Judgments of the Constitutional Tribunal. Poland is wrong in the dispute over the primacy of EU law
- There are precedents for questioning the supremacy of EU law and this was done by German judges who challenged one of the CJEU decisions for quite narrow, technical reasons
- The authors write that the Polish Constitutional Tribunal went further and further, also treating EU treaties that are inconsistent with the constitution, and therefore invalid
- But they add that the decision of the Constitutional Tribunal exposes the clarity of the voices underlying the very identity of the EU as a community of law
- The principle of EU legal supremacy is by no means enshrined in the EU treaties and results from the unchallenged judgment of the Court in 1964.
- The Union is an evolving, experimental political structure and its mandates to remove, in this country, no matter how a position can be triggered, the authors conclude
Original article on POLITICO.eu website
The questioning by the Constitutional Tribunal of the principle of the supremacy of EU law is not unprecedented. Challenging the supremacy of the Union’s courts is part of the legal right to vote, which has been going strong in recent years.
Consequently, only in the German constitutional year, it was executed to shoot “the rightful in an autonomous EU” and to undermine the “fundamental legal order of the EU”. The Karlsruhe Court questioned the legality of the so-called the Central Bank’s quantitative easing), even though it was won over the advancement with EU law by the Court of Justice of the European Union.
The Polish court, however, went further. German judges questioned the legality of the ECB’s program for rather narrow, technical reasons. The Polish court found that the EU treaties were unconstitutional and therefore invalid.
Moreover, this judgment should be communicated with the context of the organic nature of the internal struggle for the rule of law and independence of the courts between the ruling PiS and its substitutes – including the politically subordinate Tribunal of the Constitution – and pro-European Poles.
The rest of the text below the video.
Weaknesses of the EU community of law
It is impossible, however, to say that the decision of the Constitutional Tribunal is clear that the very identity of the EU is a law.
Let’s start with the very principle of EU legal supremacy. This principle was not enshrined in the 1957 treaty, the founding Roman of the then European Economic Community, or in the later EU treaty.
Rather, the supreme court was established by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) itself through its landmark decision in 1964 in the fight against ENEL.
The great success of the Union as a community lies precisely in the fact that you want to be able to pursue a country that wants to support the EU.
However, the consensus of the primacy of EU law is from the absolute. The version of supremacy articulated by the ECJ was contested by the German Constitutional Tribunal in a case that dates back to 1974. The May 2020 ruling in which the court attacked the ECB’s quantitative easing program could be the first time the court finally bit, but already before did not proclaim that EU law could not evade the German constitution almost as long as the CJEU insisted it could.
States have not formally recognized the supremacy of EU law
Moreover, when it is possible for EU countries to allow for the recognition of the supremacy of EU and national law, they did not take advantage of it.
The failed Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe, an article with the superiority of establishing the EU. Order that, together with others, advance with the progress of progress, the progress of Lisbon, after proceeding as progress, as proceeding, as before, with progress.
The fact that the Constitutional Treaty and the Lisbon Treaty were treated in this way makes the omission of the EU’s legal supremacy all the more appropriate. And, what was more than a decade old when the Union did not attempt a tentative constitutional reform each time consists of the principle whether the fundamental principles of the EU legal order are consistent with the principle of establishing what it consists of, how it is composed.
What about polexit?
Polexit is indeed “false news”, argues Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki. It is pointless to pretend otherwise, because we do not like the political program that we have on his party. The release of the EU by a state, which was supposed to have the effect that a Polish government would have a universal mandate to take a radical step, cannot be allowed to be released from the decision.
It was established that no basis had been established for the removal of control from the Union, the final control over the establishment of the database.
Perhaps someone is thinking that the Germans are trying to throw out Poland, for example? Not long ago, Wolfgang Schäuble warned the Germans against “teaching Poles what democracy is,” and it is not surprising that Merkel is in favor of dialogue rather than confrontation.
The Polish government can be criticized for many things. But when one of the Polish dailies, Gazborcza, accuses Morawiecki of “forgetting” what argued in the textbook on European law – that EU law is in the domestic online store – this criticism is misplaced.
The European Union is an evolving, experimental political structure that is neither a fully fledged federation nor a running network of sovereign nation states.
Kaczyński is waiting for changes in Europe. He counts on the success of the right
Act as it will act, creating the position it offers, also in Poland, no matter how problematic it may be.
Stefan Auer is an associate professor of studies at Hong Kong University Nicole Scicluna is a government and international professor at Hong Kong Baptist University
Editing: Michał Broniatowski