Form of Government: Historical Development and Evolution
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Form of Government: Historical Development and Evolution The ideas about Constitution and Parliament, for voting and representation arise even before the restoration of the independent Bulgarian state in 1878 under the influence of the European thoughts and political practices. In 1879 in the former capital of the Second Bulgarian state – Veliko Tarnovo is the start of the parliamentary practice of the liberated Bulgaria. The people’s representatives elaborate the Tarnovo Constitution and signed it down with one consent on April 16, 1878. It is created later than the constitutions of Greece, Serbia and Romania. The History has defined it to rule the country in the next about 70 years. According to the regulations of the Tarnovo Constitution the Bulgarian state is a parliamentary monarchy with a moderate liberal system. The supreme power in the state is divided between the ruler and the National Assembly. The Bulgarian monarch is the Head of the sate who approves the voted by the National Assembly laws. He is also the supreme commander of the armed forces. Under his name and under his supervising act the executive bodies. The Head of the state has important power also concerning the judiciary power – he could reprieve and announce amnesty. According to Tarnovo Constitution the National Assembly could be of two kinds – Regular and Great National Assembly. Basic Supreme body of the legislative power is the Regular National Assembly (NA) that elaborates and passes the laws, adopts the state budget, controls the executive power, etc. Constituent power possesses only the Great National Assembly (GNA) that has the power to change the territory of the country, to change the Constitution and to choose the monarch and regents. The implementation of the laws is imposed to the Council of Ministers, whose composition is also regulated by the Constitution. Thus is finalized the original triangular of the supreme power in the country: Royal Prince – Council of Ministers – National Assembly. This represents a modern and functional construction, the model for which has been taken from the best in the European constitutional practice. The Tarnovo Constitution provides broad citizen rights. It confirms the principle of inviolability of the personality and the private property. The freedom of the press, the freedom of unions and others have won recognition. The Tarnovo Constitution contains also texts that have more moral than political sounding. Thus it is written in it that it is prohibited division in social estates in Bulgaria and there could be not any noble titles. But the Tarnovo Constitution also contains a series of deficiencies. Thus in it here is no guarantee for the announced through it principles, rights and liberties. A serious gap is the lack of whatever regulations on the functions and of the bodies of the juridical power. Those shortcomings create opportunities for conflicts of interests and for abuses and misuses on the part of the three sides and participants in the execution of the governance. Still in its content the Tarnovo Constitution is a progressive one and it opens the doors for development of a modern Bulgaria. The Tarnovo Constitution is the basic law of Bulgaria from 1879 to 1947 where twice it has gone through some changes that decreased the powers of the National Assembly and increased the powers of the monarchy. The constitutional order in Bulgaria has been violated not once. In 1881 the Constitution is temporarily suspended, in 1923 there has been a military coup d’etat and after May 19, 1934 for a long time the country has been governed by ordinances-laws by practically abrogated constitution. On September 9, 1944 the Bulgarian Communist by the presence of Soviet troops in the country, take over the power of the country. After carrying out a referendum on September 15, 1947 Bulgaria has been proclaimed a Republic. On December 4, 1947 The Sixth Great National Assembly adopts the Constitution of the People’s Republic of Bulagria. The so-called ‘Dimitrovska’ Constitution (after the family name of the Comminist leader Georgi Dimitrov) has been prepared under the dictation of the Soviet specialists. It has been used till 1971. The most often met words in it are ‘state’ and ‘people’. With it have been adopted in Bulgaria the basic principles of the Soviet model for fusion of the legislative, the executive and the juridical powers as well as the monopoly over the power of the Bulgarian Communist Party (BCP) has been ensured. Oppressed have been the basic civil rights and liberties, though it was announced that all in the country is done ‘on behalf of the people’. And legalized is the nationalization of the private property. After the period of de-Stalinization and the stabilization of the Eastern block of states in 1971 with a referendum a ‘new’ Constitution of the People’s Republic of Bulgaria has been adopted. It has been named by the people also after the family name of the then leader of the Communist party and the country – the “Zhivkov’s” Constitution that has been regulating in the countries its basic law till 1991. There in its Article 1 it has been explicitly worded that “The leading role in the society and in the country belongs to the Bulgarian Communist Party”. This ‘new’ Constitution proclaims the fusion of the legislative and the executive power in one body –a State Council, whose President becomes at once Todor Zhivkov. The Constitution defines the system in Bulgaria of that time as ‘developed socialist society’ – a concept too abstract as formulation and notion and postpones the ‘entering into the communism’ for 1980 – one of the consecutive unrealized promises. On July 12, 1991 the Seventh Great National Assembly has voted the new Constitution of the Republic of Bulgaria. It turned into the Constitution of the revived democratic state. According to it Bulgaria is a republic with parliamentary governance. It is a united country where no autonomous territorial regions are permitted. The Constitution establishes the basic principle on which the political system of the society is based – political pluralism, division of power. It defines the system, the organization and the activities of the state bodies, the authorities of the Head of the state – the President of the Republic. In it are listed the principles of the democratic voting system – common, equal and direct voting right with secret voting, the forms of propriety are defined – private and public (state and municipal), the basic rights and liberties of the citizens and the basic obligations of the citizens. Thus the constitutionalism, that has nearly 130 years background in Bulgaria, has triumph again and Bulgaria and the Bulgarians were back on the road towards the democracy that inevitably leads them also toward united Europe. .