Venice Commission - Report on Bicameralism
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1.Has the country ever had a bicameral parliamentary (or congressional) system in the past? If so, in which period? Why was it decided to change into a unicameral system? Is there a public debate about changing to a bicameral system? What are the terms of the debate?
The modern State of Lithuania – the Republic of Lithuania, which was established in 1918, has never had a bicameral parliamentary system.
2.What is the population of the country? What is its size?
According to the official statistical data, as provided by the Department of Statistics of the Republic of Lithuania (https://osp.stat.gov.lt/EN/statistiniu-rodikliu-analize?hash=103cad31-9227-4990-90b0-8991b58af8e7#/), the population of Lithuania in 2023 is estimated to be 2,860,002 people (46 % male, 54 % female; 85 % Lithuanians, 6,5 % Poles, 5 % Russians, 3,5 % - other nationalities). The size of the country is 65,286 km2, the population density at the beginning of 2022 was 43.0 per 1 km².
3.What form of state and form of government has the country? Please provide details with reference to relevant constitutional provisions. a) Unitarian or federal/regional/other form of decentralization; b) Parliamentary, presidential, semi-presidential or mixed
Lithuania is a parliamentary republic, as the Parliament (Seimas) is the representative body elected by the People with the strongest powers to determine the strategical guidelines and the development of the State and to control the activities of the executive. The executive power is dualistic: the President is the head of the State with purely symbolic, formal and ceremonial powers in formation of the Government as well as with certain stronger powers in formation of foreign and defense policy and the appointment of the judiciary. Meanwhile, the Government has much stronger powers in daily administration of the State affairs.
4.How many members are in the lower house?
Unicameral Parliament (Seimas) of Lithuania consists of 141 members. Art. 55(1) of the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania: “The Seimas shall consist of representatives of the Nation—141 Members of the Seimas, who shall be elected for a four-year term on the basis of universal, equal, and direct suffrage by secret ballot.”
Lithuania
However, if to look at the historical development of the State of Lithuania, it had a bicameral parliamentary system in time of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania when it was a part of the Commonwealth of Two Nations (together with the Kingdom of Poland) before its annexation (the final division of the Commonwealth) by Russia, Prussia and Austria in 1795. The Constitution of 3 May 1791, which was the first written Constitution in Europe, established a constitutional monarchy and consolidated a bicameral parliament of estates (see more in: Lithuanian Constitutionalism: the Past and the Present, p. 49-56, 392-394, https://lrkt.lt/data/public/uploads/2017/12/lithuanian-constitutionalism.pdf) The Convention was composed of the lower Chamber of Deputies (representatives of lower estates) and the upper Chamber of Senators (higher nobility).
Art. VI of the Constitution of the Commonwealth (the Government Law) proclaimed that “the Diet [Seimas], or the Assembly of Estates, shall be divided into two Houses; viz. the House of Deputies, and the House of Senate, where the King is to preside. The former being the representative and central point of Supreme national authority, shall possess the pre-eminence in the Legislature; [...] In regard to the House of Senate, it is to consist of Bishops, Palatines, Castellans, and Ministers, under the presidency of the King, who shall have but one vote, and the casting voice in case of parity, which he may give either personally, or by a message to the House”.
The Constitution of 1791 was valid only a few years. After the re-establishment of the Lithuanian statehood in 1918, the modern State of Lithuania was not seen as a direct continuator of the Commonwealth of Two Nations. It was rather perceived as a qualitatively new State, established on the grounds of popular rather than estate democracy, and as a separate nation State from Poland (even the Constitution of 1791 a long time (approximately until 2000s) has been perceived as a negative symbol of the former dependence on Poland). Thus, due to the radically changed circumstances there were no preconditions or specific reasons to consider the re-establishment of a bicameral parliamentary system. This remains true until today, though the attitude to the Constitution of 1791 has been changed in a positive way.
During the independence of the Republic of Lithuania, there was no serious public debate about the possibility of re-establishing of a bicameral system.
The decisive factor why Lithuania is considered to be a parliamentary republic is the dependency of the Government upon the Parliament (Seimas): the Prime Minister has to be appointed as proposed by the parliamentary majority (the President cannot select his/her candidate), the ministers are also representatives of the parliamentary majority, the functioning of the Government is dependent on the confidence by the parliamentary majority, the Government is politically responsible and accountable only to the Parliament, the programme of the Government has to be approved by the Parliament, solely the Parliament has the right to express non-confidence to the Government, the term of office of the Government is dependent on the term of office of the Parliament( after new parliamentary elections the Government has to resign and the new Government has to be formed). Perhaps the only feature of semi-presidentialism is the direct popular presidential elections.
Art. 67 of the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania establishes that the Seimas, inter alia, “6) shall or shall not give its assent to the candidate proposed by the President of the Republic for the post of the Prime Minister; 7) shall consider the programme of the Government, presented by the Prime Minister, and decide whether to give its assent to it; 8) shall, upon the proposal of the Government, establish and abolish the ministries of the Republic of Lithuania; 9) shall supervise the activities of the Government and may express no confidence in the Prime Minister or a Minister”.
According to Art. 92 of the Constitution, “The Prime Minister shall, upon the assent of the Seimas, be appointed and released by the President of the Republic. < … > The Prime Minister, within 15 days of his appointment, shall form and present to the Seimas the Government, approved by the President of the Republic, and shall submit the programme of the formed Government for consideration by the Seimas. < …> A new Government shall receive the powers to act after the Seimas gives assent to its programme by a majority vote of the Members of the Seimas participating in the sitting”. Meanwhile, Art. 96 of the Constitution provides that “the Government of the Republic of Lithuania shall be jointly and severally responsible to the Seimas for the general activities of the Government. Ministers, in directing the areas of governance entrusted to them, shall be responsible to the Seimas and the President of the Republic, and directly subordinate to the Prime Minister”. In addition, in accordance with Art. 102 of the Constitution, “at the request of the Seimas, the Government or individual Ministers must give an account of their activities to the Seimas. When more than half of the Ministers are replaced, the Government must once again receive its powers from the Seimas. Otherwise, the Government must resign. The Government must also resign in the following cases: 1) when the Seimas twice in succession does not give its assent to the programme of the newly formed Government; 2) when the Seimas, by a majority vote of all the Members of the Seimas and by secret ballot, expresses no confidence in the Government or in the Prime Minister; 3) when the Prime Minister resigns or dies; 4) after the election to the Seimas, when a new Government is formed. A Minister must resign when more than half of all the Members of the Seimas, by secret ballot, express no confidence in him. The President of the Republic shall accept the resignation of the Government or a Minister”.
In its Ruling of 10 January 1998 the Constitutional Court f the Republic of Lithuania stated that “on the basis of the competence of the institutions of state power as established by the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania, the model of government of the State of Lithuania should be categorised as a parliamentary republican form of government. At the same time, it should be noted that the form of government of our state also has certain characteristics of the so-called mixed (semi-presidential) form of government. This is reflected in the powers of the Seimas, the powers of the Head of State – the President of the Republic, and the powers of the Government, as well as in the legal arrangement of their reciprocal interaction. The Lithuanian constitutional system lays down the principle of the responsibility of the Government to the Seimas, which determines the respective manner of forming the Government”.
This line was continued by the Constitutional Court with even stronger emphasis on the parliamentary republic in the Ruling of 28 August 2020: “on the basis of the competence of state institutions as established by the Constitution, the model of government of the State of Lithuania should be categorised as a parliamentary republican form of government. In view of this, the Constitution establishes the principle of the responsibility of the Government to the Seimas. That principle is reflected, inter alia, in Paragraph 1 of Article 96 of the Constitution, which states that the Government is jointly and severally, i.e. in corpore, responsible to the Seimas for the general activities of the Government. The constitutional principle of the responsibility of the Government to the Seimas is also reflected in the constitutional provisions establishing the power of the Seimas to exercise parliamentary control over the Government. The Constitution lays down various ways in which the Seimas implements the supervision of the Government, as, for instance: the Seimas, under Item 9 of Article 67 of the Constitution, supervises the activities of the Government; under Paragraph 1 of Article 101 of the Constitution, at the request of the Seimas, the Government or individual ministers must give an account of their activities to the Seimas; the Seimas, by a majority vote of all the members of the Seimas and by secret ballot, may express no confidence in the Government (Item 2 of Paragraph 3 of Article 101 of the Constitution). <…> The constitutional provisions consolidating the principle of the responsibility of the Government to the Seimas and the respective powers of the Seimas to exercise parliamentary control over the Government should be interpreted in the light of, inter alia, the parliamentary republican form of government, which is established in the Constitution, also in the light of the constitutional concept of pluralistic parliamentary democracy, which is enshrined in the Constitution and implies, inter alia, political pluralism in the parliament of a democratic state under the rule of law, as well as in the light of the requirement, arising from Paragraphs 2 and 3 of Article 5 of the Constitution and from the constitutional principles of responsible governance and a state under the rule of law, that the Seimas must properly implement the constitutional powers of supervision over the Government, inter alia, in adopting lawful and reasonable legal acts.< … > The principle of the responsibility of the Government to the Seimas is reflected in the provisions of Item 7 of Article 67, Paragraph 5 of Article 92, and Paragraph 2 of Article 101 of the Constitution, which … regulate the granting of powers (inter alia, the granting of powers once again) to the Government and which also consolidate the powers of parliamentary control over the Government carried out by the Seimas. < … > The regulation governing the granting of powers to the Government, consolidated in Item 7 of Article 67 and Paragraph 5 of Article 92 of the Constitution, reflects the particularities of parliamentary pluralist democracy and expresses one of the most important features of a parliamentary republic – the confidence of the Seimas as the basis for the powers of the Government. Such confidence of the Seimas is expressed in the Government in corpore, i.e. by giving assent not to the personal composition of the Government, but to its programme, which sets out the provisions of the programme of the Government – guidelines for the activities of the state for a certain time period based on the provisions of the programme of the political forces that have won the election to the Seimas (majority of the Seimas); such assent to the programme of the Government is possible only after the Seimas duly considers it in the spirit of political pluralism and if there is support by the majority of the Seimas for the provisions of the programme of the Government. It should be stressed that, according to Item 7 of Article 67 and Paragraph 5 of Article 92 of the Constitution, powers may be granted to the Government in the sole way – once the Seimas assents to the programme of the Government”.