Suchergebnisse

This book brings together a unique collection of papers concerning the protection of human rights under Bills of Rights in Commonwealth Caribbean Countries and under regional and international human rights treaties. The papers have been prepared by distinguished judges, legal practitioners, government officers and members of non-governmental human rights organisations. The work demonstrates the relevance of international human rights law in domestic cases, and considers practical ways of strengthening effective protection of human rights through constitutional and international laws and mechanisms. The book is arranged on a thematic basis, with each chapter being devoted to papers and discussions on a particular human rights issue. The issues covered are: the use of available remedies; liberty and security of the person; the right to a fair trial; access to court; the right to life and human dignity; freedom of expression; equality before the law; freedom of association; the role of Governments and of non-governmental organisations in the protection and the promotion of human rights

The year 2018 started on a high note after the resolution of a prolonged inter-branch conflict between the President, the Constitutional Court (CC), and the National Council (NaCo) over the appointment of constitutional judges. President Andrej Kiska appointed judges Jana Laššáková, Mojmír Mamojka, and Miroslav Duriš to the Court late in December 2017, filling three vacancies that had opened up in 2014. With all 13 judges in place, the Court was finally able to start working at the full capacity. The resolution of the conflict in the CC Appointments Case carried a promise of improved relations between political branches of power, which was necessary in order to change the Constitution in time for the next CC appointments due in mid-February 2019. The Ministry of Justice initiated the drafting and consultation of an amendment to fix the selection and appointment mechanism for constitutional judges in the summer, ostensibly to make good on its promise in the Programme Proclamation of the Government. The government proposal was submitted to the National Council (NaCo) after several months of public debate and critique, but efforts to change the Constitution failed after a dramatic late-night session in the NaCo, in late autumn. The selection and appointment mechanism did not change, and due to the failure, the relationship between President Kiska and the government coalition further deteriorated. Since the key constitutional moment of the year failed to deliver, we focus on the development of sub-constitutional rules governing the selection and appointment of constitutional judges. Changes to legislation still had an impact on the upcoming selection round, and we will review them in the next section. At the time of writing of this report, the CC has not yet published its annual statistics for the year 2018. However, the available data for the first six months provides us with a rough measure to estimate the judicial output of the Court for the whole year. The Court received 1 332 petitions (constitutional complaints and judicial review petitions combined) in the first half of 2018 and addressed 1 469 cases. These cases include all pending litigation, which kept accumulating during the time that the Court had been incomplete. A single judge decided 113 cases on average, with most of the cases being constitutional complaints that are handled by one of the four three-member Senates. The Plenum decided six cases of review of litigation on merits. Three of the decisions found a statute in part or wholly contrary to, and one in conformity with the Constitution. We review some of the cases, which may be interesting to a global audience in the third section. The report concludes with two observations on the future development of the Slovak constitutional law.

A neglected function of constitutions is their role in facilitating communication. This is particularly important if one accepts the approach of constitutional pluralism, both at the international level and between plural constitutions at the national level. Communication may be between different types of constitutions or between legal and other forms of social systems such as the economy and politics. Theoretical support for this approach can be found in Habermas's discursive theory of democracy, and also in recent developments in systems theory. The role of constitutional communication is here illustrated through four case studies drawn from economic management. The first two concern failures of communication through the use of balanced budget rules, and in the breakdown of institutional relations in the UK under the pressure of the financial crisis of 2008–2009. The other two identify successes; the German Federal Constitutional Court's support for legislative deliberation in relation to eurozone rescue measures and the development of countervailing institutions linked by soft law in UK monetary and fiscal policy.

This article analyses the content and application of principle of vacatio legis in the field of taxation.Taxes, being one of the most important elements of every state, undoubtedly are one of the essential factors of the political society as well. Therefore it is crucially important to ensure that taxes are established and changed only bythe procedure strictly in line with the constitutional principles of legal expectations and legal security.Vacatio legis means that there should be a gap between the enactment and announcement of the law and it's coming into force / beginning of its application. This rule ensures that persons have the opportunity to properly prepare for the application of new legislation. Vacatio legis and lex retro non agit ensure the confidence of taxpayers in the state and protects their legal expectations. Accordingly they could be defended invoking the Constitution.Legal acts of Lithuania (Law on Tax Administration and Law on the Fundamentals of Legislation) establish that tax laws enacting a new tax, setting new tax rate, introducing tax relief and/or sanctions for violations of the tax laws or substantially amending the procedure of specific taxation or the principles of the legal regulation of taxation will come into effect no earlier than in six months after the day of their publication. This term once again affirms the importance of tax rules in the political society.The abovementioned requirement has two exemptions and one of them could be applied when tax laws are directly related and enacted together with the law on next year's national budget (Law on the Approval of Financial Indicators of the State Budget and Municipal Budgets). This exemption was widely used by the legislator enacting the amendments of tax laws in Lithuania during the economic crisis. Unfortunately it is used for changing of subsequent tax laws as well.Although the Constitutional Court in its doctrine acknowledged that the amendments of tax laws, made during the economic crisis, which were enacted ignoring vacatio legis, are not in conflict with the Constitution as they were made in the extraordinary situation of economic crisis in the state, however it should be pointed out that the Constitutional Court also stressed that using of the exemptions of vacatio legis should be more the exception than a rule and used only in the exclusive circumstances having the very strong reasons for that. ; Straipsnyje analizuojama vacatio legis (lot. įstatymo nebuvimas) principo esmė ir jo taikymas mokesčių teisėje, atskleidžiant mokesčių vaidmenį polinėje bendruomenėje, jų įtaką asmenų elgesiui, galimybei rinktis tam tikras veiklos kryptis, jų teisėtiems lūkesčiams ir interesams. Straipsnyje atskleidžiamas vacatio legis ir lex retro non agit principų santykis. Tiriama vacatio legis principo įtaka 2008 m. pabaigoje – 2009 metais padarytiems mokesčių įstatymų pakeitimams ir konstatuojama, kad šio principo taikymas buvo labiau išimtis nei bendra taisyklė. Nepaisant to, tokia praktika Konstitucinio Teismo formuojamoje doktrinoje pripažinta neprieštaraujančia Konstitucijoje įtvirtintiems teisėtų lūkesčių ir teisinės valstybės principams, kartu nustatant aiškias vacatio legis konstitucines gaires ir ribas būsimiems įstatymų leidėjo sprendimams.

In June 2015, President Omar Hassan Ahmad Al Bashir of Sudan attended a meeting of the African Union (AU) in Johannesburg, South Africa, despite the fact that a warrant had been issued for his arrest by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for the commission of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide in the Darfur region. Although South Africa, a party to the ICC, was obliged to arrest Al Bashir and surrender him to the ICC under the terms of the Rome Statute of the ICC, the South African government made no attempt to apprehend him. On the application of a South African public interest law firm, the North Gauteng High Court ordered that the government was required by law to arrest and detain Al Bashir. Al Bashir was, however, allowed to leave South Africa.

This is the text of the keynote lecture delivered at the launch of Black, Lynsey and Dunne, Peter (eds). Law and Gender in Modern Ireland. Oxford: Hart, delivered 13th September 2019, Department of Law, Maynooth University, Ireland. The lecture locates the book within the context of rapid, radical transformation in gender law and politics in Ireland, highlighting some of the issues which have been the focus of activism and/or reform. The lecture goes on to outline some of the challenges which arise in the legislative pursuit of gender equality including the tension between respecting agency and choice and curbing exploitative and/or gender disadvantaging practices. Comparisons are also made with legislative initiatives in neighbouring Britain. The lecture concludes with some reflections on the interplay of sex and gender in law and public debate and their embedding in the constitutional creation of the modern Irish State.

AbstractIn light of re‐conceptualizing a European social market economy, this contribution considers competition law's position in the European economic constitution. The economic constitution captures the economic foundation of European integration as based on the market mechanism. The contribution asks whether the change towards a 'more economic approach' to competition law implies an alienation of competition law from societal challenges. The contribution considers whether this interpretation, with competition law being such an integral part of the European economic constitution, should change in light of the constitutional goal of a European social market economy. To do so, the article sketches the fundamental place of competition law in the European economic constitution and shows how its interpretation has become more economics‐based. It highlights some of the problematic aspects of this change and analyzes these findings from the perspective of an economic constitution serving a social market economy.

This book examines the everyday judicial experience in four multicultural jurisdictions as a means of exploring the relationship between legal systems and cultural identities. It deals with food, clothing and days of rest, and looks at their intersection with constitutional rights such as religious liberty or freedom of expression.

"This introductory book on Thai politics and the rule of law explains why chronically unstable Thailand struggles to mediate and adjudicate its political disputes. It focuses on the continuities between the pre-1932 and post-1932 periods. Since the shift to constitutional monarchy in 1932, the power of the monarch and military has endured; the legislature, electorate and, until recently, judiciary have been comparatively powerless; and constitutions and laws have been comparatively unimportant. Historical continuities are also evident in the persistence of hierarchical thinking and ethno-nationalism, both of which have inhibited open debates about governance, and in the emergence of a distinctively Thai legal culture. Thailand's governance was re-cast ambitiously in the 1890s, 1932 and 1997. Since 1997, governing Thailand and developing Thailand's economy have become harder. So political disputes have become more acute and the absence of a national consensus on dispute settlement mechanisms more obvious. Until governance is again re-cast, Thailand's political instability and cycle of coups will continue. This volume offers contemporary insights and historical context to the general reader, newcomers to Thailand, and students of Thai history, politics and law."--

Main Description:The New Deal is often said to represent a sea change in American constitutional history, overturning a century of precedent to permit an expanded federal government, increased regulation of the economy, and eroded property protections. John Compton offers a surprising revision of this familiar narrative, showing that nineteenth-century evangelical Protestants, not New Deal reformers, paved the way for the most important constitutional developments of the twentieth century. Following the great religious revivals of the early 1800s, American evangelicals embarked on a crusade to eradicate immorality from national life by destroying the property that made it possible. Their cause represented a direct challenge to founding-era legal protections of sinful practices such as slavery, lottery gambling, and buying and selling liquor. Although evangelicals urged the judiciary to bend the rules of constitutional adjudication on behalf of moral reform, antebellum judges usually resisted their overtures. But after the Civil War, American jurists increasingly acquiesced in the destruction of property on moral grounds. In the early twentieth century, Oliver Wendell Holmes and other critics of laissez-faire constitutionalism used the judiciary's acceptance of evangelical moral values to demonstrate that conceptions of property rights and federalism were fluid, socially constructed, and subject to modification by democratic majorities. The result was a progressive constitutional regime-rooted in evangelical Protestantism-that would hold sway for the rest of the twentieth century.

Diese erste moderne Gesamtdarstellung der Preußischen Landesverfassung vom 30. November 1920 zeichnet ein umfassendes Bild ebendieser. Zugleich wird Preußens Existenz als demokratischer Freistaat im Weimarer Republik beleuchtet und dabei stets der Blick auf die Auswirkung des Dualismus Preußen-Reich auf den Föderalismus des Reiches gerichtet. Die Dissertation umreißt Struktur und Aufbau des preußischen Freistaates und seiner Provinzen, stellt die Organe – den Landtag, das Staatsministerium und den Staatsrat – dar und behandelt die Judikative, Verwaltung und Kirche im preußischen Staat. Schließlich wird auch der Einfluss der preußischen Landesverfassung auf die Machtergreifung der Nationalsozialisten kritisch betrachtet.

Many institutions in a democratic society wield important power by virtue of the decisions they make. These decisions may concern individuals or have a more general impact on society. It goes without saying today that this exercise of power must be accounted for. A supreme court's reasoning is given in its judgements. A central bank's reasoning is given in the decision-making body's minutes. In this paper, we develop criteria for what constitute good written justifications for a decision, not what makes a good decision per se. We look at the two institutions we know best: supreme courts and central banks. Of course, these are not the only institutions that exercise power on behalf of the state, and we also ask whether our criteria could be applied more generally. We assess a selection of supreme court judgements and monetary policy decisions in various countries qualitatively against our criteria, and find that practice largely conforms to the criteria. There are some common features between supreme courts and central banks. In recent years there has been a development in the way the judgments are written in the UK Supreme Court. Earlier, each judge wrote his votum. Now they are writing a common text. With individual writing, there were many different formulations of the normative text. It is easier for the public to relate to one legislative text. The UK Supreme Court, under the presidency of Lord Neuberger, has therefore gradually moved towards writing a joint text. John Roberts, the US Chief Justice, thought that judges should be worried when they are writing separately about the effect on the court as an institution. What about the minutes of the central banks? Professor Alan Blinder at Princeton argues that a central bank that speaks with a cacophony of voices has no voice at all. Professor Otmar Issing, the former Chief Economist and Member of the Board of the ECB, believes that there is a danger that individual minutes provide an incentive for individual members to put themselves ahead of the institution We also test empirically whether the institutions' decisions and the justifications for these decisions are communicated in clear language. Our analysis is inspired by Bank of England chief economist Andrew Haldane's speech "A little more conversation, a little less action", and by the report "Bankspeak: The Language of World Bank Reports 1946-2012" by Franco Moretti and Dominique Pestre at Stanford Literary Lab. We analyse more than 6,000 central bank and supreme court decisions from the past decade and find considerable differences in length and readability across countries and institutions. The grand chamber decisions of the European Court of Human Rights are by far the longest, while the European Court of Justice employs the most complex language. The Danish central bank keeps things briefest and uses the clearest language, but also has the simplest regime to explain. The Swedish central bank's minutes stand out as both long and complex, while the Norwegian central bank is unusually concise. Moretti and Pestre analysed the text of all World Bank reports and found quantitative indications that the language of the reports had moved in the wrong direction in terms of readability. We perform the same tests on central banks and supreme courts and find that these institutions' language has not moved in the same negative direction. Former Bank of England governor Mervyn King argued that the design of an institution "must reflect history and experience", and there is no doubt that each institution's way of writing is influenced by its own history. This is what economists refer to as "path dependence". We wonder, however, whether there is rather too much path dependence in many cases, and whether the institutions in question might benefit from looking at trends and learning from other institutions both at home and abroad. In our work on this paper, we have been particularly wary of phrases along the lines of "based on a general assessment". Alarm bells sound whenever we see them, especially with any frequency, as they are liable to conceal rather than illuminate the true rationale. ; publishedVersion

The article is devoted to the problem of the constitutional right to resistance. The right to resist is one of the oldest rights, which began its constitutionalization with the appearance of the first constitutional documents - the Declaration of Independence of the United States in 1776, the French Declaration of Human and Civil Rights in 1789 and 1793. Today it is a familiar element of constitutional design. constitutional consolidation. At the same time, the content of this right and the criteria for its implementation are still insufficiently defined. The right to resist is associated with the protection of the constitution in the face of tyranny, as well as with the exercise of a number of political rights, with or without violation of the law, with or without the use of force. An approach is analyzed according to which the right to resist in a pluralistic democracy is not in itself necessary as an active one, but it should be as a reminder (prevention) for supporters of totalitarianism, as well as a means of educating democratic thinking. It is concluded that further research on this rule is essential in Ukraine. This concerns the development of a scientifically sound approach to the constitutionalization of the right to resist, as well as a legal assessment of the events of autumn 2004 and late 2013-early 2014. Similarly, understanding the concept of the right to resist helps to understand the content of as a result of the exercise of the right to revolt, gaining new legitimacy, and subsequently to defend the relevant right. The uprising can be seen from the standpoint of the current constitution as a challenge to the existing system and an encroachment on its legitimacy. Strictly speaking, therefore, the purpose of the uprising, its grounds and legitimate means for assessing the constitutionality are extremely important. The constitutionalization of the right to resist helps to use the existing legal arsenal of concepts and concepts to provide a legal assessment and develop appropriate criteria for the legitimacy of resistance. ; Статья посвящена проблеме конституционного права на сопротивление. Сделан вывод о том, что право на сопротивление является одним из древнейших прав, которое начало свою конституционализации с появлением первых конституционных документов – Декларации независимости США 1776 г., Французской декларации прав человека и гражданина 1789 и 1793 Право на сопротивление связывают с защитой конституции в условиях тирании, а также с реализацией ряда политических прав, с нарушением закона или даже и без такого нарушения, с применением силы или без такового. Постижения концепции права на сопротивление помогает понять содержание учредительной власти и определенный парадокс: новая конституция может как возникать в результате реализации права на восстание, получая новую легитимность, так и впоследствии защищаться соответствующим правом. ; Статтю присвячено проблемі конституційного права на опір. Зроблено висновок про те, що право на опір є одним із найдавніших прав, яке почало свою конституціоналізацію із появою перших конституційних документів – Декларації незалежності США 1776 р., Французької декларації прав людини і громадянина 1789 р. і 1793 р. Право на опір пов'язують із захистом конституції в умовах тиранії, а також із реалізацію низки політичних прав, із порушенням закону або ж навіть і без такого порушення, із застосуванням сили або без такого. Осягнення концепції права на опір допомагає зрозуміти зміст установчої влади і певний парадокс: нова конституція може як виникати в результаті реалізації права на повстання, отримуючи нову легітимність, так і згодом захищатися відповідним правом.

The article is devoted to the problem of the constitutional right to resistance. The right to resist is one of the oldest rights, which began its constitutionalization with the appearance of the first constitutional documents - the Declaration of Independence of the United States in 1776, the French Declaration of Human and Civil Rights in 1789 and 1793. Today it is a familiar element of constitutional design. constitutional consolidation. At the same time, the content of this right and the criteria for its implementation are still insufficiently defined. The right to resist is associated with the protection of the constitution in the face of tyranny, as well as with the exercise of a number of political rights, with or without violation of the law, with or without the use of force. An approach is analyzed according to which the right to resist in a pluralistic democracy is not in itself necessary as an active one, but it should be as a reminder (prevention) for supporters of totalitarianism, as well as a means of educating democratic thinking. It is concluded that further research on this rule is essential in Ukraine. This concerns the development of a scientifically sound approach to the constitutionalization of the right to resist, as well as a legal assessment of the events of autumn 2004 and late 2013-early 2014. Similarly, understanding the concept of the right to resist helps to understand the content of as a result of the exercise of the right to revolt, gaining new legitimacy, and subsequently to defend the relevant right. The uprising can be seen from the standpoint of the current constitution as a challenge to the existing system and an encroachment on its legitimacy. Strictly speaking, therefore, the purpose of the uprising, its grounds and legitimate means for assessing the constitutionality are extremely important. The constitutionalization of the right to resist helps to use the existing legal arsenal of concepts and concepts to provide a legal assessment and develop appropriate criteria for the legitimacy of resistance. ; Статья посвящена проблеме конституционного права на сопротивление. Сделан вывод о том, что право на сопротивление является одним из древнейших прав, которое начало свою конституционализации с появлением первых конституционных документов – Декларации независимости США 1776 г., Французской декларации прав человека и гражданина 1789 и 1793 Право на сопротивление связывают с защитой конституции в условиях тирании, а также с реализацией ряда политических прав, с нарушением закона или даже и без такого нарушения, с применением силы или без такового. Постижения концепции права на сопротивление помогает понять содержание учредительной власти и определенный парадокс: новая конституция может как возникать в результате реализации права на восстание, получая новую легитимность, так и впоследствии защищаться соответствующим правом. ; Статтю присвячено проблемі конституційного права на опір. Зроблено висновок про те, що право на опір є одним із найдавніших прав, яке почало свою конституціоналізацію із появою перших конституційних документів – Декларації незалежності США 1776 р., Французької декларації прав людини і громадянина 1789 р. і 1793 р. Право на опір пов'язують із захистом конституції в умовах тиранії, а також із реалізацію низки політичних прав, із порушенням закону або ж навіть і без такого порушення, із застосуванням сили або без такого. Осягнення концепції права на опір допомагає зрозуміти зміст установчої влади і певний парадокс: нова конституція може як виникати в результаті реалізації права на повстання, отримуючи нову легітимність, так і згодом захищатися відповідним правом.

The article is devoted to the problem of the constitutional right to resistance. The right to resist is one of the oldest rights, which began its constitutionalization with the appearance of the first constitutional documents - the Declaration of Independence of the United States in 1776, the French Declaration of Human and Civil Rights in 1789 and 1793. Today it is a familiar element of constitutional design. constitutional consolidation. At the same time, the content of this right and the criteria for its implementation are still insufficiently defined. The right to resist is associated with the protection of the constitution in the face of tyranny, as well as with the exercise of a number of political rights, with or without violation of the law, with or without the use of force. An approach is analyzed according to which the right to resist in a pluralistic democracy is not in itself necessary as an active one, but it should be as a reminder (prevention) for supporters of totalitarianism, as well as a means of educating democratic thinking. It is concluded that further research on this rule is essential in Ukraine. This concerns the development of a scientifically sound approach to the constitutionalization of the right to resist, as well as a legal assessment of the events of autumn 2004 and late 2013-early 2014. Similarly, understanding the concept of the right to resist helps to understand the content of as a result of the exercise of the right to revolt, gaining new legitimacy, and subsequently to defend the relevant right. The uprising can be seen from the standpoint of the current constitution as a challenge to the existing system and an encroachment on its legitimacy. Strictly speaking, therefore, the purpose of the uprising, its grounds and legitimate means for assessing the constitutionality are extremely important. The constitutionalization of the right to resist helps to use the existing legal arsenal of concepts and concepts to provide a legal assessment and develop appropriate criteria for the legitimacy of resistance. ; Статья посвящена проблеме конституционного права на сопротивление. Сделан вывод о том, что право на сопротивление является одним из древнейших прав, которое начало свою конституционализации с появлением первых конституционных документов – Декларации независимости США 1776 г., Французской декларации прав человека и гражданина 1789 и 1793 Право на сопротивление связывают с защитой конституции в условиях тирании, а также с реализацией ряда политических прав, с нарушением закона или даже и без такого нарушения, с применением силы или без такового. Постижения концепции права на сопротивление помогает понять содержание учредительной власти и определенный парадокс: новая конституция может как возникать в результате реализации права на восстание, получая новую легитимность, так и впоследствии защищаться соответствующим правом. ; Статтю присвячено проблемі конституційного права на опір. Зроблено висновок про те, що право на опір є одним із найдавніших прав, яке почало свою конституціоналізацію із появою перших конституційних документів – Декларації незалежності США 1776 р., Французької декларації прав людини і громадянина 1789 р. і 1793 р. Право на опір пов'язують із захистом конституції в умовах тиранії, а також із реалізацію низки політичних прав, із порушенням закону або ж навіть і без такого порушення, із застосуванням сили або без такого. Осягнення концепції права на опір допомагає зрозуміти зміст установчої влади і певний парадокс: нова конституція може як виникати в результаті реалізації права на повстання, отримуючи нову легітимність, так і згодом захищатися відповідним правом.