After the war, he advocated for the federalisation of
Belgium. As early as 1947 he promoted, together with five other members of Parliament (among whom
Julien Lahaut), a bill on the organisation of a federal state. If passed, the new
Constitution would have transformed Belgium into a
Confederation consisting of two
States,
Flanders and
Wallonia, and the federal region of
Brussels. However, a majority in the Belgian Parliament refused to take the proposal into consideration. Rey was Minister of Reconstruction from 1949 until 1950, and Minister of Economy from 1954 until 1958. As such, he was involved both in the early development of the
European Coal and Steel Community and in the negotiations that led to the creation of the
European Economic Community (EEC) and the
European Atomic Energy Community (EAEC). Member of the commission (
Hallstein Commission) of the CEE from 1958 until 1967, responsible for external relations, he played an important role in the negotiations of the
Kennedy Round (1964–1967). In 1967, he succeeded
Walter Hallstein as President of the European Commission (he was the first President of the Commission of the merged CSCE, CEE and EAEC). Still a convinced federalist, he undertook to reinforce the Community institutions. He won increased powers for the
European Parliament and advocated its election by universal suffrage. During his presidency, he oversaw the completion of the
customs union (1968). He also played an important role in the
Summit of The Hague in 1969, where the European leaders decided to relaunch European integration with two new initiatives: on the one hand,
Economic and Monetary Union of the European Union (EMU), and on the other hand, European Political Cooperation (EPC), which foreshadow the euro and the
Common Foreign and Security Policy of the European Union today. It was also at
The Hague that France gave up its resistance against the accession of the United Kingdom to the EEC. Finally, in 1970, the last year of this mandate, Rey won the European governments' support for his proposal to give the Community "own resources". This meant that the EEC no longer depended exclusively on contributions by the member states, but could complete these with revenues from customs duties, and levies on agricultural products from outside the Community, in addition to a share of the VAT revenue. From 1964 until 1974, Rey was chairman of the board of the
College of Europe in
Bruges. He presided over the
European Movement from 1974 to 1978 and was a member of the
Jean Monnet Foundation for Europe. In 1979, he became a member of the first
European Parliament elected by
universal suffrage. Jean Rey also remained active in Belgian politics. He became the
éminence grise of the French-speaking liberals who broke away from the unitary
Party for Freedom and Progress to form the
Parti Réformateur et Libéral Wallon (PRLW) in 1976. Jean Rey died in his native city Liège. In the
European Quarter of
Brussels, there is now a
square named after him. A street in the 15e arrondissement of Paris also bears his name. ==References==