Under the constitution of October 1951, the federal monarchy of Libya was headed by King Idris as chief of state, with succession to his designated male heirs (Art.

[4][5] In particular, the Constitution envisioned mechanisms to guarantee accountability in the exercise of public functions and equality of all Libyan citizens before the law.

When the original heir apparent died, the king appointed his nephew, Prince Hasan ar Rida, his successor.

[6][8] In its foreign policy, the Kingdom of Libya was recognized as belonging to the conservative traditionalist bloc in the League of Arab States, of which it became a member in 1953.

The U.S. supported the United Nations resolution providing for Libyan independence in 1951 and raised the status of its office at Tripoli from a consulate general to a legation.

Reservations set aside in the desert were used by British and American military aircraft based in Europe as practice firing ranges.

Steady economic improvement occurred, but the pace was slow, and Libya remained a poor and underdeveloped country heavily dependent on foreign aid.

This situation changed suddenly and dramatically in June 1959 when research prospectors from Esso (later renamed Exxon) confirmed the location of major petroleum deposits at Zaltan in Cyrenaica.

Further discoveries followed, and commercial development was quickly initiated by concession holders who returned 50 percent of their profits to the Libyan government in taxes.

Libya's petroleum law, initially passed in 1955, was amended in 1961 and again in 1965 to increase the Libyan government's share of the revenues from oil.

By legislation, the historical divisions of Cyrenaica, Tripolitania, and Fezzan were to be eliminated and the country divided into ten new provinces, each headed by an appointed governor.

Although it supported Arab causes, including the Moroccan and Algerian independence movements, Libya took little active part in the Arab-Israeli dispute or the tumultuous inter-Arab politics of the 1950s and the early 1960s.

[12]In response to anti-Western agitation in 1964, Libya's essentially pro-Western government requested the evacuation of British and American bases before the dates specified in the treaties.

Most British forces were in fact withdrawn in 1966, although the evacuation of foreign military installations, including Wheelus Air Base, was not completed until March 1970.

The Six-Day War between Israel and its Arab neighbors sparked violent demonstrations including attacks on the United States and British embassies and oil company offices.

At the Arab summit conference held at Khartoum in September 1967, however, Libya, along with Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, agreed to provide generous subsidies from oil revenues to aid Egypt, Syria, and Jordan, defeated in June by Israel.

Libya, nonetheless, continued its close association with the West, while Idris' government steered an essentially conservative course at home.

The monarchy came to an end on 1 September 1969 when a group of military officers led by Muammar Gaddafi staged a coup d'état against King Idris while he was in Turkey for medical treatment.

[14] In fact, Idris remains widely regarded as the father of an independent and unified Libya who led the country through its resistance to the colonial powers.

As a quiet but firm ruler, he played a unifying role both in Libya, between the various strains of Islam and the plethora of Libyan tribes, and across the region.

The United Kingdom of Libya was a constitutional and hereditary monarchy with legislative power being exercised by the monarch in conjunction with parliament.

[5] In fact, the document continues to be widely regarded as an important instrument and a solid base towards the solution of Libya's political crisis.

[23][24] Interviewed by Al-Hayat in April 2014, then-Libyan Minister of Foreign Affairs Mohamed Abdelaziz stated that the return of the Constitutional Monarchy within the institutional limits set up by the 1951 Constitution before the 1963 amendments could serve as a unifying symbol for the nation and a "political umbrella" that would guarantee the legitimacy of Libya's institutions in the face of calls for a federal solution and sectarian conflict.

The party held a meeting in Bayda attended by Cyrenaican authorities as well as by members of the Tobruk-based House of Representatives under the slogan "The return to the unamended Constitution of the founding fathers of 1951 to ensure the unity of the Libyan nation".

A conclusive statement authored by the organizers reiterated the necessity to regard the 1951 Constitution as the sole means to achieve political reunification in Libya.

[27] Notably, on 4 June 2015 Daniel Kawczynski, a member of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee in the British Parliament, published a piece advocating for the return of the 1951 Constitution as amended in 1963 in line with the growing grassroots support registered in the major cities across Libya.