At first it appeared that he might exercise his directive role from Qum, for he moved there from Tehran on February 29, causing Qom to become in effect a second capital of Iran. On March 30 and 31, a nationwide referendum resulted in a massive vote in favor of the establishment of an Islamic Republic.
The Imam proclaimed the next day, April 1, 1979, as the “first day of God’s government.”
The institutionalization of the new order continued with the election, on August 3, of an Assembly of Experts (Majlis-i Khubragan), entrusted with the task of reviewing a draft constitution that had been put forward on June 18; fifty-five of the seventy-three persons elected were religious scholars.
It was not however to be expected that a smooth transition from the old regime would prove possible. The powers and duties of the Council of the Islamic Revolutionary, which was intended to serve as an interim legislature, were not clearly delineated from those of the provisional government headed by Bazargan.
More importantly, significant differences of outlook and approach separated the two bodies from each other.
The council, composed predominantly of ulama, favored immediate and radical change and sought to strengthen the revolutionary organs that had come into being - the revolutionary committees, the revolutionary courts charged with punishing members of the former regime charged with serious crimes, and the Corps of Guards of the Islamic Revolution (Sipah-i Pasdaran-i Inqilab-i Islami), established on May 5, 1979.
The government, headed by Bazargan and comprising mainly liberal technocrats of Islamic orientation, sought as swift a normalization of the situation as possible and the gradual phasing out of the revolutionary institutions.