Institutions
Article 91 of the constitution stipulated that the institutions of the Community were to be established by 4 April 1959.
These were as follows:
The President of the Community was the President of the French Republic. The member states also took part in his election and he was represented in each state by a High Commissioner. In 1958 President de Gaulle was elected by an absolute majority in all the states.
The Executive Council of the Community met several times a year, in one or other of the capitals, on the summons of the President, who assumed the chair. It was composed of the chiefs of the governments of the different states and the ministers responsible for common affairs.
The Senate of the Community was composed of members of the local assemblies designated by them in numbers proportional to the population of the state. This body was functionally powerless, and after holding two sessions it was abolished in March 1961.
A Community Court of Arbitration, composed of seven judges nominated by the President, gave decisions in disputes between member states.
Because France did not want to become 'a colony of its colonies', African countries did not make up a majority voting bloc and were functionally required to join with French parties in order to gain voting power.
Read more about this topic: French Community
Famous quotes containing the word institutions:
“You see how this House of Commons has begun to verify all the ill prophecies that were made of it—low, vulgar, meddling with everything, assuming universal competency, and flattering every base passion—and sneering at everything noble refined and truly national. The direct tyranny will come on by and by, after it shall have gratified the multitude with the spoil and ruin of the old institutions of the land.”
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)
“Is it not manifest that our academic institutions should have a wider scope; that they should not be timid and keep the ruts of the last generation, but that wise men thinking for themselves and heartily seeking the good of mankind, and counting the cost of innovation, should dare to arouse the young to a just and heroic life; that the moral nature should be addressed in the school-room, and children should be treated as the high-born candidates of truth and virtue?”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Unless we maintain correctional institutions of such character that they create respect for law and government instead of breeding resentment and a desire for revenge, we are meeting lawlessness with stupidity and making a travesty of justice.”
—Mary B. Harris (1874–1957)