Legislative procedure (GDR)
In the GDR , after the dissolution of the GDR Land Chamber, the People's Chamber was the only legislative body. Up to 1958, in addition to the People's Chamber, the Laender Chamber had also participated in the legislative process. The People's Chamber also had the right to decide whether to hold popular votes . This only happened in the GDR in 1968, when a new constitution was passed. Until 1968 there was also the possibility of a referendum. But that never happened.
1949 Constitution
In the constitution, which came into force in 1949, the legislation was regulated in Articles 81 to 90. The government (from 1950 Council of Ministers ), the Laender Chamber and the People's Chamber had the right to introduce laws . The laws were passed by the People's Chamber; a two-thirds majority was required for constitution-amending laws. The Laender Chamber had the right to object to the legislative resolutions of the People's Chamber, but the People's Chamber was able to override the objection by means of a new vote. The laws were to be drawn up by the People's Chamber President. The President of the GDR (from 1960 the chairman of the Council of State ) had to announce the law in the GDR Law Gazette. Resolved laws had to be suspended for two months at the request of a third of the people's chamber members and, if a twentieth of those entitled to vote so requested, submitted to the referendum. This never happened, however, since the People's Chamber passed all laws unanimously with one exception and there were never enough votes against for a suspension. A referendum had to be held even if one tenth of the electorate or a party or a mass organization representing one fifth of the electorate requested it. But that never happened.
1968 Constitution
According to the constitution that came into force on April 9, 1968 after a “referendum”, the People's Chamber was “the only constitutional and legislative body in the German Democratic Republic”. The parties and mass organizations represented in the Volkskammer, the committees of the Volkskammer, the Council of Ministers, the Council of State and the Free German Trade Union Federation had the right of initiative . "Basic laws" had to be presented to the people for "discussion" before they were passed. The passed laws were announced by the chairman of the State Council in the law gazette. In this constitution there was still the possibility of referendums, but their implementation had to be decided by the People's Chamber. But that never happened. Referendums were no longer theoretically possible.
Actual conditions
The legislative process had a democratic-parliamentary appearance. However, since the People's Chamber was only made up of the members of the bloc parties elected according to the unified list , there were hardly any real discussions. Until the Peaceful Revolution in 1989, there were only dissenting votes from some CDU MPs on the law on the interruption of pregnancy . In fact, most of the bills were drafted in the governing bodies of the SED and submitted to the Council of Ministers, which adopted them. The bills were forwarded to the plenum via the People's Chamber Presidium, which they usually passed after a reading . In the case of “Fundamental Laws”, popular debates were held, but only formal questions and trivialities, not the core of the law, were discussed. In addition, the GDR Council of Ministers and its Presidium had the right to issue ordinances and implementing provisions. Extensive use was made of this right.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Federal Ministry for Inner-German Relations (Ed.): GDR Handbook . Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik , Cologne 1975, ISBN 3-8046-8515-3 , p. 374 .
- ↑ Federal Ministry for Inner-German Relations (Ed.): DDR Handbook . Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik , Cologne 1975, ISBN 3-8046-8515-3 , p. 910 .