Legal Definitions - slate

In a legal and organizational context, a slate refers to a pre-arranged list of candidates who are presented together for election to multiple open positions. This list typically includes the exact number of individuals required to fill all available roles, such as seats on a governing board or political offices.

Here are some examples to illustrate the concept of a slate:

• Imagine a local community organization holding elections for its five-member executive board. A group of current members, perhaps aligned by a common vision for the organization's future, decides to run together. They announce their "Community Forward Slate," presenting five specific individuals—one for each open board position—to the voters. This demonstrates a slate because it's a unified list of candidates, precisely matching the number of available seats, presented as a single group for election.

• Consider a large publicly traded company preparing for its annual shareholder meeting, where several seats on the Board of Directors are up for election. The current management team, aiming for continuity and stability, proposes its own "Management-Recommended Slate" of candidates. This slate consists of individuals they endorse, with the number of nominees exactly equaling the number of director positions to be filled. This is a slate because it's a specific, endorsed list of candidates put forward to shareholders for election to the board.

• During a national election, a political party might present a "party slate" for a specific state's delegation to a convention or for a set of judicial appointments. For instance, if there are three open judicial positions, the party might endorse and campaign for a slate of three specific judges, urging voters to support all of them as a package. This illustrates a slate as it's a coordinated group of candidates, often from the same political affiliation, presented together for multiple offices.