"You may have gotten the impression that the European constitution was dead -- that the French had felled it, and the Dutch had pounded a stake through its heart," wrote Daniel Hannan, a Conservative Member of the European Parliament from South East England, in the July 17th issue of the London Telegraph.

Photo credit: Davide Guglielmo

"If so, think again.

The constitution is being implemented, clause by clause, as if the No votes had not happened."

"Since the No votes, three nations - Cyprus, Malta and Luxembourg - have gone on to approve the text. All right, these may not be the three mightiest powers in Europe, but their endorsement means that 13 of 25 members have now said Yes.

Eurocrats see this number as enormously significant. "It is a strong signal that a majority of the member states thinks that the constitution correlates to their expectations,"
The way that the project of European integration has operated, writes Hannan, is this: “first, it extends its jurisdiction into a new area and then, often years later, it authorizes its power-grab in a retrospective treaty.” The ruling ideology of the EU, Hannan explains, “is thought to be too important to be left to the ballot box.”

Formal ratification by all 25 states is regarded in Brussels as a technicality. To all intents and purposes, the EU is carrying on as though the constitution were already in force. Most of the institutions that it would have authorised are either up and running already, or in the process of being established.

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