Fri, 09 Apr 2004

General Anthroposophical Society executive council receives support of country representatives in legal dispute - Court ruling to be appealed

Dornach, 9 April (NNA) – In the legal dispute over the future of the “General Anthroposophical Society (Christmas Conference)” (CCS), reactivated in December 2002, and its proposed merger with the General Anthroposophical Society (GAS), the GAS executive council has decided to proceed with its appeal to the superior court of the Swiss canton of Solothurn to reverse the judgement of the Dorneck-Thierstein municipal court.

In February, the municipal court had ruled that the CCS no longer existed and should be removed from the commercial register. This meant that the planned fusion also had to be put on hold.

The executive council decision follows a recommendation last week from country representatives and general secretaries of national anthroposophical societies meeting in Dornach, that an appeal should be proceeded with. According to a GAS press statement, the representatives confirmed the course taken by the council and expressed their support for it.

“They recommended an appeal on the basis that the resolutions of the members’ meetings of Christmas 2002 and November 2003, expressing the will of the members, had not been taken sufficiently into account in the Dornach judgement,” the statement went on to say.

Paul Mackay, executive council spokesman on the legal dispute, said: “We are gratified to note that those in positions of responsibility from the various countries too consider a clear constitution as indispensable for our common tasks throughout the world.”

Mackay has stated repeatedly that the actions of the council are intended to produce constitutional clarity and put the Anthroposophical Society on a sound legal footing. That was the only way to ensure that it could maintain is ability for effective action in the future: “We will thus continue along the path on which we have embarked, in order to be able seriously to undertake our tasks in the world,” Mackay said after the meeting with national representatives.

The executive council spokesman has been at pains to emphasise that the GAS council is not seeking legal conflict, but that, equally, legal steps also entail the opportunity to challenge them. “In view of the fact that the existence under association law and the resolutions [of the CCS] are being challenged in court, we feel an obligation to bring clarity in this matter,” the forthcoming council management report says.

“For us it is not a matter of having to be right, but we have been called upon to defend our position in this matter and from our perspective the argumentation of the court of first instance is not convincing. That is why we feel obliged to seek a new ruling on appeal because a number of things simply failed to be taken into consideration,“ Mackay told NNA.

Speaking for one of the plaintiff groups, Andreas Wilke, who clearly distanced himself from the other group and its actions, said he was only concerned to clarify the legal situation. Whether his group won in the final instance or not was not the issue, Wilke told NNA.

He had original brought the question to court because legal sources had told him that the actions of the AAG executive council were based on a weak legal foundation: “The real issue is this: there is the law and the law applies as much to the Anthroposophical Society as to any other association. As far as we are concerned, it is not a matter of not accepting a decision against us – a legal ruling is a legal ruling.”

On behalf of the plaintiff group associated with “Gelebte Weihnachtstagung”, Ursula Ruchti said in a statement: “We look forward with great confidence to the proceedings before the superior court. Our position is well founded and we have a wealth of evidence to back it up.”

In response to the point that previously, too, the plaintiffs had been successful with their procedural action before the lower court but that this had been reversed on appeal, Ms Ruchti said the situation in this case was completely different because the earlier case had been a procedural action whereas this case now dealt with the substance of the matter.

The written grounds for the appeal from the defendant and statements by the plaintiffs must be submitted to the Solothurn court by 27 April.

END/cva

N040409-01EN Date: 9 April 2004

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