1990 • DDR
June 1990A country is reborn When Stefan Heym, the acting head of state, closed the last meeting of the constitutional committee, the whole world was aware that this was a historic day for the DDR. For the first time in history, a democratic constitution for the DDR was presented and ready to be implemented. The excitement was overwhelming: on the one hand, the new DDR was designed to be a democratic country, on the other hand, the country committed itself to the concept of socialism. The constitution guaranteed major human rights such as free speech, freedom of religion, a fair and democratic political process and the right to demonstrate, but it also had a focus on the public interest of private property and described the DDR as a sovereign, independent and neutral socialist state in the middle of Europe.
The political system which was implemented in the new constitution was a federal republic, governed by a parliament. The head of state was the president of the DDR, directly elected by the people and once eligible for re-election after five years, and mostly responsible for representative tasks. The government was lead by the prime minister who was elected by the Volkskammer, the lower house of parliament, which includes 400 members who are elected by proportional representation every four years. The Bezirkskammer was the upper house of the parliament, and it was a completely new institution. It consisted of 100 members who are directly elected at-large representatives of the 14 districts and the capital East Berlin. The numbers of the members per district was proportional to the number of inhabitants. The whole institution itself was strongly inspired by the US Senate, the members had a term of six years, while one third of the Bezirkskammer was re-elected every two years. The difference between the US Senate and the Bezirkskammer was that the seats were not associated with a certain class, so that during the elections every two years, one third of a district’s delegation was to be filled.
The delegations were the following:
Rostock:
■■■■■ 5 seats
Neubrandenburg: ■■■■ 4 seats
Schwerin: ■■■■ 4 seats
Potsdam: ■■■■■■■ 7 seats
Frankfurt: ■■■■ 4 seats
Magdeburg: ■■■■■■■ 7 seats
Cottbus: ■■■■■ 5 seats
Halle: ■■■■■■■■■■■ 11 seats
Leipzig: ■■■■■■■■ 8 seats
Erfurt: ■■■■■■■ 7 seats
Dresden: ■■■■■■■■■■ 11 seats
Karl-Marx-Stadt: ■■■■■■■■■■■ 11 seats
Gera: ■■■■ 4 seats
Suhl: ■■■ 3 seats
Berlin: ■■■■■■■■ 8 seats
The constitution needed a majority of two-thirds in the Volkskammer to be ratified. The constitutional committee decided not to hold a public referendum, which was heavily criticized by the East-CDU. Heyms argument was, that the extraordinary election day, in which every member of the Bezirkskammer, the President of the DDR and all local and district representatives had to be elected, could be seen as an unofficial referendum on the constitution. That did not convince the CDU, but at least the majority of the constitutional committee.
The vote on the new constitution took place on June 18th, 1990. The PDS-SDVP coalition, which was heavily promoted the piece of legislation, had a comfortable absolute majority in the Volkskammer, but it was still 35 seats short of a two-third majority. Prime Minister Modrow and Deputy Prime Minister Meckel praised the new constitution as a “revolutionary step” towards a “democratic and socialist Germany” and that the DDR “arose from its ashes of the past.” Lothar de Maizičre, leader of the East-CDU, however, did not hold back his criticism.
“This piece of legislation is a disgraceful step of the fundamentalist left to claim this country and to prevent possible developments in the future. You call us “conservative”, and that is what we are, conservatives, who remember the old greatness of our democratic and liberal nation, but you are reactionaries, who are stuck in the years before the peaceful revolution. Honecker and Mielke were your pawn sacrifices, but their spirit it still in the heads of those who claim to be the progressives on this day. And the fact that we are now illegally ratifying a constitution behind closed doors shows that you have understand nothing, and that the democracy you appear to uphold is not more than a sham.”
De Maizičres speech was followed with wild applause by conservative members of the Volkskammer, but that did not conceal the fact that those who still believed in a German unity, or were even in favor of it, were a rather isolated group in the parliament, and nearly every other faction had understood that sovereignty was more popular among the people than the promise of a German re-unification. The Alliance 90, an ecosocialist party which had 18 representatives in the Volkskammer, said that the proposed constitution was “a first step to eliminate the musty odour of the SED’s so-called socialism.” The Democratic Farmers, a group of 14 representatives, said that “those who work hard for our prosperity have no motivation to get exploited by the western capitalism that the CDU wants to implement.” And even the Social Union, the far right populist party in the Volkskammer, claimed that “the heritage of the old German glory lies in the hand of the people of the DDR” and that the people showed that it wanted “sovereignty above all.” It was also obvious that even de Maizičres CDU was not unified on this question, and neither was the liberal Alliance of Free Democrats, which refused to say a word in the debate.
The constitution was approved by the Volkskammer with 296 aye-votes, 46 nay-votes and 68 abstentions. The East-CDU and Thomas de Maizičre suffered a horrible defeat. From this day on, the campaigns started. A super election was dated on the 18th of July, on which every now vacant office had to be elected.
