5 by an extra 7,500. Maybe this will be the last piece in the Jura puzzle. In an interview to mark 50 years since the 1974 plebiscite, Federal Councillor Elisabeth Baume-Schneider – who lives in the Jura village of Les Breuleux not far from Le Noirmont – said that Jura’s birth as a canton was a reminder of what democracy can do. “The right to freedom and self-determination is something that Jura and its people hold dear.” Cycle through the remote Franches-Montagnes countryside in the direction of Saignelégier (against the headwind naturally) and you will notice that Baume-Schneider’s definition of a free and unfettered Jura extends further than just politics. be different A narrow majority of voters in the seven districts of Jura had just decided that their canton would split from Berne, correcting an arrangement that dated back to the downfall of Napoleon and the 1815 Congress of Vienna, when the territories of the Prince-Bishopric of Basel in the Jura mountains were assigned to the canton of Berne. Jura was a form of compensation for Berne, which had had to give up its territories in Aargau and Vaud. Little Jura – Catholic and French-speaking – now found itself part of the big, Protestant, German-speaking canton of Berne. Longing for territorial autonomy and self-determination, many in Jura felt marginalised and resentful. Political experts now say that the strife surrounding Jura before the historic 1974 vote could even have led to a civil war. This is no exaggeration. From the 1960s onwards, the separatist movement Rassemblement Jurassien and its young militant group Béliers often sailed close to the wind during a resistance campaign against Berne that was as furious as it was effective. In 1969, young demonstrators from Jura gathered at the Bundesplatz in Berne to burn the controversial “Civil Defence” booklet that the Federal Council had distributed to every household in Switzerland. Activists also stormed the National Council chamber in 1968. And radical splinter groups even carried out arson attacks. Jura eventually voted for self-determination peacefully and democratically in June 1974, but in doing so created a new bone of contention: only Jura’s northern districts – Franches-Montagnes, Porrentruy, and Delémont – wanted to establish a new canton. Its southern districts opted to remain with Berne. What democracy can do Hence, Jura was divided in two when the eponymous canton was born and became part of the Swiss Confederation in 1979 – a hard pill to swallow. Battle lines remained and became even more entrenched in people’s hearts and minds. Acts of vandalism and provocation followed, including the audacious theft of the legendary Unspunnen Stone in Interlaken. The stone, which weighed 83.5 kg, was traditionally thrown in competition at the Unspunnen Festival. But a lot of water has passed under the bridge since then, with the district of Moutier due to switch allegiance from Berne to Jura in 2026 – increasing Jura’s population Actor Shawne Fielding and the Unspunnen Stone in 2001. Separatists stole, hid and defaced the stone in 1984. After its whereabouts remained unknown for many years, the object was delivered, randomly, to Fielding, the then wife of the former Swiss ambassador to Berlin. Photo: Keystone Anti-Berne protests by Jura’s separatists were loud and fierce. Pictured here: members of the separatist Béliers group on the streets of Berne in 1972, calling for an independent canton of Jura. Photo: Keystone Swiss Review / October 2024 / No.5
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