Shorter College motion denied by Ga. Supreme Court

by Staff                                                                                                         Vol. XVIII, No. 7, August 2005

The Supreme Court of Georgia has denied Shorter College's motion for reconsideration of the court's decision in Shorter v. Georgia Baptist Convention, convention attorney Tom Duvall reported July 1. The court, in a 4-3 decision May 23, upheld a Georgia Court of Appeals ruling that Shorter College's actions to sever ties with the Georgia Baptist Convention be set aside as outside the bounds of state corporate law.

A DeKalb County Superior Court judge, in April 2003, had allowed Shorter to dissolve and transfer its assets to the newly formed Shorter College Foundation Inc., thus discontinuing the Georgia Baptist Convention's selection of the college's trustees.

In March 2004, a three-judge panel of the Georgia Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the convention's appeal. Shorter then took the case to the Georgia Supreme Court.

Now that the state's high court has denied Shorter College's motion to reconsider, the case will be remanded back to the Superior Court of Dekalb County. In the meantime, attorneys from both sides will begin the process of returning the school to the authority of the convention.

The four-year struggle between the convention and the educational institution has been followed closely by other state conventions as they evaluate similar longstanding relationships with their entities.

Shorter College was founded in 1873 and has been affiliated with the Georgia Baptist Convention since 1959. [BP]