Parliament of Istalia

The Parliament of Istalia is the national legislative body of the Istalian Republic. It is a bicameral legislature with 735 elected members. It is composed of the Chamber of Deputies (Istalian: Camera dei Deputati), with 630 members (called in Istalian deputati) and the Senate of the Republic (Istalian: Senato della Repubblica), with 100 members (senatori). The two houses are independent from one another and never meet jointly except under circumstances specified by the Constitution.

History
The first legislative body in the Istalian land was the Chamber of Representatives of the Kingodom of Istalia, established in 1848 granted by the king Vittorio Alessandro II after a long period of struggle between the absolut monarchy and the democratic bourgeois forces. Even though the elections were open only to a few people, chosen according to the census, it was in Istalia the first Parliament with the effective power to determinate the fate of the Governments.

After the Quanzari conquest of the island the Istalian Parliament on the Island, as it is called to distinguish it by the future Parliaments of the Istalian Republics, was dissolved and in Quanzar for more then a century the only admitted elective body was the House of Councillors (Majatran: مجلس المستشارين, translitteration: Majlis al-Moustacharine) a merely consultative body formed by Councillors appointed by the Emir, by the ahmadi clergy and by the professional and social world and finally by Councillors elected a very narrow electorate based on census and ethnicity.

The House of Councillors in 1947 was transformed in the Parliament of Quanzar ((Majatran: البرلمان قانزاري, translitteration: al-barlaman qanzari) and to contain the democratic forces of the country its powers were expanded as well as the electorate even if the Emir continued to appoint a large part of the 100 members.

Finally in 2095, forced by a popular uprising, the Emir granted to the Parliament the power to appoint and to deceive the Government and in 2097 took place the first election in which all the members were directly elected. However the electorate were still limited and in fact only few thousand of citizens voted at the time. But it wasn't too long before the universal suffrage was granted by the NeoSocialist Government and in 2109 all the Quanzar's citizens were admited to vote.

Since 2097 the leftist forces controlled constantly the Parliament until that they led a revolution which overthrone the Emir in 2110 and that, after few years of turmoil, established the Union of the Quanzari Soviets in which the parliament was called People's Assembly.

When the Quanzari Union was about to fall, finally the istalian ethnicity arise and when was founded the first istalian republic, for the first 30 years called as Quanzarian Republic, the Parliament finally changed its name and in 2263 was officially called Parliament of Istalia and, as unicameral parliament, maintained this name until the end of the third millennium when was renamed National Assembly until the Restoration of the Quanzari rule by part of majatran forces in the XXXII century.

After the restoration of the democracy and the foundation of the fourth Republic the Parliament assumed again the name with which has been called until today. The fourth Republic, however, to avoid into the futer another fall of the democratic and istalian institutions (the fourth Republic was founded after the end of the third Quanzarian restoration), decided to establiah a Parliament based on a bicameral system, an imperfect bicameral system with a strong Low Chamber but an Upper Chamber whose positive consent is necessary to change the Constitution, Upper Chamber elected on regional basis so to strengthen the demographic weight in each individual region of the various ethnicities and so of the preponderant istalian ethnic component.

The Senate of the Republic was created and it worked, since the fourth Istalian Republic lasts for almost a thousand years.

The Low Chamber was so officially called with the unformal name with which was always also known, Chamber of Deputies.

Powers
The Parliament of Istalian is an bicameral body formed by an upper chamber, the Senate of the Republic, and a Low Chamber, the Chamber of Deputies.

The power of the two Chambers however differ a lot so as to constitute an imperfect bicameralism system in which most part of the powers rely to the Lower Chamber.

Colloquially and by the press the two Houses are called the Chamber and The Senate.

The Chamber
The Chamber of Deputies has 635 seats and is elected with a pure proportional system based on five costituencies which, as well as for the Senate, correspond to the five istalian regions. The Chamber of Deputies is the only government body which can approve the laws, the budget laws, the treaties and which can declared war.

The Chamber of Deputies is also the only Chamber which can give the confidence to the Government as well as express a vote of no-confidence for all the cabinet or for single ministers.

The Chamber is elected with a proportional system applied on five electoral colleges which correspond to the five istalian regions. The system forecast the correction given by an electoral law Electoral Law called "Honoris" which allows and promotes the formation of pre-electoral coalition for the parties, especially those which support a common candidate to the Presidency, a system which introduces majoritarian tendencies and a strong coalition responsibility which forces to a greater stability.

The Senate
The Upper Chamber, the Senate of the Republic, in fact, acts as a consultative body and as chamber of the regions, it can propose bills, send recommendation to the other Chamber and to the Government and it has part into the legislative process about the regional, local and constitutional matters. However, the Chamber of Deputies can always overcome any decision take by the Senate if more than half of all the members of the Chamber of Deputies vote to reject it exept for the Constitutional changement: in this case the Chamber cannot work alone due that a constitutional law to pass indeed requires a qualified majority of 2/3 also by the Senate. Currently the Senate has 100 senators and is elected with a corrected proportional system on regional basis: each region elects 16 senators of which 10 are expressed by the party with the relative majority, 5 by the second one and 1 by the third one. Then the last 20 Senators are elected into a national constituency using the d'Hondt method.

Membership
The current membership of the Istalian Parliament following the latest political election of 19 October 4231:

Electoral results
See the electoral history of the Istalian Parliament.

For the most recent electoral results see also the electoral results history of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate of the Republic since 4150.

Seats
Currently the two branches of the Istalian Parliament are seated in two different places. The Senate is seated in Palace of the Congregation, ancient seat of a Church's council-like institution of the Romula's Clergy.

The Chamber of Deputies instead met in the Ancient Palace of the Soviets the first modern parliament in Quanzar under the Socialist Republic, however, at the begining of XXXXIII century the palace results in critic condition, in need of serious restructuring.

These two places however are formaly two temporary solutions, adopted in 4046, after the destruction in 4042 of the Palace of Parliament, historical seat of both the two Chambers targeted by the leftist terrorist. The Palace was built between 2241 and 2246 in Revival style to host the Parliament of the Quanzarian Republic, first democratic state of Quanzar and first state which saw the Istalians rule effectively their nation. The Palace had an important role among the landmarks of the nation, because in this building Carlo Aurelio Gianti declared founded the first Istalian Republic. The destruction of the Palace was a great lose for the history of the Republic and of the architecture, and was the pretext for Antonio Battisti to demand special powers with which in the next two years established its personal regime (See also Istalian Civil War, 4044–4045).