Constitution of Iran

The Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran (Persian: قانون اساسی جمهوری اسلامی ایران, Qanun-e Asasi-ye Jomhuri-ye Eslâmi-ye Iran) is the supreme law of Iran. It was adopted by referendum on 2 and 3 December 1979, and went into force replacing the Constitution of 1906. It has been amended once, on 28 July 1989. The constitution was originally made up of 175 articles in 12 chapters, but amended in 1989 to 177 articles in 14 chapters.

It has been called a hybrid regime of theocratic and democratic elements. Articles One and Two vest sovereignty in God, and Article Six "mandates popular elections for the presidency and the Majlis, or parliament." Main democratic procedures and rights are subordinate to the Guardian Council and the Supreme Leader, whose powers are spelled out in Chapter Eight (Articles 107–112).

Over the course of the year 1978 Iran was subject to worsening cycles of "provocation, repression, and polarization" in political unrest. It became more and more clear that the Pahlavi regime was likely to fall and that the leader of the revolution taking his regime down was Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Work began on a constitution for the new Islamic state that would follow the revolution. A preliminary draft was (according to Asghar Schirazi) begun in Paris by one Hassan Habibi while Khomeini was still in exile there. It was structured like the 1958 constitution of the French Fifth Republic with separation of powers among the executive, judicial and parliamentary branches. An outline was presented to Khomeini in January 1979 and he brought it with him when he returned to Iran. After being reworked by two different commissions, it was published on 14 June 1979 by the provisional government of Mehdi Bazargan as the official preliminary draft of the constitution.

The preliminary draft differed from the final version of the constitution in a number of ways. It made no reference to velayat-e faqih, and did not "reserve any special posts for Islamic jurists" except on the guardian council where they made up a minority and were to be approved by the parliament from a list drawn up by the "highest religious authorities".

Despite this, Khomeini made "only two small changes (in part to bar women from the presidency and judgeships)", in the draft, and publicly stated his approval of the draft "on more than one occasion", declaring at one point that it "must be approved quickly". The Council of the Islamic Revolution approved of it unanimously after examination and "declared it to be the official preliminary draft of the Revolutionary Council".

What happened next is disputed. The revolutionaries' original plan was to have a Constituent Assembly of hundreds of people write the new constitution, but with this broad support for the preliminary draft, there now seemed to be a consensus in favor of a much more streamlined completion. An "Assembly of Experts" of only a few dozen members would go over the text and "present it for final ratification in a national referendum".

But Baqer Moin writes of contradictions in statements by Khomeini and questions about the election of the Experts. At the same time Ayatollah was publicly declaring the draft to be `correct`, he "had already started to denounce the supporters of a `Democratic Islamic Republic,` whose ideas were enshrined in the draft", and who included the man he had appointed president, Bazargan, as `enemies of Islam.` Also dismaying Bazargan and his colleagues, was the decision by the clerical members of the Revolutionary Council, without consulting them, to have the constitution finalized by a much smaller body—an `Assembly of Experts` with 70 members, which alarmed them because with much larger constituencies and fewer candidates "it would be easier to rig the elections". If Khomeini's network succeeded in doing so, "the likelihood of dissenting voices in the Assembly could be reduced to almost nothing".

During a joint summit between the members of the provisional government and the Superieur Council of Revolution with the presence of Khomeini in Qom, it was decided that an Assembly for the Final Review of the Constitution was to be established for a final evaluation of the constitution of Iran.^{[citation needed]}