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Authorization for Convocation of a Constituent Assembly in the Trizone (July 1, 1948)

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B. The Military Governors will resume their exercise of their full powers in an emergency threatening security, and if necessary to secure compliance with the constitutions or the occupation statute.

C. The Military Governors will exercise the above-mentioned controls according to the following procedure:

(a) Any amendments to the constitutions will be submitted to the approval of the Military Governors;
(b) In the fields mentioned in (a) to (e) of paragraph A above, the German authorities will comply with the decisions or directions of the Military Governors;
(c) Unless otherwise provided, in particular for implementation of paragraph (b) above, all laws and regulations emanating from the federal government shall come into force automatically within 21 days unless disapproved by the Military Governors.

The Military Governors will have special responsibility to observe, advise and assist the federal and state governments in regard to the democratization of political life, social relations and education. This shall not imply any restriction of the legislative, executive and judicial competence accorded to such governments in these matters.

The Military Governors request the Ministers President to submit their observations on the above principles. The Military Governors will then communicate these broad principles, modified as they may then agree, to the constituent assembly, as a guide to that body in its work of preparing the constitution, and will receive from it the observations which it may wish to put forward. When the Military Governors announce their approval for the submission of the constitution to the states they will publish simultaneously an occupation statute incorporating these principles as finally modified in order that the people of the states may understand that they accept the constitution within the framework of this occupation statute.


APPENDIX TO DOCUMENT III: Liaison Officers

Representatives of the Military Governors will be available to advise and assist the Ministers President and the constituent assembly on any matters which they may bring to their attention.




Source: The London Documents (July 1, 1948), in United States Department of State, Germany 1947-1949: The Story in Documents. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1950, p. 275; reprinted in Beata Ruhm von Oppen, ed., Documents on Germany under Occupation, 1945-1954. London and New York: Oxford University Press, 1955, pp. 315-18.

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