1946 Polish people's referendum

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The people's referendum (Polish: referendum ludowe) of 1946, also known as the Three Times Yes referendum (Trzy razy tak, often abbreviated as 3×TAK), was a referendum held in Poland on 30 June 1946 on the authority of the State National Council (order of 27 April 1946). The referendum presented an opportunity for the forces vying for political control of Poland following World War II to test their popularity among the general population. However, the results were forged and the referendum failed to meet democratic standards.^[1][2]

Questions

The referendum comprised three questions:

1. Are you in favour of abolishing the Senate?
2. Do you want consolidation, in the future constitution of the
   nationalisation
   of basic national industries, including the preservation of the statutory rights of private enterprise?
3. Do you want consolidation of the western border of the Polish State on the
   Baltic, Oder river and Lusatian Neisse?^[3]

Parties of the pro-communist Democratic Bloc, (the

The official results, published on 12 July 1946, showed that from a population of 13,160,451 eligible voters, 90.1% or 11,857,986 had taken part in the referendum. Of these, 11,530,551 or 97.2% were counted as valid. On the first question, 68% of voters chose "yes". On the second question, 77.2% voted "yes". On the third question, 91.4% voted "yes".[3]

However, the official results were far removed from the actual results since the vote had been seriously compromised by the communists and their supporters. The communists, who already de facto controlled much of the government and had the backing of the military (both the Polish

In Kraków, where the opposition managed to ensure a fair vote, the "no" results were: 84%, 59% and 30% for all three questions.^[3] PSL, which was able to obtain real records for approximately 48% of the voting districts, estimated that a "yes" for all three questions was chosen by 16.7% of respondents.^[3] Despite the protests of the opposition, led by Stanisław Mikołajczyk, and representatives of the United Kingdom and United States, the results were declared free and fair by the government.

Question I

Question II

Question III

Aftermath

Following the referendum, the

According to documents released forty-three years later, 29% of respondents had voted yes for all three questions. The official results indicated this figure was 68%.[2] Materials published after the communists lost power in Poland in 1989 showed that only the third question received a majority of votes in favor. For the first question, "yes" was chosen by 26.9% voters. For the second question, 42% chose "yes". For the third question, 66.9% chose "yes".^{[7][page needed][8]}

References