By Dr. Hasan Bello*

This article is based on two reports drafted by the republican and monarchist committees of the Albanian parliament. It aims to compare the basic arguments and counter-arguments that these two groups presented to the presidency of the parliament regarding the definition of the form of the regime in the new statute of the Albanian state. What is striking is that they reflect a high degree of responsibility, intellectual level and legal-constitutional preparation of the deputies. Regardless of how political developments unfolded, it should be noted that all representatives of the groups in question were inclined towards finding the most appropriate form of the regime, which would ensure stability, prosperity and internal constitutional democracy for the Albanian state.

The Republicans' basic arguments

In the introduction to the justification report, the Republican Commission presented historical reasons as the fundamental argument for the form of the Albanian state regime. According to them, monarchies were based on the theocratic principle, the traditions of a royal family that had ruled in the past, or historical causes. While in Albania there was no royal family that had theocratic claims, there was no national dynasty that had historical rights. This group rightly rejected Vid's claims to the throne of Albania with the argument that he had left Albania to participate in the LPB under the flag of another nation.

This action had violated the decisions of the Conference of Ambassadors, which had established the neutrality of the Albanian Principality in agreement with the Great Powers. This argument constituted a strong legal precedent to refute the claims of Vid and the supporters of the monarchist regime. This, according to this group, had proven that the saviors of a nation had always come from within the people and had never come from outside.

Another argument was that in the contemporary period the creation of new dynasties was not at all fashionable. On the contrary, a considerable number of old dynasties, with centuries-old roots, were disappearing. This argument, which linked the form of the republican regime with the historical flows of civilization, shows that the Albanian political elite was under the ideological influence of the French Bourgeois Revolution of 1789. It was not a sustainable argument for the fact that states and nations like Britain, which was the vanguard of economic, industrial, scientific and cultural development, although it was a monarchy, had not prevented it from being a model of parliamentarism.

Here it should not be forgotten that the vast majority of European states, especially Albania's neighbors, were monarchies. However, this did not prevent the supporters of the republic from arguing that Albania lacked a native dynasty, that the old traditions of the Albanian race and the historical situation freed our country from the burden of monarchy. They emphasized that the Albanian was a democrat at heart. This, according to them, had also been established in the books of foreign travel writers. They wrote that neither the long pre-Ottoman conquests nor the Ottoman Empire had been able to uproot from the Albanian soul the eternal conviction that he had towards the Eldership.

This showed that a system of Aging, that is, Republican, was a system that stemmed from the spirit and social life of the Albanian people. While the monarchy was in complete contradiction to its nature. The social condition of Albania, according to the republicans, showed that the only state form that could suit the Albanians was the Republic. This group proposed an original form of governance of the Republic, which consisted of its leadership by four representatives (a Muslim, an Orthodox, a Catholic, a Bektashi). They were to govern the Republic in a collegial manner, chairing it on a rotating basis. This model had proven effective in the years 1920-1924, when the country was governed by the High Council. The Republic, according to them, was a system that also matched the religious composition of the Albanian state.

The election of a king could not be done without the intervention of the Great Powers. The Republicans cited the example of Vid, whose rule had proved fatal. Added to these questions was the lack of a person who could enjoy the necessary skills to be placed at the head of Albania. However, the Republicans adhered to the conviction that the installation of a king would cause dissatisfaction, both among the internal and external factors. With the change in international circumstances, the installation of a foreign king, according to them, no longer corresponded to the interests of the Albanians. These interests posed the immediate need for Albania to be governed as a republic.

Another argument was the limited financial capacity of the Albanian state. According to them, with a budget of 14 million gold francs per year, Albania could not maintain a royal court. While the republic was considered a system with low financial costs, “it will be the garment that fits our body”. The argument presented by the monarchists that; “The king will be impartial and above all parties, in difficult times a pacifying force becomes and all parties gather around the king”, although at first glance it seemed reasonable, the republicans rejected it by bringing the history of the Balkan kingdoms as an example. The republicans called for the form of regime of the Albanian state to be sanctioned an hour ago.

According to them, the world was facing various political complications, which would sooner or later also affect our country. Therefore, the solution to this problem had to be done as soon as possible. This would avoid the seeds of uprisings and fratricide among the Albanian people. To the fears of those who thought that a dictatorship could arise from the republic, they replied that they were the offspring of historical circumstances and that they could arise from both large monarchies and small republics. This could be avoided by establishing constitutional guarantees in the statute, which would block the way for the establishment of a dictatorship and guarantee the sovereignty of the people. This report bears the signature of the chairman of the republican commission, lawyer and deputy Petro Poga.

The basic arguments of the monarchist deputies

In the introduction to the explanatory report of the monarchist commission, it was articulated that the state, as a product of historical events, as a manifestation of the strongest social needs, had as its primary duty: Ensuring internal and external peace. The development from every point of view of the people it included in its fold.

According to the monarchists, the Balkan, European and world states had different political forms. But the best form was the one that, in accordance with the level of development and civilization of a nation, ensured it stability; that form which, by avoiding political and social upheavals and the infringement of the freedom of the people, ensured the gradual but rapid development of all the mental and spiritual faculties of that nation. These qualities of the form of a state were also needed by the Albanian people, who were taking their first steps towards civilization and political life.

According to the monarchists, the happiness, progress and freedom of a people were not ensured by adopting the most modern and liberal form imagined in theory, but by applying that governmental system which best corresponded to the level of political and social development. According to them, an ultra-liberal form of state for an underdeveloped people could have the opposite result. It could create the premises for bringing into power, under the guise of freedom and sovereignty of the people, dictatorships and parliamentary oligarchies, which would suppress the most elementary rights of a nation.

This conclusion was the fruit of an analytical look at the history of Albanian parliamentarism in the years 1920-1924. It was the logical conclusion of the political chaos that had produced the fragility of parliamentary democracy in this period. Historically, the forms of the state, according to monarchists, were essentially divided from the point of view of sovereignty into two main categories: Monarchy or Absolute Empire in which sovereign power flowed from top to bottom, as an hereditary right bestowed by God to a royal family to rule and direct as Sovereign a nation.

A concrete example according to them was the Ottoman Empire in the period of Abdülhamid II and France in the Bourbon period. A special category of these forms were constitutional monarchies, in which royal families, as a result of pressure from the people, were forced to delegate part of their power. This was regulated by statutes or constitutions. Such an example was Tsarist Russia after the creation of the Duma, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, etc., which were considered archaic and out of fashion forms.

The second category were republican or monarchical democracies, in which power flowed from the bottom up and sovereign power rested entirely with the people. While the people, according to the rights defined in the statute, delegated part of this sovereignty to the king. The latter enjoyed some prerogatives, which were hereditary. Another example were aristocratic republics, in which sovereignty rested in the hands of several families (Venice). But this form was also out of fashion. Therefore, the main forms of the contemporary period that rivaled each other were parliamentary monarchies and democratic republics.

In the judgment of the monarchists, from the point of view of the sovereignty of the people, these two forms had no difference from each other. The only difference was that while in one form the head of state was elected, in the other he was hereditary. According to them, the form of the regime was not an indicator of the degree of emancipation and democratization of a society. They argued this with the case of the most civilized peoples of the world such as the Belgians, the Dutch, the Scandinavians, who, although they were monarchies, were no less sovereign than the people of the Republic of Mexico.

According to monarchists, there was no difference between the French and British constitutions in terms of the sovereignty of the people. In fact, there were cases, such as the President of the USA, who, based on the constitution, enjoyed more rights than the King of Italy. To reinforce this view, monarchists also referred to international experience. They accepted that after the end of the British Empire, the republican regime had become fashionable in many countries. But this, according to them, was the result of historical events or political developments, which were often not the product of the general desire of the people to apply the republic. As an example, they took the USA, which was the most democratic and functional republic of the time.

According to this model, several republics were also founded in South America. But except for the USA, where, as everywhere, the instinct of the Anglo-Saxon race had shown natural qualities for regulation with complete freedom according to the parliamentary system, in other countries the republican form of regime had not given good evidence. On the contrary, in most cases there had reigned coups d'état and dictatorships of presidents of the republic, who with their supporters had seized the leadership of the country. The most negative model they brought was the Republic of Mexico.

Further, this group considered the forms of regime of several continents: Australia, where even where a republic existed, it could not be said to have full sovereignty since it depended on the Kingdom of England. Asia was a real hodgepodge of regimes, which were not distinguished by democratic and functional states, together with Africa it was in most cases a colony of Western kingdoms. Here, Egypt was a certain exception, which had a civilization and historical heritage from the period of antiquity. But this was also a monarchy.

The best model for republicans was the European continent, or more precisely France. The latter, after long uprisings, starting with the Revolution of 1789, had shed endless blood. However, the change in the form of the regime in France had changed nine times within 80 years: three times the empire, three times the monarchy and three times the republic. This showed that this state known for its high level of civilization, culture and philosophy had periodically experimented until it had found the most appropriate form of regime in an evolutionary way. / Memorie.al