Apple Inc. (AAPL) shareholders who participated in the company's annual meeting overwhelmingly voted against a proposal that would have required the consumer electronics giant to disclose how it would handle a potential change in chief executives.

Slightly more than 400 million votes were cast against the measure brought by the Laborers' International Union, while roughly 172 million votes were cast for it, defeating the measure by a margin of more than two-to-one. In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Apple said investors abstained from voting about 3.4 million shares.

The vote on succession planning was closely watched, since Chief Executive Steve Jobs, a cancer survivor and transplant recipient, took a sudden leave of absence for medical reasons in January.

Shareholders gathered at the iPhone maker's Cupertino, Calif. headquarters Wednesday to cast votes for the company's board members: former Vice-President Al Gore, Intuit Corp. (INTU) Chairman Bill Campbell, J. Crew Group Inc. (JCG) Chairman Millard Drexler, Avon Products Inc. (AVP) CEO Andrea Jung, Genentech Chairman Arthur D. Levinson, and Northrop Grumman Corp. (NOC) CEO Ronald D. Sugar. Each was handily reelected, as was Jobs, who received nearly 571 million votes in favor of his reelection.

-By Ian Sherr, Dow Jones Newswires; 415-439-6455; ian.sherr@dowjones.com
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