VENEZUELA: No. 22

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It was 1 o'clock in the morning of Venezuela's Independence Day (July 5). The galleries in the Capitol building in Caracas overflowed with impatient spectators. Below, members of the National Constituent Assembly, weary from 16 hours of continuous session, neared the end of six months' labors.

At last it was done. The final clause was approved and Venezuela had a new constitution. It was the 22nd since the country broke away from Spain 136 years ago. On hand for the signing and formal promulgation was Provisional President Rómulo Betancourt, who had promised a new constitution when he overthrew the Isaias Medina Government in October 1945. With him were other members of the revolutionary Junta, his Cabinet, members of the diplomatic corps.

The waiting crowd had something to cheer about. The Constitution, modeled on the U.S.'s, is the hemisphere's most leftist. It provides specific guarantees for labor: the right to strike, paid vacations, pay for Sunday work, pensions, dismissal bonuses, some profit-sharing. Everyone is guaranteed the right to education, employment and health insurance. The state is given an important role in planning a national economy. The right of private property is recognized and protected; while monopoly is forbidden, capital is to be entitled to a fair return; employer associations are permitted.

The new government machinery will roughly parallel that of the U.S., with a Senate and Chamber of Deputies, a Supreme Court with the power to pass on the constitutionality of laws. The President will be elected for a four-year term by direct universal suffrage, but cannot succeed himself for two following terms. Most controversial measure: the power given the President, subject to the approval of Congress, to order the "preventive detention of persons who there is reason to believe are implicated" in plans to overthrow the Government.