LONDON -- The proposed European Constitution was decisively rejected by French voters on May 29 and by the Dutch on June 1. The constitution has been ratified by other European states including Germany, which did not hold a referendum, and by Spain, which did. In theory, the referendums in France and the Netherlands could be repeated and the constitution approved, but it seems unlikely that the French and Dutch electorates would change their verdict. As the constitution must be approved by all 25 European Union states before it goes into force, it must now be seen as having failed.
There is no single answer as to what went wrong. The constitution was too long and complicated for the average voter to understand. It tried to be "all things to all men," incorporating all the previous treaties.
The electorates in France and the Netherlands opposed the constitution for different reasons, but both expressed disillusionment with the government in power as well as suspicions of bureaucratic over-regulation from Brussels.