scholarly journals Protection in Germany of the fundamental rights of the European Union (GrCH). Case note of the BVerfG (German Federal Constitutional Court) of 06.11.2019 - 1 BvR 16/13 concerning the interpretation of the fundamental rights within the Basic law with regard to non-fully harmonized EU law.

2021 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 523-541
Author(s):  
Filippo Luigi Giambrone
2021 ◽  
Vol 192 ◽  
pp. 451-511

451Economics, trade and finance — European Monetary Union — Fiscal sovereignty — Public debt — Monetary policy — Economic policy — European Union — Asset purchase programme — Quantitative easing — Central banks — European Central Bank — European System of Central Banks — BundesbankTreaties — Treaty-making powers — Constitutional limitations on treaty-making powers — Transfers of powers by States to intergovernmental and other transnational authorities — Whether compatible with constitutional prerogatives of national parliament — Overall budgetary responsibility — Basic Law of GermanyInternational organizations — European Union — Powers — Member States as masters of the treaties — Principle of conferral — Whether Union having competence to determine or extend its own powers — Principle of subsidiarity — Court of Justice of the European UnionRelationship of international law and municipal law — European Union law — Interpretation — Application — Judgment of Court of Justice of the European Union — Weiss — Principle of proportionality — Whether application of EU law having absolute primacy — Whether German Federal Constitutional Court having absolute duty to follow judgment of Court of Justice of the European Union — Compatibility with Basic Law of Federal Republic of Germany — Openness of German Basic Law to European integration — Whether purchase programme ultra vires — Whether ultra vires acts applicable in Germany — Whether having binding effect in relation to German constitutional organsJurisdiction — European Union institutions — Whether jurisdiction of German Federal Constitutional Court extending to Court of Justice of the European Union and European Central Bank — Whether acts of EU institutions subject to national constitutional review — Ultra vires review — Review of core identity of national constitution — Whether application of EU law having absolute primacy — Whether absolute duty to follow judgment of Court of Justice of the European Union — The law of Germany


2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (S1) ◽  
pp. 19-26
Author(s):  
Karsten Schneider

AbstractThe First Senate of the German Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) has recently introduced the express promise that where EU fundamental rights take precedence over German fundamental rights, the Court itself could directly review, on the basis of EU fundamental rights, the application of EU law by German authorities. There are, however, differences between the Basic Law as the relevant standard of review and other standards of review that are dangerous to ignore. The constitutional status of the FCC’s jurisdiction depends crucially on whether the Court relies on the constitution or on EU fundamental rights. If the constitutional status of the novel jurisdiction covered any binding-effect, and that is a big if, the FCC still would not safeguard the unity and coherence of Union law. Leaving aside the fact that the First Senate is confined to reversing and remanding (unable to enforce anything directly), no beneficial effect on legal certainty grows apparent. Any binding-effect of the novel jurisdiction only provides for consistency without finality. And to venture further into the question: Even if anyone welcomed this novel kind of consistency without finality (virtually “provisional consistency”), this oddish consistency would still be a localized consistency, i.e. in German courts only.


2006 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 209-226 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Tomuschat

Features European Arrest Warrant – Article 16(2) German Basic Law, which allows exceptionally for the extradition of German nationals, not read in the light of the European Union integration clause in Article 23(1) Basic Law – Complaint of violation of the democratic principle put in perspective – Preservation of the statehood of Germany – Lack of proportionality in and procedural defects of the implementing Act


2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (5) ◽  
pp. 1006-1022
Author(s):  
Vlad Perju

AbstractScholarly consensus sees EU supremacy as “necessarily bidimensional”: the supranational dimension necessarily stands alongside the national dimension, which rejects the absolute and unconditional supremacy of EU law. I argue that this view of bidimensional supremacy is conceptually flawed and descriptively inaccurate. On the conceptual side, I identify the fallacy of symmetry (the idea that national and supranational perspectives on supremacy are similar in nature and equally reductionist), the fallacy of selection (the view that bidimensionalism alone can overcome what it perceives as an inevitable subjective bias in the choice between national and supranational supremacy claims), and the fallacy of construction (an originally shared popular sovereignty theory, which turns out to be riddled with biases that disrupt the equilibrium within the internally divided sovereign). On the interpretative side, I suggest that the empirical evidence in support of bidimensional supremacy is weaker than it is generally assumed. I then offer an interpretation of the PSPP judgment of the German Federal Constitutional Court, which holds a judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union to be ultra vires, unlawful and thus non-binding. PSPP presents a problem of German origins and cast, rather than one stemming from the inner structure of EU constitutionalism. At most, PSPP represents a contingent, rather than necessary, and thus unexceptional instance of bidimensional supremacy.


2009 ◽  
Vol 10 (8) ◽  
pp. 1219-1240 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frank Schorkopf

Sixty years after the promulgation of the German constitution, which from the beginning was distinguished by its “visionary openness towards Europe,” the German Federal Constitutional Court reassessed the historic process of European integration. It reviewed the compatibility of the legal foundations of the European Union with the German Basic Law and provided a thorough overview. The Treaty of Lisbon and its sweeping, integrating reform of the European Union is compatible with the Basic Law, the Court's Second Senate ruled, so long as it is applied within the framework outlined by the Federal Constitutional Court. However, the Court found that the German implementation law is not consistent with the Basic Law. Accordingly, the Court made clear that Germany can continue with the ratification of the treaty only after introducing a new implementation law. The 147-page decision could be summarised in the following way: The European Union is an association of sovereign states and, hence, a secondary political area.


2010 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 399-418
Author(s):  
Elisabetta Lanza

In the 2009 judgment dealing with the Treaty of Lisbon, the German Federal Constitutional Court urges to modify a domestic statute in order to guarantee the rights of the internal rule-making power and also provides a reasoning on the role of the European Union (EU) as an international organization, the principle of sovereignty and the relations between European Institutions and Bodies and the EU Member States. According to the German Court the Treaty of Lisbon does not transform the European Union into a Federal State (Staatsverband), but into a Confederation of States (Staatenverbund). In spite of the 1993 landmark judgment, the so-called “Maastricht Urteil”, the Court steps forward and focuses also the subject-matters that necessarily have to pertain to the Member States jurisdiction, the so-called “domain reserve”. The German Federal Constitutional Court decision on the Lisbon Treaty arouses the reflection on the core of State sovereignty and on the boundaries of the EU legal system and focuses on the force of the right to vote of every citizen, the basis of democracy.Furthermore, the decision of the German Federal Constitutional Court highlights the well-known issue of the EU's identity and the balancing between EU democracy and Member State sovereignty. In the light of the German Constitutional Court statements, the present work aims to understand which could be actually the EU's identity and how could be approached “democratic deficit” of the EU.


2010 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 367-390 ◽  
Author(s):  
Armin Steinbach

The German Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) has found that there are no constitutional objections against the Lisbon Treaty. At the same time, the FCC imposed limitations to future integration by identifying a number of state functions that are non-amenable to integration and which have to be retained at the national level. This article examines the scope and content of these core competencies. It also discusses to what extent the criteria used by the FCC for the determination of core competencies might reflect a European-wide standard for the determination of limits to the transfer of competencies to the European Union. The article concludes that the judgment clarifies the limitations of the transfer of competencies, even though the criteria used by the FCC cannot claim to produce the set of inalienable sovereign powers that were recognized as such throughout the Union.


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