But it did protect individual liberties and rights and instituted new rules
in the exercise of state authority. As has been often observed, with the new Constitution of
1911 the foundations were laid for the rule of the law in Greece.
The fundamental innovations were: the
permanency of the civil service; free compulsory elementary education;
the independence of the judiciary, the Council of State, Court Elections and various other judiciary institutions.
Also of importance was the decision regarding the compulsory expropriation
of private lands (though with compensation) and the abolishment of the medieval agricultural system of the Ionian islands,
measures that paved the way for the restoration of landless peasants and agricultural reforms. For
the first time the formation of agricultural cooperatives is provided for.
There were also improvements in the parliamentary system, which was adjusted to new
needs (such as a decrease in the size of the quorum, the abolition of the need for three debates per bill and the
right to ratify legal codes in their totality).
The reforms also provided for the possibility to assign commissions to foreign organizers, thus legalizing the employment of foreign experts who would undertake the organization and improvement, especially in the country's defense systems.
This was a Constitution and a body of laws which generally served the double objective of consolidating
the principles of the rule of the law and the liberal republican constitution. In other words, it safeguarded individual liberties (while also preventing the
undue exercise of these) and facilitated the interventionist role of the state in the economy and the
practice of social policy.
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