Resounding No

A free vote and a free answer

The voters of Uruguay, who have lived for seven years under a harsh, military-backed regime, trooped obediently to the polls last week in a national plebiscite. The object of the exercise: approval or rejection of a new 238-article constitution giving the military an even more pervasive role in the future political life of the country. Under almost any other authoritarian regime in the world, the outcome would have been foregone. Not in Uruguay. To the acute embarrassment of the military, the constitution was resoundingly defeated, with 54% voting no and 39% yes.

The vote demonstrated that the years of repressive rule had not dulled democratic impulses in a country that was once known as "the Switzerland of South America." The armed forces had seized power in stages during the early '70s after emerging as a law-and-order counterforce to the Tupamaros, the violent young leftist radicals, similar to Italy's Red Brigades, who scourged the country with guerrilla terror. The military's apparent mistake in fashioning the rejected constitution was the sweeping power it gave itself. Under the vague pretext of national security, it was to have a part in virtually every organ of government, and could interrupt the political process at any time the military chiefs determined that there was an emergency.

The rejection of the constitution is not likely to bring early changes to Uruguay's government. The reins will remain in the hands of a 25-member Council of State headed by President Aparicio Mendez and composed of relatively faceless civilian technocrats; a 28-member junta of generals--top army, navy and air force officers--will exercise the real power behind the council. Meanwhile, the military must start anew to shape a constitution more acceptable to Uruguayans.

One immediate effect of the plebiscite, ironically, may be to polish Uruguay's image in international eyes. The regime's human rights violations during the campaign against the Tupamaros seemed restrained only in comparison with the methodical executions and disappearances in neighboring Argentina. But the military kept its pledge to have an honest referendum, and public opposition to the constitution was expressed in newspapers and at political meetings. The regime, moreover, is somewhat less repressive than it used to be. Although the Tupamaros leaders are still in jail, the number of political prisoners has dropped from 4,000 (in a population of only 2.9 million) to about 1,500, and the use of torture is said to have all but ceased. The question now is how long it will be until Uruguayans get another fair say, like the plebiscite, in their own political future.

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