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Comparative Politics and Government

Notes (Staatenbund) into a federal State Bunderstaat). The Constitution of 1848 was radically revised in
1874, and the Constitution of that year, subsequently amended in certain features, is the one under
which Switzerland is governed today.”

Switzerland now is divided into twenty-two cantons, self-governing as far as their local
affairs are concerned, but united into a federation for national purposes.

The Constitution of 1848 was essentially the creation of a committee of 23 men elected by their
colleagues in the Diet or, in the case of a few ecalcitrant cantons, appointed by its Chairman. As
members of the Diet, most of them were also chief of their cantonal governments. The ones who
came from the liberal cantons had also participated in the liberal devision of their cantonal
Constitutions. The large majority were members of the legal profession, supplanted by a few
merchants, two doctors and few high-ranking officers who had just returned from the Sonderbund
War. Perhaps the most interesting characteristic of the participants was their relative youth. Four,
including the Chairman of the committee, were in their thirties, the great majority were in their
forties, and only six were over fifty. Only Neuchatel which was still nominally a principality
under the monarch of Prussia and Apenzell-Inner Rhodes were not represented on the drafting
committee.
Prior to its eventual ratification by the people and the cantons, the Constitution could be adopted
as a result of compromise. While the advocates of centralism desired a strong Central government,
the federalists were no less adamant on ensuring the principle of autonomy of the units. bicameral
legislative system was thus accepted so that the units of the onfederation may have their
representatives in the upper chamber of the ederal Assembly. Then, a peculiar pattern of a collegial
executive was adopted so that no member of the government could exercise his authority in an
arbitrary manner. Likewise, the idea of a powerful judicial authority as one having its manifestation
in the United States was abhorred with the result that the Federal Tribunal was deprived of the
power of judicial review of legislation. In fine, while the ‘centralists’ could be successful in devising
a strong and unified government at the Centre, the federalists could emerge triumphant in
reconciling the issue of a strong Central government with the freedom of the people and the
autonomy of the cantons.
It was specifically given that the cantons would remain ‘sovereign so far as their sovereignty is not
limited by the Federal Constitution’. The powers of the Federal Government extended to diplomatic
and military affairs as well as to certain other spheres such as posts, customs, weights, and
measures and such other matters in which concerted action was deemed necessary with a view to
achieving national unity. The executive power was vested in a Federal Council consisting of 7
members elected by the Federal Assembly. The legislative power was vested in a bicameral body
called the Federal Assembly. While the National Council was given to represent the people, the
Council of States was to have the representatives of the cantonal governments. The judicial authority
was vested in the Federal Tribunal without power of judicial review. An important change in the
direction of a strong and unified government at the Centre could be visualised in the provision
that while the Constitution guaranteed sovereignty to the cantons, it authorised the Federal
Government to intervene in the cantonal affairs without awaiting a request from the cantonal
authority in the event of internal disturbances or threatened conflict between the cantons.
The most important feature of the Constitution of 1848 should, however, be traced in its provision
for a strong and unified government system based on a federal model. It terminated the system of
a loose Union of States as coming from five and a half centuries and set up a new model which,
though formally designated as a ‘Confederation’, was the model of a federation. Thus, the
transformation of a loose league of cantons into a federation of the units of ‘Confederation’ should
be described as the dominant feature of the Constitution of 1848. Certainly, it afforded “an even
more striking example than the United States of how conflicting state interests can be overcome,

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