Your Congregation's Bylaws:
A Guide to Effective Writing and Revising
About Using This Guide
Welcome to this new version of the bylaws guide. We have expanded it to include information that will be useful to congregations of all sizes and stages of congregational life and development. Many Unitarian Universalist (UU) congregations contributed bylaw articles to provide real-life examples. These examples may not always cover all the important points mentioned in the discussion text of this guide, but the discussion text and the examples together may enable you to craft your own further improved versions. Every effort has been made to provide accurate information that will help you write, change, or expand your bylaws. We strongly encourage you to consult an attorney and use local and state resources as you write or revise your bylaws.
Electronic and Web Versions
Please note that if you are reading this document as a PDF
(portable document format) file, it is also available
as a Microsoft Word document to enable you to cut and paste any
useful text into the draft of your own congregation's bylaws. Please
open and download the congbylaws.doc
Word document for your use. If you have trouble downloading it,
please e-mail Susanna Whitman at swhitman@uua.org,
or contact her at Congregational Services, UUA, 25 Beacon Street,
Boston, MA 02108 617/948-4270, for an electronic copy to be sent
to you by e-mail or on disk in the mail. If requesting it on disk,
please specify whether you prefer a CD data disk or a floppy disk.
This document also is available on the Web as an HTML
(HyperText Markup Language) document with links to extra
examples of articles, in case you find that you need further examples
to meet your congregation's needs.
Thus, this guide is produced in three electronic formats and one print format. The following suggestions should help you determine which format will best suit your needs:
- Use the PDF file if you want to
read the document in a more concise form and you find that the
up to four examples given will generally suit your congregation's
needs.
- Use the Word document if you would
like to save time typing your congregation's bylaws and you plan
to use some of the examples provided as the basis for your draft.
For most types of articles, this document includes examples beyond
the ones given in the PDF file version described above.
- Use the HTML document if
you are searching for appropriate bylaws text on the Web and would
like the short, less cluttered document, but with the option to
view more indexed examples for each type of article. Like the
PDF file, the HTML document has up to four examples of each concept
in the main body of the document, but you can click on links to
view extra examples. The HTML version links to the same examples
found in the Word document.
We hope that you find this document a useful guide as you undertake the important work of writing or revising your congregation's bylaws.
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