The made-for-television drama in the Mideast moved on from Cairo last month when Hosni Mubarak fell from power, and Egyptians got down to the hard but less glamorous work of building a democracy. Today's referendum on a slate of eight amendments to the constitution is a first chance to measure progress. The verdict isn't good but luckily isn't final either.

The generals who now run Egypt want to put the reins in civilian hands through free elections by the end of summer. The impulse would otherwise be welcome in a country effectively run by the military since 1952. But their haste suggests the military prefers a shallow democratic transition. Egypt deserves better.

The referendum comes five weeks after Mr. Mubarak's fall. Four months later parliamentary elections are due, followed in September by a presidential poll. It's a mad rush. By comparison, South Africa spent four years negotiating the terms of its democratic handover between the day Nelson Mandela walked out of prison to its first free elections in 1994.

Many Egyptians called for a steady, transparent and prolonged transition the moment Mubarak left. After three decades of his calcified rule, Egypt lacked proper parties, free media or democratic habits. This takes time to develop.

The generals' decision to rush reflects either a lack of vision for Egypt's future, a desire to avoid responsibility for governing a huge and troubled state, or the preference for keeping the status quo minus the old pharaoh. Probably all of the above.

The approach benefits the groups best organized today. The Islamist Muslim Brotherhood, founded in 1928, and remnants of the old ruling National Democratic Party are the loudest champions of today's referendum and the current timetable. They want elections before democratic forces can organize.

If the military sticks to this calendar, the bulk of power could fall into their hands. The Brotherhood says it won't contest the presidency, but the group will run for parliament and may win a plurality. There they would be well-placed to write the political rules for the new Egypt. One of the amendments up for vote today gives the legislature the power to draw up a new constitution.

Even if free, today's vote is flawed. The amendments were written by a group handpicked by the military that didn't include anyone from an organized political group other than the Muslim Brotherhood. All leading secular democratic figures in Egypt opposed the referendum. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, on her first visit to post-Mubarak Cairo this week, missed an opportunity to lend America's voice to the debate. "We don't have an opinion" on the referendum, she said. We should.

The military earned public goodwill by protecting demonstrators on Cairo's Tahrir Square and easing Mr. Mubarak out of office. Their record since is mixed. Protestors were beaten in recent weeks and prison detainees have been tortured, but the ruling council has sometimes bent to public pressure and done the right thing. It fired the Mubarak-era cabinet and this week disbanded the hated security services.

This uncertain transition was bound to be full of ups and downs. To get on track, Egypt's rulers can open up the transition government to civilians, form a representative assembly to write a new constitution to replace the old Mubarak document wholesale, and push back the date of elections. These steps would give the Arab world's oldest and largest nation a better chance to end up with a strong and truly liberal democracy.