Giscard suspected of taking interest in USA system

EUobserver.com ^ | Sept. 3, 2002 | Daniella Spinant

[TheMole]

EUOBSERVER/STRASBOURG - Members of the European Parliament suspect Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, president of the Convention on EU future, of taking too much interest in the American institutional system, with a view to introducing it in the European Union. Mr Giscard, who is leading an unprecedented reflection on the future of the European Union in the Convention, which may end up writing a European constitution, was reported to have read up over the summer the history of the United States of America and its institutional system.

VALÉRY GISCARD d'ESTAING - Chairman of the European Convention was reported to have read up over the summer the history of the United States of America and its institutional system. (Photo: European Convention)

The former French president allegedly spent the summer reading books about the making of the constitution of the United States of America.

Philadelphia Convention parallels

Mr Giscard, who compared himself with Benjamin Franklin, has already made parallels between the Convention on the future of Europe and the Philadelphia Convention, which wrote the constitution of the United States of America.

However, high officials close to the Convention's president are seeking to play down Mr Giscard's interest in the USA institutional model. "The parallel with the United States does not go too far. There is a parallelism in form and name, between the European Union and the United States, but not on substance," Mr Giscard's spokesman Nikolaus Meyer-Landrut told the EUobserver on Tuesday.

"Nobody can seriously claim that on the substance the results of the Philadelphia Convention can bring about solutions for the future of the European Union," Mr Meyer-Landrut said. The Convention's spokesman added, however, that one can have an intellectual interest in the USA institutional and political model.

The United States' institutional system has been mentioned as a possible example for the future European Union several times since the debate on reforming the EU has started. A number of Convention members, including representatives of the French government Pierre Moscovici, referred to the United States of Europe when outlining ideas for reforming the EU.

[TheMole]

This actual, real, intended-to-be-serious article was excerpted and linked to by opinionjournal.com's Best of the Web feature under the heading "This should be in The Onion". I followed the link to see if it was real. It's astonishing how some people refuse to believe or acknowledge that America's success has anything to do with the Founding Fathers and the constitution they wrote.

[flying Elvis]

Interestingly, M. Gascard changed his last name to D'Estaing. The last surviving D'Estaing was an admiral in the French Navy who assisted the colonists during the American Revolution. He was later executed during the French Revolution. M. Gascard is also a conservative. Things that make you go "hmmmm?"

[wretchard]

At least two issues are sure to reprise in any consideration of an EU constitution. One where sovereignty resides. During the Philiadelpha convention, the prevailing view was that sovereignty inhered in the United States. The individual states were held to be "great corporations" without essential sovereignty. The second was state equality versus proportional representation. Some wanted all states, no matter how small, to be the equal of large states. Others wanted voting power apportioned according to population. Philadelpha compromised: the number of Congressmen each state has is proportionate to its population; the number of senators for each state is exactly two. State equality also figured in the design of the electoral college, which chooses the president.

Where will European sovereignty reside? In the Union or the will it remain with the individual countries? Will the countries be equal at the voting table, or will the large countries have proportionately more votes?

Given that the Europeans have no history of addressing these issues, D'Estaing is going back to the one body which successfully met these problems: the Philadelphia Constitutional Convention. After all, the hillbilly Republic formed from that Constitution is several times older than the sophisticated, experienced and incomparable Fourth Republic that D'Estaing once had the honor of leading.

[fporretto]

Of course any interest in the American Constitution will be decried by Euro-socialists. Their schemes require total and unabridged power over their subjects. A constitution is inherently a power-limiting instrument, that enumerates the legitimate powers of the State and prescribes its procedures for wielding them.

Our domestic socialists can't evade the fact of our Constitution, so they work their way around it with notions like the "evolving document" and ever more creative distortions of the text. That's hard work, which the Euro-socialists would prefer to avoid. After all, what's the point of having all those serfs if you're saddled with a Constitution that prevents you from mulcting them at your pleasure?

Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
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