Amid the excitement and promise of April 1964 it seemed feasible that Tanzania, a new country born of the union of just independent Tanganyika and Zanzibar, could have a constitution within a year. That was the demand stipulated in Article VII of the eight Articles of Union signed between the combined nation’s founding fathers, Julius Nyerere of Tanganyika and Zanzibar’s Amani Abeid Karume. That document was short, running to barely 800 words, not enough on which to base the governing of a new country. It was designed as an interim measure. It stated bluntly that a commission must be…
