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powers of the central government while paying lip service to the Laender (states) as the foundations of the state. It listed certain "guaranteed rights" of citizens, but, as in other Communist constitutions, these rights were qualified and subject to laws or interpretations of laws put into effect from time to time. Certain duties of citizens were stressed. Men and women legally were equal. Although the constitution appeared to establish a multi-party system of popular representation and a parliamentary form of government featuring legislative supremacy, in practice the executive branch of the government dominated. The executive, which was in turn controlled by the SED through interlocking directorates, made all major decisions and suspended or withdrew democratic rights as desired by the party leaders.
At the Seventh Party Congress in April 1967, Ulbricht stated that the 1949 constitution no longer reflected the political and social changes that had occurred during the previous two decades. A constitutional drafting committee was established in December of that year and 2 months later a draft was produced and made public. In an unprecedented move, the draft constitution was submitted to a nationwide referendum on 6 April 1968, and in carefully controlled voting was approved by nearly 95% of those who voted. The relative haste with which the new constitution was promulgated seemed due to a desire to emphasize the sovereign nature of the German Democratic Republic by distinguishing it clearly from West Germany.
The new constitution was designed both to incorporate into a basic framework the various changes adopted piecemeal by the regime since 1949 as well as to justify the coercive measures employed by the state to channel and control expression. In addition to codifying the numerous legislative and social changes which had been instituted in East Germany, the present constitution places particular stress on the sovereign political character of the state, and constitutionally anchors the SED in its leadership role. All political power is nominally exercised by the workers and peasants, led by the SED-dominated National Front and its component parties and mass organizations.
A whole series of rights contained in the old constitution is retained in the new, including among others the right to inherit "personal property"; to inviolability of the home, "to social care in case of old age and invalidity"; and the right "to profess a religious creed and to carry out religious activities." However, other rights guaranteed in the old constitution have been qualified. Thus, free speech, freedom of the press, the right to assemble peacefully, and the right of association can only be exercised "in accordance with the spirit and arms of this constitution." Certain other rights have been defined more narrowly or simply dropped from the new constitution; thus, the individual is not entirely free in his choice of work, and there is no provision which allows workers to strike in order to seek redress of their grievances. In short, the 1968 constitution is more explicit in granting authority to the state and subordinating the rights of the individual to the needs of society.
1. Legislature
The legislature (Volkskammer or People's Chamber) is one of the elite institutions of the German Democratic Republic and is meant to mirror the social structure of the population, to emphasize the direction the regime wants its citizens to go, and to honor worthy contributors to the building of socialism. Unlike legislative bodies in the West, however, the People's Chamber has little actual power and functions as a rubber-stamp, endorsing laws and decrees already formulated by the party.
East Germany's first constitution in 1949 established a bicameral federal legislature consisting of a People's Chamber and a chamber representing the Laender. The constitutional revision of 1968, however, replaced the two-chamber parliament with the unicameral People's Chamber consisting of 500 deputies elected for 4-year terms by citizens who have reached 18 years of age.
Candidates for the People's Chamber are proposed by election commissioned organized by the SED-dominated National Front. The front is a loose federation of nine officially sponsored groups including five political parties (the SED and four collaborating parties: the Christian Democratic Union, the German Liberal Democratic Party, the German National Democratic Party, and the German Democratic Peasants Party) and four mass organizations (the Free German Trade Union Federation, the Free German Youth, the Democratic Women's League of Germany, and the German Cultural Association). Only these nine organizations have seats in the People's Chamber. In legislative elections the National Front apportions the seats among these groups, designates the candidates who must be approved by the SED, and then nominates them en masse and places their names on the ballot. Because the National Front is exclusively empowered by the regime to put forth candidates, there is only a single-
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