. group ought to be fully self-supporting, declining, outside contribution. I dare say that in the early days of AA, that was very easily understood because of small groups we met in homes and money was beside the point. We began to grow, we looked for larger quarters, and first thing you know a little light bill or rent became involved. We were not too thick about the passing of the hat at these little home meetings, but when these other things came up we had to sit up and take a little notice. And of course you know as tradition tells us in the passing of the hats, we all remember one thing that we learn or try to learn very early in AA And that is our honesty. I believe as a matter of record, we have not lost the hat. Now, a little early enthusiasm went with this money becoming involved. And some of us will say who might have been a little bit more fortunate than others were throwing those dollar bills in once and twice a week, sometimes three times a week all according to what our ambitions were and then we began to do a little figuring and two and two made four and four and four made eight. These are eight bucks that's a lot of money. I have to cut this down so we started dropping to a half and then to the two bit style and the first thing you know we wasn't worrying about the flavor of scotch anymore but it was a very noticeable old scotch, eating that we would go all the way to nickels and dimes. And then when the lights and the rent was due, we was running a little short. Now along with that and the growth, I might say that more people became very much interested in our work, and one of the first things they asked was, how can I help? What can I give you? Well, we said, very sorry, but we don't accept any outside donations. we grew and we grew and the public became more and more interested and some people who were very much interested in our work decided that it would be a very mighty fine gesture to make larger offers that we would fall for I'd say just recently, it was last year sometime, that in Miami we had an offer of $25,000 that's a lot of money and a lot of ears went up. We were kind of straining at the traces, but fortunately there was enough among us, we might say, who had read and understood tradition. We remembered having been told that in the early days one of the greatest mistakes that ever could have been made as far as our organization of Alcoholics Anonymous was concerned was to accept a large amount of money. So the consensus of opinion was no on the 25G. Tradition number eight, AlcoholicsAnonymous should remain forever non-professional but our service centers may employ special workers. This has been given a lot of room for thought discussions and in some cases arguments. Like a great many other things we have been able to iron out the wrinkles and along with being more or less schooled in the development of understanding we arrived at certain things where by the day I don't believe we have too much trouble from time to time and we're never going to please them all we do hear a few grunts and groans and gripes about the man or the woman who has a job in AA if we will all but remember this that there is a job to be filled a job that will take time and effort and a job that you would have to pay someone for if, and this is another consensus of opinion over a period of years, the alcoholic or the member of AA who was qualified, we feel, is justified to take that job and we feel justified in paying them. It's a whole lot different than some things that might turn up from time to time. In my early days in A.A., as a young secretary, being exposed to something a little bit new and different every once in a while, I had the novel experience, you might call it, of being offered $2,000 for saving a member of a family. Two uncles and a brother pleaded with me to take this money and take over this boy so that we could straighten him out. Now, you know there was just a little element of temptation there, but I had to say no. It's a good thing for me that I did. It was a good think for anybody who might be exposed to temptations of that kind to just take time out to think. A thought won't take more than a few seconds and if you understand as I do did at that time, your answer, too, would be no. In reference to these jobs that I mentioned, right at this time, here in Cleveland, where all you allergic convention-minded people are so many of us here, if you will bear in mind the enormity of this job, the responsibility and that it fell on one man. That man has given up considerable of his time many weeks in advance of this convention. To handle it and handle it properly meant full-time. There are people, professional people, experienced in this line of work who we would have to have paid a high salary they took it out of themselves here to put this man in this job and to pay him my own personal opinion and I have talked to a great many people is that the man should not be criticized for taking money for this enormous job that he has done I think that about covers seven and eight in reference to the professional end of our program programs. We do not professionalize in anything. We pay those only who can do the work that is so necessary in the growing up of our organization. Thank you. Thank you, Fred. And now to discuss Traditions 9 and 10, George, the Calzad Group of the San Diego, California area. George, this is it. Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, my friends, I have been given the assignment to tradition's nine and ten, and I shall not presume upon your intelligence with any lengthy discussion. In fact, I feel like Jonah did when the whale swallowed him The whale turned and said Jonah, I'm going to kill you I feel sick to my stomach And Jonah said We'd both feel a hell of a fight better If you kept your big mouth shut I will re-condition mine. A.A.S.S., ought not be organized, but we may create service boards or committees directly responsible to those they serve. Now, in my opinion, and from my experience in different groups in the several years which I've been a member of Alpoet's Anonymous, I found that there was a tendency for the graybeard to take charge. In my own case, I came into AA in a very large area, in large cities through. Afterwards, I moved to a smaller group, and I hadn't learned that I had not filed down my ego sufficiently, so I undertook to carry to this small group of Alcoholics Anonymous the city slickers idea that we did photo in the big center used You've been so and so here, and I confess I more or less have that idea. Today, I wish to say, gratefully, to divine providence, that a little of my ego has filed itself down to the point where now I realize that each group is its own. It elects its officers and controls itself at all times for members that we are all united for our common welfare and the person's recovery depends upon it. And in all these conditions, it is a fact that they coordinate like our 12 steps. I'm not going to say any further on that condition because I do not presume upon your intelligence, my dear friend. Now on Tradition 10. Alcoholics anonymous have no opinion on outside issues. Hence the A name ought never be drawn in the public controversy. That is a very important tradition, and one that should be abused. in my own case and I say that because I am a human being with all the frailty for mankind even though I have spent several years trying to follow the program there are many times when I've been called on as a speaker I've done I've seen in public life at times not as a speak but as a singer and I still have that actor's ego and I thought it might be a good time here to use my name. Get a little billing here. Figuring this thing out to myself, I see now the wisdom and the good old common sense in all of our traditions. We today now the names of our speakers here on your platform are mentioned to you. And I think it's right. You want to know who we are, where we came from. It's right, good for the work. But when we reach public level then we must and I think he's right keep our anonymity. In my humble opinion anonymity is the great spiritual gift that Alcoholics has had all through its life and the spiritual marvel that will lead us down to tradition forever. Thank you. Thank you, George. I may be permitted to digress just a moment when George in his opening turned to me and said, Mr. Chairman I literally shrunk back somehow or other the old idea go away you drunken bum still hangs around when anybody turns around and now to discuss traditions 11 and 12 Charlie from Boston, Massachusetts Uh, through most of the previous discussion about traditions, these two have been talked about because I think they're the background of all we have to offer. And the most important thing about AA is what we have to offer... We have to offer security. to a beaten, broken-down, defeated, frustrated alcoholic. That's all. A home, shelter. In all these matters, I can only interpret them with relationships that tie us. Why, I don't know. It isn't that he's very important, but I can't seem to interpret them as how they would affect you. But I can insofar as they affect me. To show you what I mean, in my latest revision of the 12 steps and from time to time I revise them So far, no one has published any of my revisions, by the way. I have taken out the personal pronoun we and our and substituted I and my for very, very, good reasons. over the years I've become an expert diagnostician of other people's failings and that doesn't do very much good I have become very adept at confessing other people sins and weaknesses and that does not do very much good for Kyrie so I think this step should say I made a decision to turn my role over to the care of God, as I understand it. Because I can't speak for weeks. Why do I bring this out? Bring this out because my drinking, which I think perhaps had something to do with my alcoholism, came as a result of certain people not being willing to make adjustments on themselves. I would have been all right But they wouldn't conform They included many people My wife, my employer At times I took on some very worthwhile adversaries The Roman Catholic Church They had a few weaknesses which they wouldn' t change and, as a result, alcoholism for Kylie. The United States Navy was a fairly tough out there, too. I cackled them for a while. I gave them a hell of a run for it, too, while I asked them, by the way. Even in May 8th, I found that certain people needed to adjust themselves. As the time went on, I learned that any progress that would be made would be mad as a result of Kylie making adjustments on Kylie. God, what a bitter lesson. It was brutal. It was almost worse than drinking. And believe me, that was bad. but that was the only way there was to be any progress and so with regard to these traditions how are we going to enforce them are we gonna set up five committees to see who goes out and makes a little touch someplace in the name of AA and puts the money in his pocket or something like that sometimes we forget that we have a membership of 100,000 what's a good term for them? Fraud. Con men. Phonies. I don't know what you might call them. This is after they get through drinking. I'm not talking about when they're drinking. They're pretty good people. This is After They Get Through. How shall we rule them? How shall we rule you? Get that? We shall rule you if Kiley makes adjustments on Kiley. Some few years ago, I was at the Yale School for Alcoholic Studies. Bill was submitted to a question and answer period after he had given a talk about A.A. government. And a little dried up... And I hope there are no Baptists in the house today. I don't know. I really don't know what it means, but this guy was a Baptist minister. Believe me, he was dry. He got up and said words something like this. It seems as though he had some deacons and boards of directors to contend with, and they weren't making the proper adjustments. And he said, all this wonderful government, this organization, just enough organization to prevent organization is a wonderful thing. and I'd really like to take it and transplant it into my church so that these ladies would mind their own business and let me run this thing the way it should be run. He didn't say that, but that's what he meant. And tell me how I can do that. And I thought that was a tough question and I thought he had still, you know, pretty well wrapped up. I didn't know what he was going to say. I thought I was going give him the old razzmatazz, you know that easy does it routine that he gives you when he doesn't get the answer. that's another story I'll tell you about that sometime they go down to New York and they ask Bill the most compounded question in the world and they come back and they say did you get the answer yeah well what'd he say he said easy does it the guy only heard it 38,000 times in the last 52 weeks he went down to New York and paid about 50 bucks to get back and forth and find out easy does it but Bill thought for a moment and he slowly said to the guy I think I think I've got the answer for you. He said, you find some way to get the bite on your parishioners like John Ballycon and get the fight on us, and you won't need any laws or rules or regulations. And I have come to find out, in making these adjustments on Kylie, that if I don't, John Valleycon, it's all probability will again put the bite on me and I'll be back where I started. There's too long a road back, believe me. And so with these traditions, I'm sure that's how we'll enforce them. I will help to promote AA publicity by attraction, not by promotion. by living the kind of life where people say, well, I don't know, in my little neighborhood where I live, typically Irish neighbor, I suppose, a lot of rebels who resist everything. They don't really know what's going on. They know something has happened. Lightning struck and the bomb is over, but God says keep quiet and don't mention it because we belong to something. I don' t know what it is, but let them stay the hell in there. Don't get them out. That is publicity by attraction, believe me. I don't want to bore you with too many details about myself, but God has been good. I have been a very very lucky guy things have happened to me which I can explain in no other way there isn't any other explanation for them except that that's the way it should be for a purpose I have not I haven't tossed into a position where I'm a chairman of a board of a public body that's going to spend $200 million in the next four years. Can you imagine tossing Kylie of old into a job like that? Can you image can you imagine the terrific responsibility when the whole community in which I live knows that I'm an ex-drunk? It's a matter of public record. Everybody knows it. I can't walk down the street and say I'm in church now and I used to be a drunk. They know. I don't mean by that that I publicly allow my name to be used and say the great Kiley is now a member of Alcoholics Anonymous. No, that isn't the way it's done. But people know. People have a way of finding out, particularly when you're taught in a position like that. And I say literally taught for no good reason, but I can say nothing to do with ability, nothing to deal with talent, but just that's the way it should be. It puts an added burden on my shoulders because, you know, human beings being what they are in and out of AA people like to see the heads of the great fall and it might be quite an event in some people's lives that highly did go back to creation. Perhaps I'd stay sober now if I'd fight. I wouldn't give a death It's a great lesson for me down through the years in AA. I have had a crowd of guys around me, my friends. At times I didn't know that was a word for them, but now I know that it is. who have been great deflators, who have been able to keep me in line, who have done really very very good for me. They are still my friends. And that's why it's very simple for me to have the most important thing in my whole life being to submerge myself as just another drunk in this great organization. Thank you, Tony. You've heard six individual interpretations of a portion of the traditions. A little yarn they told some time ago About the lush who went over to see his doctor The doctor talked with him quite a bit And it seems that our friend Joe Was quite hard of hearing The doctor spoke long and loud And when he got through And he said, and furthermore, Joe If you don't stop drinking you'll probably become stone deaf. Our friend Joe looked at the good doctor and said, I think to life what I've been drinking better than what I'm hearing. Whatever your feelings are at this moment if we excite discussion among you as to these traditions and what they mean to this movement of ours, we will have accomplished our end. But I do know and feel that the following summation perhaps there will be no question about it. And so I'm very happy now to introduce Bill Wood. When you and I are ten years older, I think we shall all look back upon this day as a great one in our history. I think we shall account it today when we pass from adolescence into maturity, the day in which we looked our future in the face, the day in which we took great decisions affecting our destiny. And may those decisions be the right ones. You've heard a perfectly marvelous summary of our A.A. traditions expressed from all quarters of this society about us. They have literally welled up the air in front of us, from the grasses, the distillates of our experience in living and working together, the platform upon which we expect to stand in unity for so long as God may need. It may take a moment to let go back a little, and recount some of the steps that we have taken in arriving at these conclusions. You would like to know how these traditions were really formed. to put the paper and repeat this repeatedly response. I suppose some here would say that I am the author of these predictions, but that is not true. It is really not true in any sense of the word. I held the pen that wrote the words, but the words are yours because they are only a mirror which reflects the experiences we have had over the years as I glance over these short sentences a whole rush of reminiscence comes up in my mind and I marvel how far we have come. And I almost begin to agree that we have laid a platform out of our experience quite unlike, in some respects, that that any men and women ever stood upon before. It may be, in some ways, that no society like ours has ever been known. So contrary are some of these practices to our human nature. So contrary, are they to the practices of the world outside. And speaking of the world outside, we all know its state. It is in state of more and more and more divisions. Praise God, while society about us has been disintegrating, we have been integrated. We have been unified. But let us make no mistake, and let us not congratulate ourselves. We shall be subject to these great storms which beat upon other societies of men. And the test is yet before us. Whether these forces, within and without to divide all other societies today, shall sometime rend ours and tear it apart. That will be the test of our maturity. But how did we get where we are now? Well, I look at these first two traditions that have to do with the common welfare, which states that in matters touching group unity and the survival of this movement that obviously the common warfare must come first. And I look at this funny one which says that there is no authority in Alcoholics Anonymous excepting a loving God expressing himself through the group that sounds rather odd in this modern world and isn't this a queer sounding one set it alongside of what you read in the newspapers our leaders are but trusted servants they do not govern well Well, there's a great weller of experience that we've had that lies behind those simple statements. I remember when the temptation first fell on me, when it was a question of the welfare of this society or of my personal welfare. things had been going on very slowly three or four years 30 or 40 of us had turned our faces to the light so that they stayed that way financially the wills were very much on the bump Lois was still working in her department store people were saying when is he going to quit being a missionary and go to work. So I was up one day at Old Charlie Town, at Town Hospital, New York, where I had that also very odd hot flag. Old Charlie town, the owner, who since proved himself a wonderful friend of this movement, called me in his office and said, hey, Bill. He said, when Silfors first brought you into this place, I was pretty skeptical. I'm not exactly what you call a man of God. I'm a man of business, frankly. But he said, I can't help being impressed. Thirty or forty of you have got well of something that I know to be practically hopeless. I can see this thing going by chain reaction Until someday this movement fills Madison Square Garden Well, I said, Charlie, I think you're an optimist Remember there are only 40 of us now Well, he said, I really believe that But, said Charlie, what gets my goat is this Here you're dishing out This stuff to be drunk day after day they're going back to work they are earning good living what about you? your wife is still working to support you to do this he said look back in 1929 in the days of the stricken stockbrokers here in New York this dump used to make a good many thousands of dollars a month now he said just look at this balance seat. He said, we're barely getting along. Now, said he, isn't it a fact that Silkworth helped you a lot in this place? Isn't it the fact that this so-called spiritual awakening of yours took place in here? I said, yes. Well, said Charlie, isn' t it very logical now that I should give you an office here? He said as a matter of fact, I'll give you a third of the process, and in a perfectly ethical way. You know we could advertise that you're here, that the work started here, and then you could eat. Then came my hour temptations, and many of us have met the same odds. And you know what wonderful rationalizers we drunks are? I said why. The Bible tells me what to do. The good book says the laborer is worthy of his heart. So I went back home, and Lois was cooking supper after a hard day's work. I said, well, Lois, we're really going to eat. Old Charlie is going to put me on a drawing account up there, and we're going to move in. We'll carry on from up there. We'll have an office, an assured income, and the cut on the profits of that place. Well, she wasn't quite so excited as I was, but I fancy the sight of groceries looked good to her. That evening we had a meeting down in our little front parlor. Just a handful of people. I told them the good news. And their faces fell. None of them wanted to say a word. They didn't say very much, but I could tell by the look in their eyes what they were thinking. And after a while, they did say it out loud. They said, yes, Bill. Charlie Towns' proposal is perfectly ethical It's perfectly all right But don't you realize that if you go to work That you'll professionalize this thing That you will become just another lay therapist And aren't you the guy Who has so often told us that sometimes the good is the enemy of the best. And nothing is good enough for this thing of ours but the bests. This is a matter of survival. No, Bill, you can't do this to us. So now you see what is back of this tradition. Who had the wisdom then? The so-called inspired leader, founder, if you like? No. The group conscience spoke up. How right it was. Oh, here's the one about membership. We've been all over the place on membership. In the early days there were these terrible fears that somebody would come in and rock the boat. So we talked about the pure alcoholic. What he is has never been made clear. Alcohol with no complications. You couldn't have queer people. Couldn't have people out of the lunatic asylum. I think two of the board of trustees of the AA Foundation are out of there, but... Couldn't be any prisoners. Oh, dear, what would people think? And besides, they might come out of these jails in sandbags. Well, you heard Warden Duffy this morning how times change. Ah, we had our fears and so many. And often I've told the story about the drunks who came in and did the unforgivable thing. In the early days, we suffered a great deal from piety. So this drunk came in and stood up in the meeting, and he said, This is a good system, but you don't need this God business. Damn this God-business to take! And the deacon called him into the corner and said, You can't do this around here. Oh, he said it's not so. He said, Look at the first page of the book Alcoholics Anonymous. which says that anybody can be a member of Alcoholics Anonymous if they have the alcohol problem. Does that say that I've got to believe in your 12 steps or believe in God or anything? Am I right, or am I wrong? Well, you know, in the way he was speaking for the group conference, how right he was. We elders had to concede almost that the group or the individual had the right to be wrong if they wished until they learned about it. So he stayed to our great discomfiture and became the founder of one of our oldest and best groups. He's sitting here in this audience today, oh I don't know, 12 or 13 years, it's over. And now we deacons who were going to expell him look at each other and say, supposing we had closed the door of the Court of Last Resort to Jim, where would he be now and all the people he's helped save? Each group should be autonomous, accepting matters affecting other groups or as a whole. I didn't used to believe that at all. After we got that office started down there in New York. I used to just love to think of sitting down there and running the AA group. I find in recent years that I'm all the time dodging to keep out of their way. Now, AA is autonomous. Each group can handle its affairs as it likes with one important provision, that its behavior doesn't seriously affect surrounding groups. Therefore, obviously, no group can take the public relations of the whole movement in its hands or of its area. It shouldn't do things that would affect general welfare because that would imperil our security. Of course, that's true. It's plain as a pipe setter. Then each group has one primary purpose. Why, years ago we used to think that when we got a lot of money together That we'd go into the educational business The research business That we do everything for drunks All the time, every place But we've learned much better We know we had better do one thing well Than many things best We who are of such peculiar, unique use to the other alcoholic We shouldn't dissipate our efforts in other enterprises We should be friendly with those enterprises But we can't very well endorse or finance them or engage in them For what we can do face-to-face with that other alcoholic Is a matter of life and death to him So AA has just one primary purpose To carry a smith to the alcoholic who still suffers. And I partly covered this next one. An AA group ought never endorse, finance, or lend the AA name to any related facility or outside enterprise lest problems of money, property, and prestige divert us from our primary aim. We're the best intention in the world. Some of us as individuals have gone to work for other enterprises and then have freely used the AA name to attract publicity or fun. Well, we have since learned that that is a profoundly mistaken attitude, that it seriously imperils our safety as a movement. So by the strongest kind of tradition, not of rule, notof law, we are learning better. Every AA group ought to be fully self-supporting supporting declining outside contributions. Oh, I go back in my experience to a time when I thought A.A. needed millions. But probably Mr. Rockefeller or somebody ought to put them up. We could do great good with money. Oh, how times have changed. We now find that our charity is not a money charity at all. It is a giving of oneself. Our expenses are tripping. Our earning power collectively is enormous. Of course we're going to pay our own bills. Of course we're not going to stand before the community and say now we have something to give. We are going to abandon that old cry of the drunk, I have no troubles that money can't cure. Of course this society is going to pay its own small bill. The next tradition too. Alcoholics Anonymous should remain forever non-professional. But our service centers may employ special workers. Oh, we've been a very long time arriving at that. At one extreme, I described a case where I was going to hire out to do face-to-face therapeutic work. How fortunate for us that never came about. Yet as time has gone on, It's very obvious that we do need certain services performed. Some people will tell you that A.A. has become big business, a big money proposition. Well, let's see right here in this town how big it is. There are probably three or four thousand A.As who live within 20 miles of this hall. I believe they hire one small office. I believe the have a secretary in there and one type of assistant officer. I wouldn't call that big business for three or four thousand AAs. Down in New York, serving 100,000 AAs, and the million yet to come, what do we find? We find five paid AA gals doing a beautiful job as secretaries. They're not paid to the 12th set. For 100,000 people to hire five secretaries is not big business. And out in the back room in the office we have ten packing boys, clerks, bookkeepers. because 10 clerks and bookkeepers is not big business for a movement of 100,000. Take our grapevine. It has a circulation of 20,000 and it's becoming a vital source in AA. Every month, volunteers put that thing together. They have to have some help. I think they have five paid help down there. None of them out in college. Why pay help to maintain a magazine for 100,000 people? No, thank God it is small business, but vitally important business. And so now we are fully clear that when people are hired to do a special service for us, they ought to be paid according to the service. But under no circumstances is anybody to be played with a 12-step. So that is our position on perfectionism. A.A. such ought never be organized, but we may create directly responsible to those they serve. Well, I've covered a part of that, but let's take that last one. But we may created special boards or committees directly responsible for those they served. Now, when an AA group starts, who are its first servants? The fellow or gal who starts it? His first friends. They are the first informal committee that makes the simple arrangements for the meeting place. They see most of the new people. They do the chores. They probably see the local newspaper. They are your first servants. They are you first self-appointed committee. But when the group has grown a little larger, then you get a reversal of that authority. The old-timers step aside and sometimes I regret to say they are pushed aside. But the group then takes over the management of its simple affairs through a rotating committee. The authority for services comes up through the bottom instead of down through the top. Take these little intergroup offices, which do such marvels of service in our metropolitan area, whose position, thank God, is strengthening all the time. Usually a few old-timers set those things going, but they have to go to you groups for support. Eventually you have a delegates meeting with a lot of sound and fury, and you get out a committee that conducts this little office. Again, the authority for services comes up through the bottom instead of down through the top, and the people who are serving you are directly responsible for it. Practically the only remaining exception to this situation is the Alcoholics Foundation in New York. There, Dr. Bob and I some years ago, believing that this movement would need a few services which could not be provided locally, we instituted the so-called Foundation, very, very much helped by dear friends of this movement. A board of trustees was formed, and that board of treaties now owns your book, the book Alcoholics Anonymous. It publishes our standard literature. It has charge of your general AA office, which does a world service. The trustees have in charge the public relations for this whole movement. They have your money. They are responsible for the conduct of your newspapers. Therefore, you see, our top service affairs, our overall service affairs are still in the hands of Dr. Bob and myself and our friends. Now, today is the day, we think, that marks our emergence from adolescence into adulthood. And so it is with great pleasure that I can make to you the announcement that the Board of Trustees have authorized the formation of a yearly conference composed of regional members of AA who can assume a part of the responsibility for your services, your books, your money, your public relations. And I ask you, will you take that responsibility so vital to our unity, so vital to the million yet to come? I know you will. Alcoholics Anonymous has no opinion on outside issues. Hence, the AA name ought never be drawn into public controversy. You know, one of the marvelous things that we can report about AA is the fact that we never quarrel about the kind of things that men in the outside world quarrel about. We don't quarrel about religion. We don' t quarrel about politics. We know that we dare not quarrel lest these issues divide and split us as they divide and split the world outside. By some deep instinct, we have always known that we cannot quarrel about such things. The tradition was an unwritten one, almost from the beginning. Almost never have we heard in AA of violent religion or political argument. Yes, sir, there are those here in this room of every single faith and power. And we shall rue the day, if ever such a quarrel does break down, to divide this movement, to come to public attention, so that those alcoholics who haven't yet had their chance may turn their faces to the wall and die and say this is some more of the same old business. No, we shall never quarrel at the public level about anything important. But we still can reserve the right to fight like the very devil over how to do the most good drunk. How could I possibly improve on the summation of the last two steps? Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion. We need to always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio and film. Or the last one, again emphasizing the spiritual value of anonymity. is the spiritual foundation of all our traditions, ever reminding us to place principles above personality. Oh, let me tell you one more story of a great temptation I had. The book was under preparation. We had no title for it. Somebody suggested the name Alcoholics alcoholics or not. In each meeting for months, we voted on titles. Nobody cared too much for that title. But at long last, when the day approached we had to name the book, that title got to be very, very popular. At first, I had liked the idea. And then something which certainly was not of God, began speaking to me and saying, Bill, why shouldn't you sign that book? After all, authors sign books. You've written the text. Sure, the other fellows wrote some stories, but, you know, the text is important. Why don't you find that book?" At that time, the most popular title in the voting was a title called The Way Out. And I thought to myself, well, why not The Way out by Bill? Now, wouldn't that be great? Then I had even another thought. Forgetting dear old Smithy, the rock on whom this movement is founded, I said to myself why shouldn't this be called the Wilson Movement when I came into our little meeting where we were talking about these titles and tactfully insinuated these ideas of signing the book and the Wilson movement I got that very stony stare and the group conscience again spoke and it said no you can't do this thing to us aren't you the guy who is so often said because it's the enemy of the best so it became Alcoholics Anonymous and years later The March of Time did a newsreel about us I was in the projection room An official of the company said Do you realize, Bill Wooden that this film is going to be shown to 12 million people That 12 million who knew little or nothing of Alcoholics Anonymous were now to find out And then that film unrolled and as it rolled on the book, Alcoros to None was held up to view two or three times. And I looked at it and I must confess that I cried like a baby thinking how much wider my college had been than this. Asking myself had this been called the way out by Bill Whitman, would the mark of time been showing this society to 12 million people? Of course not. Thank God it's Alcoholics Anonymous. Thank God for the conscience of this movement which corrects its name. Thank God it is Alcoholics Anonymous, period. So these, my friends, are the principles upon which this society of ours think we would like to rest our future. Like everything in AA, there is nothing final about these pronouncements. Perhaps time will show us a better way. But in this hour, when we are passing from adolescence into maturity, isn't it a good time for us to ask ourselves, shall we adopt these traditions, those of us who sit here, as our flashbacks? Not as an official act of this movement. movement will never have or make an official act of renunciation. But can't we express our sentiment about it? Alcoholics and anonymous, not by any virtue of our circumstances, but by force of circumstances, is a beautiful democracy bordering almost on a planet. The right of the individual, praise God, is unquestioned to speak and to be heard. Therefore, I am going to practice this democracy right now. I am going to ask any who oppose these traditions in principle, or any one of them, to register their opinion. And don't be ashamed to do so. I'm sure a majority of us will vote for them, but if any oppose them, please know that I'll defend your right to do so. If any oppose then, will they stand up? We have no time to debate, but if any seriously oppose me, will they stand? Then I say, by general affirmation rather than any official act, we who are here in this hour of destiny may now be willing to run and confirm the tradition of alcoholic binoculars? And then, what could be more appropriate? and that we ask God's blessing upon this decision in the usual manner. Shall we not rise once more and say the Lord's Prayer? Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. You give us this day our daily bread, and deliver us from our trespasses, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us to Jesus. For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, forever and ever. Amen. Thank you.