Greece Once Had a Senate. It Was Abolished in 1935 and Never Came Back
Greece has had a Senate twice in its modern history, and both times the institution was scrapped before it could take permanent hold. The country has operated without an upper legislative chamber ever since 1935.
The first Senate was created under the Constitution of 1844, which King Otto granted following the September 3rd Revolution. It had 27 senators, all appointed for life by the king himself, and among the first 36 members named that year were celebrated heroes of the 1821 War of Independence, including Petros Mavromichalis, Ioannis Kolokotronis, and Konstantinos Botsaris. The first Senate president was Georgios Kountouriotis. That body was abolished with the Constitution of 1864, when Otto was overthrown and George I took the throne.
The Senate was not reinstated, specifically because it was seen as a Venizelist creation.
The Senate was revived nearly 65 years later, in 1929, under the government of Eleftherios Venizelos. This second version had 120 members, 92 of them elected by universal suffrage, 18 by professional organizations, and 10 chosen jointly by both chambers. Senators served nine-year terms, with one third of seats renewed every three years. The first Senate elections, held on April 21, 1929, were a decisive Venizelist sweep, with pro-Venizelos parties capturing 70.58 percent of the vote and 78 of the elected seats. The first president of this second Senate was Alexandros Zaimis.
The second Senate lasted just six years. On April 1, 1935, it was dissolved following the suppression of a Venizelist military uprising that had tried to return Venizelos to power. When King George II returned and the Constitution of 1911 was restored that November, the Senate was not reinstated, specifically because it was seen as a Venizelist creation. Greece has had a unicameral parliament ever since.
No other major European democracy of comparable size has gone this long without revisiting the question of an upper chamber. The Senate exists today in Italy, France, and the United States as a check on parliamentary or executive power, the exact function it briefly served in Greece under two very different political systems.
