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Concept
Constitution of the Netherlands
Summary
The Constitution for the Kingdom of the Netherlands (Grondwet voor het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden) is one of two fundamental documents governing the Kingdom of the Netherlands as well as the fundamental law of the European territory of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It is generally seen as directly derived from the one issued in 1815, constituting a constitutional monarchy; it is the third oldest constitution still in use worldwide.
A revision in 1848 instituted a system of parliamentary democracy. In 1983, a major revision of the Constitution of the Netherlands was undertaken, almost fully rewriting the text and adding new civil rights. The text is sober, devoid of legal or political doctrine and includes a bill of rights. It prohibits the judiciary to test laws and treaties against the constitution, as this is considered a prerogative of the legislature. There is no constitutional court in the Netherlands, except for the Constitutional Court of Sint Maarten which only governs the Sint Maarten legislature. The Kingdom of the Netherlands also includes Aruba, Curaçao and Sint Maarten: there is an overarching instrument of the entire kingdom that has constitution characteristics: the Statute of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
The first constitution of the Netherlands as a whole, in the sense of a fundamental law which applied to all its provinces and cities, is the 1579 constitution, which established the confederal Dutch Republic. The constitution was empowered by the Union of Utrecht, thus by treaty. Article XIII of the treaty granted each inhabitant of the Republic freedom of conscience.
After the French invasion of 1794 the Batavian Republic, a unitary state, was proclaimed. On 31 January 1795 it issued a bill of rights, the Verklaring der Rechten van den Mensch en van den Burger. On 1 May 1798 a new constitution, the first in the modern formal sense, the Staatsregeling voor het Bataafsche Volk, written by a Constitutional Assembly, went into force, approved by the National Assembly.
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