The following decisions were reached by the AHA Council at its meeting held June 4–5, 2005, at Washington, D.C.

• Approved the minutes from the January 6 and 9, 2005, meeting of the Council held during the 119th annual meeting in Seattle.
• Approved the nominations for the Awards for Scholarly Distinction that will be announced at the 120th annual meeting at Philadelphia.
• Approved the nomination for the 2005 Honorary Foreign Member award.
• Approved the 2005–06 budget.
• Approved the list of the 2007 Program Committee members.
• Approved the application for affiliation from the Western Association of Women Historians.
• Approved the recommendation from the Research Division to accept the Statement on Peer Review.
• Approved the recommendation from the Research Division to allow open access to the articles of the American Historical Review online (but not to the book reviews), to disseminate high-quality scholarship as widely as possible.
• Approved the recommendation from the Research Division to accept the “Guidelines for Collaborations with External Partners.”
• Approved the nomination from the Professional Division for the 2005 Troyer Steele Anderson Prize.
• Approved the appointment of the following new members to the Board of Editors of the American Historical Review:
  • Janet Ewald (Duke Univ.), Africa
  • Merry Wiesner-Hanks (Univ. of Wisconsin-Milwaukee), Early Modern Europe
  • William B. Taylor (Univ. of California at Berkeley), Latin America
  • Gary Gerstle (Univ. of Maryland at College Park), Modern United States
• Approved the Committee on Women Historian’s document “Gender Equity in the Academic History Workforce”.
• Approved $1,000 to underwrite graduate students’ attendance at the Committee on Women Historians’ breakfast at the annual meeting.
• Approved the recommendation to incorporate the current addendum to annual meeting contracts into the body of the actual contract.
• Approved the continuation of negotiations for the 2014 annual meeting.
• Approved the Accessibility Policy for the Annual Meeting:
  

  It is the policy of the American Historical Association to hold events (meetings, conferences, and professional gatherings) where physical and communications barriers do not exclude people with disabilities from attending and participating. Anyone requiring special assistance in order to participate in the AHA annual meeting is asked to check the appropriate box on the registration form and attach a written description of their requirements. Specific requests can also be made directly to access@historians.org or by phone, 202-544-2422, ext. 104.
  Due to the large size of the annual meeting Program, large print, Braille, and audiocassette recordings are not available. However, if requested in advance, arrangements can be made to provide the final Program on CD-ROM.

• Authorized the president and executive director to send a letter expressing concern about the cancellation of the academic conference in Turkey on the Armenian question.
• Endorsed the statement issued by the American Association of University Professors condemning the resolutions adopted by the British Association of University Teachers calling for a boycott of Israeli universities. The statement reads as follows:
  

  Academic Boycott
  Delegates to a recent meeting of the British Association of University Teachers (AUT) approved resolutions that damage academic freedom. The resolutions call on all members of AUT to “refrain from participation in any form of academic and cultural cooperation, collaboration, or joint projects” with two universities in Israel, Haifa University and Bar Ilan University. Excluded from the ban are “conscientious Israeli academics and intellectuals opposed to their state’s colonial and racist policies,” an exclusion which, because it requires compliance with a political or ideological test in order for an academic relationship to continue, deepens the injury to academic freedom rather than mitigates it.
  These resolutions have been met with strong condemnation and calls for repeal within the United Kingdom and elsewhere. The American Association of University Professors joins in condemning these resolutions and in calling for their repeal. Since its founding in 1915, the AAUP has been committed to preserving and advancing the free exchange of ideas among academics irrespective of governmental policies and however unpalatable those policies may be viewed. We reject proposals that curtail the freedom of teachers and researchers to engage in work with academic colleagues, and we reaffirm the paramount importance of the freest possible international movement of scholars and ideas. The AAUP urges the AUT to support the right of all in the academic community to communicate freely with other academics on matters of professional interest.

• Approved staff recommendation to proceed with electronic balloting for the 2005 AHA election.