Constituent Assembly

“ There are those who question why a Constituent Assembly is needed, if the Constitution can be amended by Congress. Those who make this objection should remember that the Executive Branch must concentrate on governing, and Congress on legislating and exercising political control over the government; tasks that must be referred to attend the urgent matters of each day. ”

“ The Constituent Assembly Everyone knows, because we have stated so many times, that one of our main political flags, now converted into a flag of the majority of the people, is the convocation of a constituent assembly that provides our country with a new constitution that allows change the face of our economic and social reality. ”

“ If the august Constituent Assembly itself, fixing the regards of the Universe, could, at the present distance of time and place, gain comparatively small attention from us, how much less can this poor Legislative! It has its Right Side and its Left; the less Patriotic and the more, for Aristocrats exist not here or now: it spouts and speaks; listens to Reports, reads Bills and Laws; works in its vocation, for a season: but the History of France, one finds, is seldom or never there. ”

“ That is why the constituent work cannot and should not be in charge of these bodies. Instead, the Constituent Assembly will be elected by the people exclusively to dedicate itself to preparing, within a predetermined period, a draft Constitution, the product of political debate and pluralist agreement, which will be submitted to a referendum. ”

“ The measures adopted by the Constituent Assembly seem to republican eyes just and moderate. Experience, it is true, has proved that it is safer to have two houses of legislation, a senate and a lower house, than one, but the subsequent decrees passed by this one house were manifestly dictated, not by passion, but by patriotism and a sense of right. ”

“ Naturally, the interests of this revolution stand higher than the formal rights of the Constituent Assembly, even if those formal rights were not undermined by the absence in the law on the Constituent Assembly of a provision recognising the right of the people to recall their deputies and hold new elections at any moment. ”

“ Here also appeared an announcement of the propagandism of liberty, of which the Girondists spoke so enthusiastically a year later. [122] A few numbers later, an article censured the indifference of the people in regard to the elections for the coming Legislative Assembly, saying that upon the composition of this body would depend the safety of the republic. The Constituent Assembly is not spared criticism for making the Constitution unalterable by the Legislative Assembly. ”

“ Mirabeau's fulminant words to him: exit De Brézé, fruitless and worse, 'amid seas of angry people.' All France on the edge of blazing out: Court recoils; Third Estate, other Two now joining it on order, triumphs, successful in every particular. The States-General are henceforth 'National Assembly'; called in Books distinctively 'Constituent Assembly'; that is. Assembly met 'to make the Constitution,'—perfect Constitution, under which the French People might realise their Millennium. ”

“ Having secured the Rights of Man, they looked with alarm at future legislation, that could not improve, and might endanger them. They wished the Constituent Assembly to bind and bar its successors as far as possible; for none would ever speak with so much authority as the genuine voice of the entire people. ”

“ Until both Houses of Parliament have been duly constituted and summoned to meet for the first session under the provisions of this Constitution, the body functioning as the Constituent Assembly of the Dominion of India immediately before the commencement of this Constitution shall be the provisional Parliament and shall exercise all the powers and perform all the duties conferred by the provisions of this Constitution on Parliament. ”

“ All electoral committees, all local organizations, the Councils of Workmen's, Soldiers' and Peasants' Delegates and the soldiers' organizations at the front are to bend every effort toward safeguarding the freedom of the voters and fair play at the elections to the Constituent Assembly, which will be held on the appointed date. ”

“ Notwithstanding anything in article 168, Parliament may by law provide for the abolition of the Legislative Council of a State having such a Council or for the creation of such a Council in a State having no such Council, if the Legislative Assembly of the State passes a resolution to that effect by a majority of the total membership of the Assembly and by a majority of not less than two-thirds of the members of the Assembly present and voting. ”

“ Article 2 The States may merge with one another, sub-divide or partition in order to annex themselves to others or form new States, by vote of the respective legislative assemblies, plebiscite of the populations directly concerned and approval of the National Congress. ”

“ The Constituent Assembly affirms the decision of the Portuguese people to defend their national independence, to guarantee the fundamental rights of citizens, to establish the basic principles of democracy, to safeguard the primacy of the rule of law in a democratic state and to open the way to a socialist society, with respect for the will of the Portuguese people and the goal of building a freer, more just and more fraternal country. ”

“ The organs comprising Electoral Power are governed by principles of organic independence, functional and budgetary autonomy, separation of the electoral organs from the political parties, impartiality and citizen participation, as well as decentralization of electoral administration, transparency and expeditiousness of the voting process and tallying of votes. ”

“ Deputies of the National Assembly, are obligated to work on a full-time basis for the benefit of the people's interest, and to stay in constant contact with their constituents, heeding these opinions and suggestions and keeping them informed about its individual and Assembly Management. They shall render in an annual accounting of its management to the constituents* in the jurisdiction from which they were elected, and shall be subject to recall by referendum as provided for under this Constitution and the applicable law. ”

“ The proposals of resolutions, laws and regulations shall, in order to be brought into conformity with the Constitution, be transmitted by the President of the Government of the F.P.R.Y. to the legislative committees. Section 137. All persons under the age of eighteen, who have been entered in the lists of electors for the Constituent Assembly, shall retain the electoral right thus acquired. ”

“ We who remain free number a hundred and twenty Republican Representatives. Let us install ourselves in this hall. Let us install ourselves in the fulness and majesty of the Legislative Power. Henceforward we are the Assembly, the whole of the Assembly! Let us sit there, deliberate there, in our official sashes, in the midst of the People. Let us summon the Faubourg St. Antoine to its duty, let us shelter there the National Representation, let us shelter there the popular sovereignty. ”

“ Sovereignty resides untransferable in the people, who exercise it directly in the manner provided for in this Constitution and in the law, and indirectly, by suffrage, through the organs exercising Public Power. The organs of the State emanate from and are subject to the sovereignty of the people. ”

“ Where there are two Houses of the Legislature of a State, one shall be known as the Legislative Council and the other as the Legislative Assembly, and where there is only one House, it shall be known as the Legislative Assembly. ”

“ The executive power of every State shall be so exercised as not to impede or prejudice the exercise of the executive power of the Union, and the executive power of the Union shall extend to the giving of such directions to a State as may appear to the Government of India to be necessary for that purpose. ”

“ The most natural substitute for an assembly of the whole, is a delegation of power, from the many, to a few of the most wise and virtuous. In the first place then establish rules for the choice of representatives: agree upon the number of persons who shall have the privilege of choosing one. As the representative assembly should be an exact portrait, in miniature, of the people at large, as it should think, feel, reason and act like them, great care should be taken in the formation of it, to prevent unfair, partial and corrupt elections. ”

“ The assembly shall be elected in universal, direct and secret suffrage of the citizens resident in its area by a system of proportional representation.
3. The organs of local authorities may undertake direct consultations with the citizens enrolled on the electoral register in their area, by secret vote, on matters within their exclusive powers, in the cases, under the conditions, and with the effect, that the law shall prescribe. ”

“ The actions that Municipalities have the power to take within the scope of their competence are without prejudice to national and state competence as defined by law in accordance with the Constitution. ”

“ All citizens* have the right to participate freely in public affairs, either directly or through their elected* representatives.
The participation of the people in forming, carrying out and controlling the management of public affairs is the necessary way of achieving the involvement to ensure their complete development, both individual and collective. It is the obligation of the State and the duty of society to facilitate the generation of optimum conditions for putting this into practice. ”

“ The Vice President shall be the chairman of the Constitution Committee and five justices of the Supreme Court and five members of the National Assembly shall serve as members of the Constitution Committee. A decision holding that a law is unconstitutional requires a two-thirds majority of the Constitution Committee. The organization and the rules of procedure of the Constitution Committee shall be determined by law. ”

“ He was to nominate the members of the council of state, whose duty it was to prepare the laws, and of the senate, a body permanently established as a constituent part of the empire. One innovation was made, namely, that the Legislative Body was elected by universal suffrage, but it had no right of initiative, all laws being proposed by the executive power. ”

“ Every citizen of the age of 21 could vote directly in the election of deputies, who were chosen for a year at a time and were to sit in a single assembly. The assembly had the sole power of making laws, but a period was fixed during which the constituents could protest against its enactments. The executive power was entrusted to 24 men, who were chosen by the assembly from candidates nominated by electors chosen by the original voters. ”

“ Public Administration is at the service of the citizen and is based on the principles of honesty, participation, expeditiousness, efficacy, efficiency, transparency, accountability and responsibility in the performance of public functions, being fully subject to the law and to the right.
Article 142: Autonomous institutions can be created only by law. Such institutions, as well as public interests in foundations or organs of any nature, shall be subject to State Control in such form as may be established by law. ”