At a specially convened National Conference of the PCR in December 1967--the first such conference in twenty-two years--Ceausescu continued to strengthen his own position. The conference was attended by the members of the Central Committee as well as by 1,150 delegates from local party organizations. Ceausescu elected to employ the technique of the party conference rather than a special party congress in order to have his proposals approved by a larger body than the Central Committee. At the same time, he wanted to avoid the requirement of having to elect a new Central Committee, which would have been the case had a congress been held. In his address to the conference, Ceausescu declared that in order to modernize Romania as a socialist state it was imperative to adopt new organizational and ideological forms. To achieve this end, he proposed a number of reforms in the structure and functioning of both the party and the government and defended the country's policy of independent development. Speaking of the relationship between party and government responsibilities, Ceausescu asserted the need to eliminate overlapping and duplication in party and government functions. As a remedy, he proposed that only one individual, whether in the party or in the government, should deal with a particular sector of activity. In addition, he called for a clearer delineation of the responsibilities of the government and the party. It was not necessary, he declared, for the Central Committee to decide all questions of economic affairs and continue to maintain a number of economic departments that duplicated the functions of the Council of Ministers and the economic ministries. He proposed that the Central Committee limit itself to basic decisions of economic policy and that the specific matters of implementation be left to the government ministries. Political and ideological activity, Ceausescu proposed, would remain under the control of the Central Committee and would be given greater emphasis and direction through the creation of an ideological commission that would work to develop an intensified program of political education. A defense council, composed of the party's Standing Presidium and other members, would be established to deal with most military questions, but the basic questions of guidance for both the armed forces and the state security apparatus would continue to be the responsibility of the Central Committee. Major foreign policy questions would be decided by the Standing Presidium (see ch. 8).