Word: referendum
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Before Charles de Gaulle vowed to resign "without delay" if Frenchmen reject his proposals in the April 27 national referendum, the polls showed an apathetic and uncertain electorate: 52% undecided or determined to abstain and the rest almost evenly divided. Last week the first poll taken after the general's ultimatum turned up results that would dismay a lesser man. A full 40% of the voters had not yet made up their minds, and the rest were still divided. Only 52% intended to vote oui for De Gaulle's program-and therefore for De Gaulle himself...
...concern was reflected in a massive campaign. Finance Minister François-Xavier Ortoli promised no new taxes this year. Defense Minister Pierre Messmer announced that the government was considering lowering compulsory military service from 16 months to twelve. The Ministry of Interior prepared 29 million pamphlets explaining the referendum-one for every voter in France. Applying what has always before been the clinching argument, Minister of State Roger Frey drew a frightening picture of a France without De Gaulle: "To vote no or to abstain is to vote for the Communist Party, to compromise France's economic recovery...
Paris' Le Monde had a word for that: "Blackmail." The Gaullist scare tactic further distorted an already complex referendum that lumps three disparate issues in one take-it-or-leave-it package. The main component is De Gaulle's plan to shift power from Paris bureaucrats to newly created economic regions. Along with this popular measure, voters are asked to endorse De Gaulle's plans to strip away the Senate's powers and shift the line of presidential succession from the President of the Senate to the Premier-a De Gaulle appointee. Thus put, the packaging...
...decision to have today's symposium was reached after a Business Referendum voted 847-430-124 last week to "support a joint Student-Faculty symposium on the issues now facing Harvard." There will be a follow-up meeting on Monday
...hope Mr. Kutik's article has not guaranteed that no one will step forth to assume the thankless and obviously personally perilous task of conducting the coming referendum. I certainly shall not, although I still desperately desire to serve the free academic community of Harvard in this its darkest hour...