[1] In balloting at the Lutheran Church in America's biannual convention held in June 1966 in Kansas City, Missouri, Marshall received 70 of the 615 votes cast for president, behind Rev.
[3] Marshall was elected in June 1968 to serve as president of the Lutheran Church in America, succeeding Franklin Clark Fry, who had died earlier that month.
[4] Marshall was elected to a full four-year term at the biannual convention held in Minneapolis in June 1970, receiving 545 votes out of the 593 cast.
In an interview with The New York Times, Marshall pointed to successful fundraising, adoption of a new book of worship and ecumenical outreach to the Episcopal, Roman Catholic and evangelical movements as among his achievements.
[1] In 1976 in Philadelphia, at the 41st International Eucharistic Congress, an interfaith ecumenical gathering of scholars and church leaders, Marshall received a lengthy standing ovation after opening his remarks with the two words "Fellow Christians".