As a politically interested person, this is the most beautiful
political mechanism I've seen. The freedom of Jura came late and only
after many bombings and spectacular demonstrations, but that is another
story. I wish the Juranese method for drawing borders could be copied
to all situations where a border in the world needs to be defined. Let
the people who live there decide!


The creation of canton Jura

First, a constitutional amendment in canton Bern 1969, prescribed what
the procedures would be if some part of it wanted to leave. Special
rules gave the seven Jura districts _individual_ choices after the big
Juranese referendum that was to be held.

So in a referendum in June 23, 1974, the population in the French
speaking Jura, part of canton Bern, were asked the question "Do you wish
to form your own canton?". A slim majority said yes. The Juranese
majority, consisting of French speaking Roman Catholics (3 districts),
supported the separation, but it was rejected by the French speaking
Protestants (three districts) and also by the German speaking population
(Catholic, 1 district). The French Catholics in the north now tried to
persuade the French Protestants in the south to think about Juranese
unity but were blamed for imperialism.

The constitution said that in those districts where there had been a no-
majority, the population had the time of 6 months to collect name
signatures to hold a second referendum on the individual district's
belonging. 20% of the population needed to sign. And after that, the
border _communities_ in the districts that had voted to remain in Bern,
had 3 months to collect the same percentage of the population's
signatures to hold a third referendum, if they so wished. And in one of
the districts, they could also decide to go to neighboring canton Basel,
if they voted so.

In the three Protestant districts, the referenda all showed a yes-
majority to the question: "Do you want to remain in canton Bern?". In
one of the districts, there were 9 Catholic communities all on the
border, who voted no. There were a few others too voting no, one in
another district, that finally caused 13 communities to hold referenda
on which canton they wished to belong. All in all, 8 chose canton Jura
and 5 canton Bern.

The formation of the new canton Jura required ratification in a national
referendum and 82.3% of the voting population (70% in Bern) and all
cantons consequently voted yes on September 24, 1978.

On September 23, 1993, Laufental, a German district that would have been
an exclave, joined Basel-Landschaft. 75.2% and all cantons had voted yes
in the national referendum (89% in Jura, 67% in Basel-Landschaft and
57% in Bern).

On June 25, 1995, Jura voted to increase its territory by accepting the
French speaking village Vellerat (currently in Bern) to be a part of the
canton. 91.9% voted yes with a voter participation of 44.2%. Vellerat
had already had a local referendum on the matter. All of Switzerland
will also have to approve the change of the cantonal borders. The
referendum will be on March 10, 1996.

Everything is frozen legally now and there is no possibility for a
district or community to break out from canton Bern unless the Bern
constitution is changed once again.

Source: Keesing's Contemporary Archives, Record of World Events, 1974-
1975; 26698-26699, 27169, 27404