June 13, 1950
After more than a year of debate on a constitution for the new State of Israel, the first Knesset adopts a compromise stipulating that instead of a single document, the “constitution” will be composed of a series of Basic Laws created over time by a special committee and approved by the Knesset.
The compromise, known as the Harari Resolution, was sponsored by Knesset member Yizhar Harari. It states: “The First Knesset instructs the Constitution, Law and Justice Committee to prepare a draft State Constitution. The constitution will be built chapter by chapter, in such a way that each will constitute a separate Basic Law. The chapters shall be presented to the Knesset when the committee completes its work, and all the chapters together shall comprise the Constitution of the State.”
Although Israel’s Declaration of Independence called for the drafting of a constitution “not later than the 1st October 1948,” and a draft constitution was published in The New York Times in December 1948, leaders of the new state remained at odds.
Religious parties opposed a constitution other than the Torah, especially one that would grant civil liberties they saw as in opposition to Jewish law. For example, the freedoms of speech and expression have different parameters under Jewish law than as civil rights guaranteed in a democracy.
But the leading voice against the constitution was Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, who was not religious. In a Cabinet meeting December 13, 1949, he argued that the new state did not have enough time to develop a constitution and that there were more important tasks at hand, such as defending the country against external threats, bringing in immigrants, settling the Negev and building infrastructure. The prime minister said: “The coming few years are the most important in our history. If anyone thinks that declaring independence or winning the war were what was needed to found the state, they’re wrong. The work is all ahead of us.”
