THE REFERENDUM IN SWITZERLAND.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "Simms/v[4n SM,—You no doubt have noticed how the Swiss Parliament, after a long and somewhat heated debate, has just formally and finally ratified the agreement with Germany and Italy, which is currently named the Gothard Convention. Both houses were full when the vote was taken. The National • Council showed a majority of a hundred and eight ayes against seventy-seven noes, and the Council of States gave thirty-three votes for and nine against. The feeling of the people was decidedly opposed to the ratification ; in coin*
mercial and business circles the agreement was looked upon simply as a business transaction in the matter of tariffs as between the German, Italian, and Swiss State railways. However, the discontent of the people will have a consequence of a kind which will interest you as enlarging the sphere open to the action of the Swiss referendum. The leaders of the Opposition, holding that the Federal powers have countenanced a direct encroachment upon the sovereign and discretionary authority of the Swiss in matters of internal government, by an international treaty, are collecting signatures with a view to adding to the Constitution a new article making inter- national treaties liable as a whole to the exercise of the referendum if they are concluded for an indefinite period, and even restricting to a duration of fifteen years such inter- national agreements as may legally be withdrawn from the operation of the referendum. This is a strongly nationalistic movement, and shows that the Federal powers are no longer implicitly trusted by the people to resist, unaided, foreign blandishments.—I am, Sir, &c., SWITZER.
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