The European Parliament has voted overwhelmingly in favour of the so-called Project for a European Union Constitution.
500 MEPs voted in favour, 137 against and there were 40 abstentions.
Spaniards will be the first to test public support for the text when a referendum is held there on 20 February.
About half of the 25 EU member states will follow with referendums of their own during the year.
The other members, including most notably Germany, will leave parliament to pass the text into law.
Lithuania, one of the ten states which joined the EU last May, became the first and so far only country to ratify the text in a parliamentary vote in November.
