2022, the year of the referendums
2022 will start with a bang, because the political agenda sees the contemporaneity of two key events: the election of the President of the Republic and the Constitutional Court ruling on referendums which could radically change the framework of rights in our country. If there is the go-ahead from the Council, which in January will assess the constitutional compliance of the questions, between April 15 and June 15 Italians would be called upon to express themselves on four central themes of the political debate: the introduction of legal euthanasia, the decriminalization of cannabis cultivation, the abolition of hunting and the reform of justice, with the abolition of various rules on the profession of magistrates. A poker of very significant changes, on which politics has not been able to perform its function for several years now, mired between crossed vetoes and moralistic legacies that do not “only” have to do with the Catholic culture of our country, as some argue .
The ferment of popular participation
Also for the intolerance towards these “blah, blah, blah”, as you would define them Greta Thunberg, while the municipal and regional elections last autumn marked record levels of abstention, the collection of signatures for the referendums marked a popular participation far above expectations, quickly breaking through the minimum threshold of 500,000 signatures required to request popular consultation. Net of the strong push given by the digital signature (for the first time it was possible to join with the Spid), it was a huge success of the promoting committee – and in particular of Marco Cappato, in the front row in this battle – which traces a very clear path: 2022 (barring surprises from the Consulta) will be the year of the referendums. But to decide what? Let’s see it on the merits of each individual theme:
The referendum on legal euthanasia
This referendum was promoted by theLuca Coscioni Association, to fill a legislative void that emerged clearly from the acquittal of its treasurer Cappato in the famous case of DJ Fabo. Having accompanied him to Switzerland to put an end to his suffering thanks to the “sweet death”, which is legal in the Confederation, made the activist risk 12 years in prison. The acquittal was a fundamental step not only for the accused, but also for the company, as it was clearly established that art. 579 of the penal code on the so-called “homicide of consenting” must be changed, as it is not comparable to instigation to suicide, punished instead by the subsequent art. 580. Declaring unconstitutional the norm that punishes who helps suicide also of a patient suffering from irreversible pathology and able to decide, the Court has invited the legislator to take a decision by precisely 2022. The referendum initiative serves to put pressure on Parliament, even if there will be no overlap with the bill , as the basic text affects several articles of the penal code. Indeed, the promoters of the referendum have already amply expressed their disappointment at the parliamentary debate that opened in recent weeks.
The referendum on free cannabis
The aim of this initiative is not to achieve liberalization tout-court. Chemically produced substances will continue to be illegal, as the proposal refers only to cultivable ones (cannabis and hallucinogenic mushrooms), with the further exclusion of criminal association aimed at illicit trafficking. The basic text foresees the possibility of cultivating up to four cannabis plants for personal consumption, thus emerging from a paradox that has seen punishing even the seriously ill who used the substance to relieve pain. Both the sale and the transfer to third parties would remain illegal, but it is proposed to lower the penalties. Unlike euthanasia, the bill in Parliament could instead conflict with the referendum, affecting the same single text on drugs.
The referendum on the abolition of hunting
This is perhaps the simplest issue among those under discussion, because the proposed solution is the most radical: to completely abolish the hunting activity envisaged by the law 157 of 1992, as well as the capture of live animals to be used as a lure for prey. To push towards this proposal are not only the reasons of the animal rights activists, but also the objective data that speak of the increasingly frequent accidents (even lethal) between human beings in some way involved and the various collateral damage caused by hunting the environment. The fact that the issue is the simplest does not mean, however, that the outcome of the referendum is to be taken for granted, quite the contrary. Notoriously, hunters are a very well organized and influential lobby and already in the 90s, two referendums on the issue failed due to the failure to reach a quorum.
The referendums on news for Justice
Of the four topics covered by the referendum, this package of proposals is the only one that should not be examined by the Council. This is because the promoters have chosen an alternative way to collecting citizens’ signatures, that is, the presentation of the question by at least five regional councils. Nine regions presented the proposal, all led by the center-right. On this issue, in fact, there was a convergence between the Radicals and the Lega di Matteo Salvini, who personally spent himself to support the initiative, while on euthanasia and cannabis he has positions very far from those of the referendum committee. Not only that: even some exponents of the center, including Goffredo Bettini, said they were willing to vote the referendum on Justice, with a transversality that is causing debate. The package consists of six questions, of which four directly affect the professional activity of judges. The first cancels the need to collect signatures to apply for the CSM, so as to reduce the political weight of the currents of the judiciary that have been well described by “The system” of Luca Palamara And Alessandro Sallusti. The second introduces the civil liability of magistrates, who can therefore be cited by citizens who consider themselves harmed by their decisions. The third introduces the judgment of non-professional members in the evaluation of the professionalism of magistrates, today instead entrusted only to their colleagues. The fourth provides for the separation of careers between the investigating (prosecutor) and judicial (judge) judiciary. Then there are two questions more focused on the relationship between magistrates and citizens: the fifth severely limits the possibility of resorting to prison as a precautionary measure, while the sixth abrogates the Severino Law, which provides for the incompatibility or forfeiture between some political offices and crimes against the Public Administration, already after the first degree sentence.
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