User:MJL/History of the Constitution of the Netherlands

The constitutional foundation of government in the Netherlands dates back late 1570's with the signing Union of Utrecht, which would later form the basis of the Dutch Republic in 1581. Over its history, The Netherland’s government has operated under the direction of various legal documents with numerous different governmental structures.

Staatsregeling 1798 was approved by National Assembly of the Batavian Republic, written by a Constitutional Assembly.

On August 7, 1806, the Constitution for the Kingdom of Holland came into being in the context of the new Kingdom of Holland, a constitutional monarchy. In 1810 this was annexed by the French Empire.

The short-lived Constitution for the United Netherlands was adopted in 1814. It was replaced a year later by the current Constitution for the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

Union of Utrecht
The Union of Utrecht (Unie van Utrecht) was a treaty signed on 23 January 1579 in Utrecht, the Netherlands, unifying the northern provinces of the Netherlands, until then under the control of Habsburg Spain.

The Union of Utrecht is regarded as the foundation of the Republic of the Seven United Provinces, which was not recognized by the Spanish Empire until the Twelve Years' Truce in 1609.

The treaty was signed on 23 January by Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht (but not all of Utrecht) and the province (but not the city) of Groningen. The treaty was a reaction of the Protestant provinces to the 1579 Union of Arras (Dutch: Unie van Atrecht), in which the southern provinces declared their support for Roman Catholic Spain.

During the following months of 1579, other states signed the treaty as well, such as Ghent, cities from Friesland, as well as three of the quarters of Guelders (Nijmegen Quarter, Veluwe Quarter, Zutphen County). In the summer of 1579, Amersfoort from the province of Utrecht also joined, together with Ypres, Antwerp, Breda and Brussels. In February 1580, Lier, Bruges and the surrounding area also signed the Union. The city of Groningen shifted in favor under influence of the stadtholder for Friesland, George van Rennenberg, and also signed the treaty. The fourth quarter of Guelders, Upper Guelders, never signed the treaty. In April 1580, Overijssel and Drenthe signed on.

This leads to a general and simplified overview of the parts that joined:
 * the County of Holland
 * the County of Zeeland
 * the Lordship of Utrecht
 * the Duchy of Guelders
 * the Lordship of Groningen
 * the Lordship of Friesland
 * the County of Drenthe
 * the Lordship of Overijssel
 * the Duchy of Brabant
 * the County of Flanders
 * the cities of Tournai and Valenciennes

Antwerp was the capital of the union until its fall to the Spanish.

Flanders was almost entirely conquered by the Spanish troops, as was half of Brabant. The United Provinces still recognized Spanish rule after the Union of Utrecht. However, the Union contributed to the deterioration in the relationship between the provinces and their lord, and in 1581 the United Provinces declared their independence of the king in the Act of Abjuration.

The Twelve Years' Truce of 1609 essentially marked the end of the Dutch struggle for independence and a pause in one of history's longest running conflicts, the Eighty Years' War. As Pieter Geyl puts it, the truce marked "an astonishing victory for the Dutch." They gave up no land and did not agree to halt their attacks on Spanish colonies and the Spanish trade empire. In return the Spanish granted the United Provinces de facto independence by describing them as "Free lands, provinces and states against who they make no claim" for the duration of the truce.

Religious tolerance
The Union of Utrecht allowed complete personal freedom of religion and was thus one of the first unlimited edicts of religious toleration. An additional declaration allowed provinces and cities that wished to remain Roman Catholic to join the Union.

Governance After the Batavian Revolution
The Batavian Revolution ended with the proclamation of the Batavian Republic in 1795. William was forced to flee to England, where he issued the Kew Letters proclaiming that all Dutch colonies were to fall under British rule, as they had declared war on the Batavian Republic. A number of these colonies, such as Sri Lanka and the Cape Colony, never returned to Dutch rule, although the Cape did so temporarily between 1803 and 1806. Several coups followed in 1798, 1801 and 1805 which brought different groups of Patriots to power. Though the French presented themselves as liberators, they behaved like conquerors.

Staatsregeling 1798
The 1798 Constitution, officially the Constitution for the Batavian People, was the Constitution which was adopted in 1798 and came into force for the Batavian Republic. This Constitution of 1798 is also considered the first Dutch constitution. It replaced the Union of Utrecht (1579), which was never intended as a "constitution" of the later Republic of the Seven United Netherlands but had become so in practice.

Background
After the Batavian Revolution abolished the Stadholder system, it ended with the proclamation of the Batavian Republic on 19 January 1795. At first, the revolutionaries used the constitutional machinery of the old confederal republic which was the States-General. The revolutionaries, through the States-General, attempted significant reforms to establish a more democratic political order throughout the country. Popular sentiment against the States-General form of government began to grow, however.

In the Fall of 1795 the States-General started to work on a procedure to peacefully replace itself, "by constitutional means", with a National Assembly that would possess full executive, legislative and constituent powers. This National Assembly first convened on March 1, 1796 in The Hague. According to the final Rules of the States-General of 30 December 1795, a constitutional committee had to be established within two weeks, which would have six months to draft a constitution and submit it to the meeting. This committee was instituted, and submitted its plan for a new constitution on 10 November 1796 to the National Assembly.

The draft constitution had been rejected by almost eighty percent, which meant that a new Constitution would have to be drafted. In the elections for the National Assembly a few months later, the supporters of a unitary state won the majority, but the supporters of a federal state retained the majority in the constitutional commission. Meanwhile, in France, the radicalists led by Pierre Augereau had seized power. With French help, the radical unitarists staged a coup d'état in January 1798. A new constitution, establishing a unitary republic, was quickly adopted in the National Assembly. This draft constitution was approved in a referendum on April 23, 1798.

The Staatsregeling 1798, officially the Constitution for the Batavian People, was the Constitution which was adopted in 1798 and came into force for the Batavian Republic. The Staatsregeling 1798 is considered the first Dutch constitution in the modern sense of the word. It had replaced the Union of Utrecht (1579), which was never intended as a "constitution" of the Dutch Republic, but did so in practically the same function.

The National Assembly met on March 1, 1796. According to the Rules of the States-General of 30 December 1795, which had been declared valid at the time, a constitutional committee had to be established within two weeks, which would have six months to draft a constitution and submit it to the meeting. This so-called first constitution committee was also instituted and designed a plan of Constitution 1796 which was submitted to the meeting on 10 November 1796. In a referendum (that is: in the ground meetings) of 1 August 1797 this plan was rejected by an overwhelming majority on which a second National Assembly met on 1 September 1797 and a second constitution committee was established. This committee prepared a state regulation that was overtaken by historical events and could not finish its work. On 22 January 1798 a coup took place and the Constituent Assembly was formed and the second committee was dissolved. On January 22, 1798, a third constitution committee was established, which designed the so-called Constitution of 1798. This was adopted on 23 April in a referendum, proclaimed on May 1, 1798 and entered into force on May 4, 1798. With the Constitution of 1801 it was canceled.

Referendum
On 23 April 1798, a constitutional referendum was held about the new constitution in the Bavarian Republic. Only opponents of the federalists were allowed to vote. After the referendum, a new coup d'état was done by the Unitarians, and the constitution became effective in July 1798. The French, who had a big influence in the Batavian Republic, were not satisfied with the 1798 constitution, so a new constitution was written, for which a referendum in 1801 was organized.

Constitution of the Kingdom of Holland
The Batavian Republic saw its end in 1806, when the Kingdom of Holland was founded, with Napoleon's brother, Louis Napoleon as King of Holland. The Napoleonic Kingdom of Holland, a constitutional monarchy, was established by the Constitutie voor het Koningrijk Holland on 7 August 1806. In 1810, the area was annexed into the First French Empire, and only in 1813, the Netherlands regained their independence, with William's son, William Frederick, as sovereign prince.

History
After the French troops had been driven out by Russian Cossacks, the new independent state of the Netherlands, a principality, was established by the constitution of 29 March 1814, the Grondwet voor de Vereenigde Nederlanden. William VI of Orange, instated on 2 December 1813 as "Sovereign Prince" by acclamation, and only accepting "under the safeguard of a free constitution, assuring your freedom against possible future abuses", had first appointed a number of men of good standing as electors and these approved the constitution, written by a commission headed by Gijsbert Karel van Hogendorp. On 24 August 1815 William — since 16 March King William I of the Netherlands — having proclaimed himself King of the larger United Netherlands six days earlier, issued the first version of the current constitution, the Grondwet voor het Koningrijk der Nederlanden or Loi fondamentale du Royaume des Pays-Bas, establishing the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, now expanding his realm with the territory of the present state of Belgium, which would again secede from it in 1830. It included a limited unentrenched bill of rights, with freedom of religion, the principle of habeas corpus, the right of petition and freedom of the press as its main points. In the Treaty of London of 1814 the Allies had ordered that the original Dutch state would devise the new constitution. It had been approved by the new States General (consisting of 55 members) of the Northern Netherlands, but rejected by the majority of appointed electors (796 against 527) of the Southern Netherlands. As 126, however, had indicated that they were against because of the (by them still considered too limited) freedom of religion, which was mandatory under the Treaty of Vienna that ordered the union of the Northern and the Southern Netherlands, their votes and those of the men having refused to vote, were added to the minority, and by this infamous "Hollandic Arithmetic" William felt justified to proclaim the new kingdom.

Regarding the frame of government the 1815 constitution did not diverge much from the situation during the Republic: the 110 members of House of Representatives (lower house) of the States General, the "Second Chamber" as it is still called, were still appointed by the States-Provincial (for three years; each year a third was replaced), who themselves were filled with nobility members or appointed by the city councils, just like under the ancien régime. However, now also some rural delegates were appointed to all States-Provincial (first only true for Friesland) and the city councils were appointed by electoral colleges which were in turn elected by a select group of male citizens of good standing and paying a certain amount of taxes, so very indirectly there was a modicum of democracy introduced to the system. In all the administration was very monarchical, with the king appointing for life the members of the Senate, the "First Chamber", that mockingly was called the Ménagerie du Roi.

Constitutional Reform of 1848
The Constitutional Reform of 1848 (Dutch: Grondwetsherziening van 1848) laid the basis for the present system of parliamentary democracy in the Netherlands. It is often described as the original version of the Dutch Constitution that is still in force today. Under pressure from the Revolutions of 1848 in surrounding countries, King William II agreed to several demands of the liberal parliamentary opposition. The House of Representatives obtained much more influence, and was now directly elected (although still by a restricted group of voters within a system of single-winner electoral districts). The reform was in some sense a peaceful revolution, in which liberal politician Johan Rudolph Thorbecke and King William II played important roles.

On 17 March 1848, the king appointed a state commission composed by Johan Rudolph Thorbecke (leader), Dirk Donker Curtius, Jacobus Mattheüs de Kempenaer, Lodewijk Caspar Luzac and Lambertus Dominicus Storm to prepare the Constitutional Reform, which was finished on 19 June. The commission's draft formed the basis of the government's proposals. The King and Minister Donker Curtius then made sure that the proposals were accepted by both houses of the States General, both of which still had a conservative majority. Agreement was reached on 11 October 1848. On 3 November 1848, the new Constitution was proclaimed.

The most important changes included:
 * The introduction of full ministerial responsibility, which meant the henceforth the Ministers were responsible for the government's policies instead of the king, who received sovereign immunity.
 * The States-Provincial, themselves elected by the voter, appointed by majorities for each province the members of the Senate from a select group of upper class citizens.
 * Parliament was henceforth elected directly, and obtained the right to interpellation, the right to hold investigative hearings (recht van enquête), and the right to amend government bills.
 * Suffrage was enlarged (though still limited to census suffrage), as was the bill of rights with the freedom of assembly and freedom of association, the privacy of correspondence, freedom of ecclesiastical organisation and the freedom of education.

The freedom of ecclesiastical organisation enabled the Catholic Church to reestablish the episcopal hierarchy in the Netherlands in 1853 (the previous hierarchy had been abolished during the Eighty Years' War). This challenged the perceived notion of the Netherlands being a Protestant nation, but Prime Minister Thorbecke maintained that, based on the freedom of religion and separation of church and state, the Catholic Church was allowed to reorganise itself on Dutch territory. Conservative Protestants initiated the April Movement in an attempt to prevent it, winning the sympathy of King William III. This led to a constitutional crisis and the resignation of the Thorbecke cabinet, because the king had violated the new Constitution that prohibited his interference in political affairs, and the ministers had to take responsibility in his stead.

Minor Revisions after 1848 Constitutional Reform
In 1884 there was a minor revision. In 1887 the census suffrage system was replaced by one based on minimal wealth and education, which allowed an ever-growing percentage of the male population to be given the right to vote; therefore this provision was at the time nicknamed the "caoutchouc-article". The election interval for the House of Representatives was changed from two (with half of it replaced) to four years (with full a replacement of now hundred members). Eligibility for the Senate was broadened. Any penal measure not based on formal law was prohibited.

In 1917, like in 1848 influenced by the tense international situation, manhood suffrage was introduced combined with a system of proportional representation to elect the House of Representatives, the States-Provincial and the municipality councils. The Senate continued to be elected by the States-Provincial, but now also employing a system of proportional representation, no longer by majorities per province. The Christian-democrat parties allowed manhood suffrage in exchange for a complete constitutional equality in state funding between public and denominational schools, ending the bitter "school struggle" which had antagonised Dutch society for three generations.

By the revision of 1922 universal suffrage was explicitly adopted in the constitution, after it had already been introduced by law in 1919. Each three years half of the members of the Senate were to be elected by the States-Provincial for a period of six years, within a system of proportional representation.

In 1938 there was a minor revision, introducing some elements of the then fashionable corporatism by giving a constitutional base to public bodies regulating sectors of the economy. A proposal to make it possible to impeach "revolutionary" members of representative bodies, directed against communists and fascists, failed to get a two-thirds majority.

After the Second World War in 1946 a revision failed attempting to simplify the revisional procedure. However, a change was accepted allowing to send conscripts to the colonial war in the Dutch East Indies.

In the revision of 1948 a complete new chapter was added to facilitate the incorporation of the new state of Indonesia within the Kingdom. Soon it would become irrelevant as Indonesia severed all ties with the Netherlands in 1954. Also the revision created the office of secretary of state, a kind of subminister or junior minister but one fully subordinate to a certain minister.

In 1953 new articles were introduced concerning international relations, as the Netherlands was abandoning its old policy of strict neutrality.

In the revision of 1956 the constitution was changed to accommodate the full independence of Indonesia. The number of members of the House of Representatives members was brought up to 150, of Senate members to 75.

The revision of 1963 accommodated the loss of Dutch New Guinea to Indonesia. The voting age was lowered from 23 to 21.

In 1972 there was a minor revision; the main change was a lowering of the voting age to 18.

Constitution of 1983
The Netherlands currently operates under the constitution passed in 1983 where the constitution was almost entirely rewritten. Many articles were abolished. Social rights were included, most articles were reformulated (the main exception being article 23 about the still sensitive freedom of education) using a new uniform legal terminology and their sequence was changed. The bill of rights was expanded with a prohibition of discrimination, a prohibition of the death penalty, a general freedom of expression, the freedom of demonstration and a general right to privacy.

In 1987 there was a minor revision. In the revision of 1995 the introduction of a professional army, replacing the conscript army, was regulated. In the revision of 1999 a proposal to introduce an advisory referendum was rejected by the Senate. After a minor revision in 2002, the last changes were made in 2005; a proposal to introduce an elected mayor was rejected by the Senate.