On behalf of the Nominating Committee, I am pleased to report the results of the 2002 election for AHA offices. The committee is grateful to all the candidates who agreed to stand for Association elective office and committee positions despite other pressing obligations. The Association depends for its continued well-being upon the willingness of its members to serve. Elected candidates are indicated with an asterisk.

President (1-year term)

*James M. McPherson, Princeton University (Civil War and Reconstruction, slavery and antislavery, race relations in American history)

President-elect (1-year term)

John W. Dower, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Japan, U.S.-Asia relations, World War Two in Asia, racism in comparative perspective, 19th- and 20th- century representations of "East" and "West")

*Jonathan D. Spence, Yale University (history of China from the later 16th century to the present, Chinese foreign relations, Western perceptions of China, Chinese experiences in the West)

Vice President, Research Division (3-year term)

John A Boyer, University of Chicago (19th- and 20th-century Germany and Austria, Hapsburg Empire 1648-1918, religion and politics in modern Europe)

*Roy A. Rosenzweig, George Mason University (19th- and 20th-century U.S. history; history and new media; public history; social, cultural, labor, urban, and oral history)

Council (3-year terms)

Position 1

Robert L. Harris Jr., Cornell University (African American, United States, historiography, thought and culture)

*Quintard Taylor Jr., University of Washington (African American, American West)

Position 2

Abraham Smith, Howard University (African Diaspora in Latin America and the Caribbean)

*Myrna Ivonne Wallace Fuentes, Duke University (modern Latin America, working class, intellectual)

Division Representatives (3-year terms)

Professional

David S. Newbury, Smith Coll. (precolonial and colonial African social history, environmental history, African historiography)

*Denise J. Youngblood, University of Vermont (Russia/USSR, modern European cultural history, Eastern European nationalities and nationalism, film and history, war and society, cultural globalization)

Research

*Karen Ordahl Kupperman, New York University (early modern Atlantic, colonial America, American Indian)

Leslie S. Rowland, University of Maryland, College Park (U.S. South, Civil War and Reconstruction, transition from slavery to freedom, postemancipation societies)

Teaching

*Joan Arno, Central High School, Philadelphia (world, post-World War Two Japan, America, geography)

Barry Bienstock, Horace Mann School, New York City (U.S. race and ethnicity, Native America)

Committee on Committees (3-year terms)

Position 1

*Peter Guardino, Indiana University (Mexico, Latin America, political culture)

Lyman L. Johnson, University of North Carolina at Charlotte (colonial Latin America, identity and social forms, 19th-century economic)

Position 2

*Elaine Tyler May, University of Minnesota (20th-century U.S.: Cold War, politics, women, family, sexuality)

Alan Taylor, University of California at Davis (colonial North America, American Revolution, early republic, American West, Canada, rural and agricultural, environmental and social)

Nominating Committee (3-year terms)

Position 1

David A. Bell, Johns Hopkins University (early modern and modern France, nationalism, social history of language, military)

*Paula Findlen, Stanford University (early modern Europe, Renaissance Italy, history of science and medicine)

Position 2

Thomas Cohen, Catholic University of America (religious and cultural history of colonial Latin America and early modern Europe, history of Catholic missions, Jewish history)

*Michael J. Gonzales, Northern Illinois University (modern Latin American, revolution, labor and social, especially Mexico and the Andean region)

Position 3

Iris B. Berger, SUNY-Albany (Africa, comparative women and gender, labor, religion)

*Kenneth Pomeranz, University of California at Irvine (late imperial and modern Chinese social, economic, and cultural; comparative and world)

Survey and Ballot Systems, Inc. of Eden Prairie, Minnesota, scanned the ballots and tabulated the results. Only 27 ballots needed to be hand counted. Some voters registered their opinions about candidates, and the committee will review these comments at its next meeting in February 2003.

Of the 13,573 members of the Association, 2,692 cast ballots before the November 1 deadline. (The AHA constitution precludes counting of ballots postmarked after November 1.) This number is about 10 percent less than usual, and is, therefore, cause for some concern. In my view, this makes further consideration of electronic voting all the more timely.

The Nominating Committee met in Washington, D.C., February 9-11, 2002. This was the sixth year that the committee had met from Saturday to Monday. Although some telephone calls had to be made by the chair after the meeting had adjourned, the meeting schedule allows the committee to reach nominees more easily. As is the case elsewhere in the profession, e-mail is replacing the telephone as an efficient mode of communication. Some professors prefer e-mail, which they can more easily access than phone messages. Nonetheless, the Nominating Committee still believes that a phone call is a more appropriate and personal mode of communicating such an important invitation. Thus in coming years I expect the committee to use both e-mail and telephone calls; therefore, it is important that appropriate computers and Internet connections are set up in the committee's meeting room.

The 2003 Nominating Committee will be chaired by Joyce Chaplin, Harvard University, and will meet February 1-3, 2003.

Subsequent to the announcement of 2002 candidates in the April issue of Perspectives, Michael S. Sherry, Northwestern University, who had been nominated as a candidate for the vice presidency of the Research Division, notified the committee that he was withdrawing his name from consideration. Article VIII, Section 2 of the AHA constitution states that "the Council may, in its bylaws or by resolution, provide for additional nominations to be made by the Nominating Committee for any position where there is a vacancy through death or by resignation of a candidate." The executive director notified Council of the withdrawal and its members charged the Nominating Committee to make another nomination. John Boyer, University of Chicago, was selected after full consideration of the committee to stand for the vice presidency. The committee and the Association are very grateful to Professor Boyer for accepting the nomination under these circumstances.

The Nominating Committee is committed to bringing a diversity of candidates to the offices of AHA leadership. To us, the concept of diversity is itself diverse: we must be cognizant of ethnicity and gender; the geographical locations of the schools represented; the type of college, university, or high school represented; and to the specialized field of expertise within the historical profession. This often means that diversity is a moving target for the committee, in which a particular category may be privileged in one year more than another.

The committee wishes to thank Assistant Director Sharon K. Tune for her outstanding guidance and advice, without which the committee could not fulfill its responsibilities.

—Gary R. Kates (Pomona Coll.) is chair of the 2002 AHA Nominating Committee.