Comment by flir
1 day ago
Ireland rejected. The treaty was modified to address the concerns of Irish voters. Ireland accepted.
"Ireland rejected, the treaty was modified, and the Irish government said 'despite your changes, we refuse to allow our electorate to revisit this'" doesn't sound like a better approach.
You're talking about the first big EU farce, the Nice Treaty. Btw: "Nice", as in the Roman city in the south of France with the excellent Carnaval, not the English word.
But then there was the second farce, the "EU constitution":
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_establishing_a_Constitu...
Note how many referenda and votes were planned ... but suddenly canceled after voters started rejecting the treaty. And note how the page does not say how the replacement, the "Treay of Lisbon" was adopted. Sure they would vote on it, right? Otherwise, what credibility would they have left?
Well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Lisbon
Obviously there were no more votes on any EU future plans, with one exception.
I've worked for the EU Commission. Let me tell you: the bureaucrats there are angry about this. You see, the whole constitution was an attempt for the EU to become more democratic, gain credibility, by "sacrificing" power to voters. By the time the Treaty of Lisbon was created, the EU had lost power (much less than the constitution, but still some. Oh and they lost power to member states, NOT to voters), had "been forced" to push through the reforms anyway AND they had lost all credibility.
The only exception, the only vote on the EU's future? The Brexit vote ...