Constitutional Council (France)
The Constitutional Council (French: Conseil constitutionnel; French pronunciation: [kɔ̃sɛj kɔ̃stitysjɔˈnɛl]) is the highest constitutional authority in France. It was established by the Constitution of the Fifth Republic on 4 October 1958 to ensure that constitutional principles and rules are upheld. It is housed in the Palais-Royal in Paris. Its main activity is to rule on whether proposed statutes conform with the Constitution, after they have been voted by Parliament and before they are signed into law by the President of the Republic (a priori review), or passed by the government as a decree, which has law status in many domains, a right granted to the government under delegation of Parliament.
Constitutional Council
Constitutional authority
9 years (non-renewable)
9 + 2 former presidents of the Republic (de facto)
8 March 2016
Since 1 March 2010, individual citizens who are party to a trial or a lawsuit have been able to ask for the Council to review whether the law applied in the case is constitutional (a posteriori review). In 1971, the Council ruled that conformity with the Constitution also entails conformity with two other texts referred to in the preamble of the Constitution, the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen and the preamble of the constitution of the Fourth Republic, both of which list constitutional rights.[1][2]
Members are referred to as les sages ("the wise") in the media and the general public, as well as in the Council's own documents.[3][4][5] Legal theorist Arthur Dyevre notes that this "tends to make those who dare criticise them look unwise."[6] Since 2016, Laurent Fabius has served as President of the Constitutional Council (Président du Conseil constitutionnel) following his appointment by President François Hollande.
Controversies[edit]
In 1995, Roland Dumas was appointed president of the Council by François Mitterrand. Dumas twice attracted major controversy. First, he was reported as party to scandals regarding the Elf Aquitaine oil company, with many details regarding his mistress, Christine Deviers-Joncour, and his expensive tastes in clothing being published in the press.[37]
In this period, the Council issued some highly controversial opinions in a decision related to the International Criminal Court, in Decision 98–408 DC, declaring that the sitting President of the Republic could be tried criminally only by the High Court of Justice, a special court organized by Parliament and originally meant for cases of high treason. This, in essence, ensured that Jacques Chirac would not face criminal charges until he left office. This controversial decision is now moot, since the Parliament redefined the rules of responsibility of the President of the Republic by the French constitutional law of 23 July 2008.[38] In 1999, because of the Elf scandal, Dumas took official leave from the Council and Yves Guéna assumed the interim presidency.[39]
In 2005, the Council again attracted some controversy when Valéry Giscard d'Estaing and Simone Veil campaigned for the proposed European Constitution, which was submitted to the French voters in a referendum. Simone Veil had participated in the campaign after obtaining a leave of absence from the Council. This action was criticized by some, including Jean-Louis Debré, president of the National Assembly, who thought that prohibitions against appointed members of the council conducting partisan politics should not be evaded by their taking leave for the duration of a campaign. Veil defended herself by pointing to precedent; she said, "How is that his [Debré's] business? He has no lesson to teach me."[40]