Historical Aspects
On 25 November 1830 a draft for the constitution, elaborated by a commission nominated by the Provisional Government, was submitted for vote to the National Congress. Finally, the Congress approved the constitution on 7 February 1831. It entered into force on 26 July 1831, with the exception of certain provisions.
The Belgian constitution is a synthesis of the French constitutions of 1791, 1814 and 1830, Dutch constitution of 1814 and the English constitutional laws. However, the resulting constitutional text is an original creation. Its basic principles are still in use today.
Belgium is a constitutional monarchy sometimes called a popular monarchy.
In 1849 Denmark drafted their own constitution, largely based on the Belgian and the Norwegian constitutions.
Only in 1967 an official Dutch version of the Belgian Constitution was adopted. Up to then, the Dutch text was only a translation without legal value. Since 1991 there is also an official German version of the Constitution.
Constitutional theorist A.V. Dicey has observed that the Belgian constitution "comes very near to a written reproduction of the English constitution."
Read more about this topic: Constitution Of Belgium
Famous quotes containing the words historical and/or aspects:
“After so many historical illustrations of the evil effects of abandoning the policy of protection for that of a revenue tariff, we are again confronted by the suggestion that the principle of protection shall be eliminated from our tariff legislation. Have we not had enough of such experiments?”
—Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901)
“Grammar is a tricky, inconsistent thing. Being the backbone of speech and writing, it should, we think, be eminently logical, make perfect sense, like the human skeleton. But, of course, the skeleton is arbitrary, too. Why twelve pairs of ribs rather than eleven or thirteen? Why thirty-two teeth? It has something to do with evolution and functionalism—but only sometimes, not always. So there are aspects of grammar that make good, logical sense, and others that do not.”
—John Simon (b. 1925)