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Toward Independence

In 1950 Prime Minister Mohamed Shanniq formed a new government, one that for the first time since the Al Marsa Convention had a Tunisian majority in the cabinet. Salah Ben Youssef, the Neo-Destour secretary general, joined the government as minister of justice, but it was Bourguiba who went to Paris to lay before the French government a program for independence that included provisions to create a national legislature and emphasized demands for civil rights. The Tunisian proposal also insisted on maintaining cultural, economic, and military ties with France. The French government refused out of hand to give up direct participation by French officials in the Tunisian government, but Foreign Minister Maurice Schuman confirmed that a newly appointed resident general "had been given the task of leading Tunisia to independence."

The residency offered only minor reforms, all of them eventually rejected by the nationalists. Terrorist groups directed attacks against French authorities and colons, who in turn formed counterterrorist vigilante units. The residency retaliated with a crackdown on all nationalists, including moderates as well as those extremists who had engaged in terrorist activities. In January 1952 the French demanded that Al Amin Bey (1943-57) dismiss Shanniq as prime minister and, when the bey refused to comply, arrested Bourguiba, Shanniq, and most of his ministers. Ben Youssef, however, escaped the French net and fled to Egypt, where he fell increasingly under the influence of the pan-Arab nationalism of Gamal Abdul Nasser. In exile, Ben Youssef became a vocal exponent of violent revolution.

The arrests intensified nationalist bitterness toward the protectorate and produced two years of terrorist violence, rioting, and strikes. The UGTT's Hached, a voice of moderation, was murdered by colon vigilantes, who thereby cut off a valuable channel for dialogue between the nationalists and the residency. Meanwhile, France's ability to cope with the growing unrest was compromised by its own political instability that had brought down five governments in two years and had left the country without a government for more than three months during that period. Tunisia, however, was a minor concern in Paris when compared with the debacle in Indochina in the spring of 1954.

Early in 1954 Bourguiba was released from prison to negotiate with French premier Pierre Mends-France. The nationalists and the French government were still deadlocked between Tunisian demands for full independence and the French plan, which called for internal autonomy despite vigorous objections from the colons. But Bourguiba showed a willingness to accept what France was prepared to offer while pressing for further concessions. In July Mends-France, who had just concluded the dismantling of the French colonial empire in Indochina, flew to Tunis and issued the dramatic Declaration of Carthage, which recognized Tunisia's internal autonomy. The French preferred to have leaders of the old Destour Party guide the new semi-independent country, but continuing violence persuaded them to bring in Bourguiba, who made it clear that he accepted autonomy only as the first step toward full independence. Although he functioned as the power behind the new government, he refused to take part in it formally while the French presence remained.

The next major step toward the fulfillment of Bourguiba's demand for full independence came in June 1955, when French premier Edgar Faure and Tunisian premier Tahar Ben Ammar signed a series of agreements in Paris. The six agreements covered internal administration, status of residents, judicial reform, administrative and technical cooperation, cultural relations, and economic and financial relations. The most significant aspect of the agreements was the abrogation of Article I of the Al Marsa Convention of 1883, which gave the French resident general control over internal government. However, the Bardo Treaty of 1881, by which France obtained responsibility for Tunisia's foreign affairs and defense, remained in force.

Bourguiba endorsed the agreements as part of his pragmatic strategy for achieving independence with measured steps, but Ben Youssef, a close collaborator for many years, broke with him on the issue. Ben Youssef, who had returned to Tunisia, and the leftwing faction supporting him held out for immediate independence and contested Bourguiba's leadership of the Neo-Destour Party. When the party congress backed Bourguiba's gradualist policy, Ben Youssef returned to Cairo to lead an opposition movement from exile. Guerrilla units loyal to him conducted military operations against both the French and the new Tunisian government.

The agreements, as they affected relations between the bey as monarch and the French government, required certain changes in Tunisia's governmental structure. By decree in September 1955, Al Amin Bey reaffirmed his absolute power but agreed to accept the advice of his prime minister, who was the president of the Council of Ministers (cabinet). While legislative and executive power remained formally in the hands of the hey, in effect the decree required the bey to have the approval of the full Council of Ministers before issuing a law. It also authorized elections for a constituent assembly and gave that assembly the right to establish the form of government that it chose for Tunisia.

The bey, aware of the threat to the monarch posed by a popularly elected assembly that was likely to be republican in its sympathies, was pressured into signing the decree for the Constituent Assembly by Bourguiba, who threatened to expose the hey's request that the French remain in Tunisia. Shortly thereafter the bey ratified Bourguiba's electoral law, which provided for voting for party lists rather than for individual candidates. The law meant that party headquarters would select the candidates and that party lists would sweep the elections, although some effort was made to represent other interests in the assembly by consultation with labor, professional, and farmer organizations and by formation of the so-called National Front.