Maverick Sears Shareholder Makes Point With Challenge

Robert A. G. Monks concedes that his bid for a seat on the Sears, Roebuck & Co. board is a long shot, but even if he loses today’s proxy contest, he hopes that his campaign won’t have been in vain.

Monks says he wants people to remember his campaign “as the point when owners recognized the need for genuinely independent directors.”

The former Labor Department official heads Institutional Shareholder Partners Inc., a Washington-based company that advocates replacing management’s handpicked yes-men with independent directors.

Monks has the support of the California Public Employees Retirement System, which owns 2.3 million Sears shares.

Meanwhile, a federal judge in Philadelphia on Wednesday denied a petition by two Sears shareholders to postpone today’s meeting until the company provided more information about a decision to restructure the company.