Reformed Political League Gereformeerd Politiek Verbond
Founded	1948 (1948)
Dissolved	2003 (2003)
Merged into	Christian Union
Youth wing	Gereformeerd Politiek Jongeren Contact
Membership(2000)	12,940
Ideology	Christian democracy Social conservatism
Political position	Centre-right
Religion	Orthodox Protestant[a]
Politics of the Netherlands Political parties Elections

TheReformed Political League^[1] (Dutch:Gereformeerd Politiek Verbond, GPV) was an orthodox Protestantpolitical party in the Netherlands. The GPV is one of the predecessors of theChristian Union. The party was atestimonial party.

The GPV was founded in 1948 as the result of a theological conflict within theReformed Churches in the Netherlands, which led to the creation of theReformed Churches in the Netherlands (Liberated). In 1944 a group of orthodox Protestants left the Reformed Church, because they disagreed withAbraham Kuyper's view that God had created multiple branches of Christianity (Catholicism, Protestantism etc.), each with their own sphere.

In 1948, adherents of the Reformed Church in the Netherlands (Liberated) left theAnti-Revolutionary Party, the party linked to the Reformed Church in the Netherlands. On 1 April 1948, they founded the GPV during a congressAmersfoort. Former ARP MP Albertus Zijlstra chaired the congress, and also led the party in its early years.

The party was specifically linked to the liberated Reformed Church. Membership of the church was a pre-requisite for membership of the party. This dogmatic position isolated the party.

The party participated, without success in the1948,1952 and1956 general elections. After the 1956 elections, the number of seats in parliament was extended; therefore, the number of votes needed to obtain a seat was decreased from one percent of vote to two-thirds of one percent of vote. In the1959 general election it appeared that the GPV had won a seat. Its sole MP, Laning, was asked to visit the queen to advise her on the formation of a new cabinet. After the results were calculated exactly, however, it became clear that the GPV had obtained too few votes for a seat.

In1963 the party finally entered the House of Representatives in the person of Pieter Jongeling, who was madetop candidate on advice of prominent professor oftheology J. Kamphuis. In the1967 general elections, they were able to retain their one seat. During the early 1970s, a group called Nationaal Evanglisch Verbond (NEV) had left the ARP because they thought the party's alliance with theCatholic People's Party was wrong. They asked the board of the GPV whether they could join their party. This was rejected by the board of the GPV, who said that the party was open only to members of the liberated Reformed Church. This group would later become theReformatory Political Federation (RPF). In the1971 general election, the party was able to obtain a second seat, which it managed to retain in1972. In the1977 general election, Jongeling was replaced by Verbrugh and the party lost one seat. Before the1981 general election, Verbrugh was replaced by Schutte, who would lead the party until 2001. He was able to retain the one seat in 1981,1982 and1986 general elections, and he won a second seat in1989. In the1994 general election the party retained its two seats. In 1993 the GPV officially opened itself to non-liberated members. This started a slow process of cooperation between the GPV and the RPF, another orthodox Protestant party. From the1998 general election onwards, the two parliamentary parties began to cooperate, holding common meanings and appointing common spokespersons. The fact that the GPV had only two seats and the RPF three inhibited the cooperation. In 1999, their parliamentary parties in theSenate officially merged, forming one parliamentary party. In 2001, the same happened in theHouse of Representatives. In2002 general election the GPV and RPF presented a commonelectoral list of candidates for the House of Representatives, entering the elections as theChristian Union: they obtained four seats. In 2003, the GPV officially disbanded, making its merger into the Christian Union final.

The GPV chose the name Gereformeerd Politiek Verbond (Reformed Political Alliance), because it wanted to convey that it was a reformed party, and that its organisation was decentralised: the GPV was primarily an alliance of local branches.

In its first years, the GPV did not have a separate election manifesto or manifesto of principles. Instead it claimed to base its policy directly on the bible. In 1967, the first manifesto of principles was published, in which the party again stressed that theBible was the basis of their policy. The party saw the Netherlands as a Protestant nation, which should be defended.

In practice, this meant that the GPV took the following stances:

• The GPV was againstEuropean Integration, because it distrusted the Catholic nature of the project;
• The party was in favour of a strong defense;
• The GPV was staunchly monarchist because it saw theDutch Monarchy as a God-given institution;
• Originally the party wanted the government to decrease its influence on society, allowing for private initiative and civil society to take over some of its functions; during the 1980s the party wanted to retain thewelfare state and paid attention to the environment;
• The GPV defended the system ofspecial schools, which allowed for schools to be founded on liberated reformed principles;
• The party favoured the independence ofSouth Maluku andIrian Jaya, and supportedApartheid inSouth Africa^{[citation needed]};
• As an orthodox Christian party, the party was against theDutch policy on soft drugs,same-sex marriage,prostitution,abortion andeuthanasia

The GPV's electorate was almost entirely made up out of members of theReformed Churches in the Netherlands (Liberated). These were concentrated in Gelderland, Utrecht and South Holland, which form part of the Dutch Bible belt, and Groningen

The highest organ of the GPV was the congress, it is formed by delegates from the municipal branches. It convenes once every year. It appoints the party board and decides the order of candidates on electoral lists for the Senate, House of Representatives and European Parliament, and has the last word on the party program. The party secretariat was located inDordrecht and later inAmersfoort.

The party publishedOns Politeuma ("Our citizenship"). It scientific institute was theGroen van Prinsterer Stichting ("Groen van Prinsterer Foundation") and its education institute wasMandaat - Gereformeerd Politiek Vormingswerk ("Mandate, Reformed Political Education work"). Its youth organisation was theGereformeerde Politieke Jongeren Club ("Reformed Political Youth Club"), which publishedPlein ("Square") andStand-By.

The party had a small liberated Reformedpillar around, consisting out of like minded organisations. Most prominent was theReformed Churches in the Netherlands (Liberated). The paperNederlands Dagblad was closely linked to the GPV, until 1974 Pieter Jongeling, who also led the parliamentary party, led the paper. TheKampen Theological University of the Reformed Church (Liberated) was also linked to the liberated Reformed Church.

Before 1981, the party was very isolated, this was caused by their own dogmatic position on non-liberated Christians. Nonetheless the knowledge and conscience of its MPs was respected throughout parliament.

After 1981, the party began to cooperate with more with other parties, especially with the orthodox ProtestantPolitical Reformed Party (SGP) andReformatory Political Federation (RPF). In 1981, the GPV allowed municipal branches to cooperate with branches of other parties, this led to the formation of several combined lists with either the SGP or RPF or both. In 1984, the party entered in theEuropean elections with a combined list the RPF and SGP. It won only one seat. In 1994. they were more successful and won two seats, one of which was taken by the GPV.

In 1993, the party allowed non-liberated to become member of the party, this started a slow cooperation process with the RPF which resulted in the fusion in theChristian Union in 2003.

Internationally the party was comparable to theAmericanChristian Right and the small Protestant parties of Scandinavia, such as theChristian Democratic Party of Norway, theSwedish andDanish Christian Democrats. The party has never been in a government coalition however, instead it has chosen to voice its concerns with government policy, while acknowledging that they are not big enough to force their opinion upon others.^{[citation needed]}

• Klei, Ewout (2011).'Klein maar krachtig, dat maakt ons uniek'. Een geschiedenis van het GPV, 1948-2003. Amsterdam: Bert Bakker.ISBN 978-90-351-3609-0.

• Christian Union (Netherlands)
• Confessional parties in the Netherlands
• Defunct Christian political parties
• Defunct political parties in the Netherlands
• Political parties established in 1948
• Political parties disestablished in 2003
• Protestant political parties
• Conservative parties in the Netherlands
• 1948 establishments in the Netherlands
• 2003 disestablishments in the Netherlands

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