Addendum. Constitutional courts as positive legislators in comparative law

• Author: Allan R. Brewer-Carías
• Profession: Emeritus Professor of Law, Central University of Venezuela Fellow, Trinity College, and Simón Bolívar Professor, University of Cambridge, UK (1985-1986)
• Pages: 415-441

415

JUDICIAL REVIEW IN COMPARATIVE LAW

ADDE NDUM

CONSTITUTIONAL COURTS AS POSITIVE

LEGISLATORS IN COMPARATIVE LAW*

PRELIMINARY REMARKS

-The subordination of Constitution al Cou rts to the Constitutio n

In all democ ratic countrie s, Constitutio nal Courts1 have th e same role of

interpreting and applying the Constitution in order to preserve its supremacy testing

the constitu tionality or conve ntionality of statut es,2 and in order to ass ure the

prevalence of the democratic principle and of fundamental rights they even have

the role of adapting the Constitution when changes and time imposes such task.

And this is tr ue in all systems of cons titutional jud icial review, wh ere a

progressive convergence of principles and solutions has been consolidated over the

past decades,3 being nowadays very difficult even to draw in a clear wa y the classical

distinction between the concentrated and the diffuse systems of judicial review4 so

commonly used during many decades.5

*Synthesis of the General Report, Subject IV. B.2, «Constitutional Courts as 󰜙Positive Legislators»,

XVIII International Congress of Comparative Law, International Academy of Comparative Law,

Washington, July 27, 2010. See Allan R. Brewer-Carías, «Constitutional Courts as Positive Legislators»,

in Karen B. Brown y David V. S nyder ( Editors), General Reports of the XVIIIth Congress pf the

International Academy of Comparative Law- Rapports Généraux du X VIIIème Congrès d e l󰜚Académ ie

Internationale de Droit Comparé, Springer, 2012, pp. 549-569. The full text of the General Report (as

well as the text of the National Reports) in Allan R. Brewer-Carías, Constitutional Courts as Positive

Legislators, Cambridge University Press New York, 2011, 933 pp.

1For the purpose of the General Report, due to the variety of solutions, I have used the expression

«constitutional court» in a general sense, as referring to any court acting as constitutional judge.

2For the purpose of theGeneral Report, I used the expression «control of constitutionality» as comprising

not only judic ial review of statutes regarding their con formity wi th the Constitution, but also

comprising «control of conventionality» in the sense of their conformity with International Conventions,

particularly on matters of Human Rights, as is the case, for instance, in The Netherlands, in the

U.K., in France and in many Latin American countries; as well as their conformity with «Constitutional

Conventions», called by John Bell, the British National Reporter, as «constitutional review». See in

general Ernesto Rey Cantor, El control de convencionalidad de las leyes y derechos humanos, Ed. Porrúa,

Mexico 2008; Juan Carlos Hitters, «Control de constitucionalidad y control de convencionalidad.

Comparación (Criterios fijados por la Corte Interamericana de Derechos Humanos), in Estudios

Constitucionales, Año 7, N° 2, Santiago de Chile 2009, pp. 109-128.

3See Lucio Pegoraro, «Clasificaciones y model os de justicia cons titucional en la dinám ica de los

ordenamientos», in Revista Iberoamericana de Derecho Procesal Constitucional, No 2, Instituto Ibero-

americano de Derecho Procesal Constitucional, Editorial Porrúa, Mexico 2004, pp. 131 ff.; Alfonse

Celotto, «La justicia constitucional en el mundo: formas y modalidades», inRevista Iberoamericana de

Derecho Procesal Constitucional, No 1, Instituto Iberoamericano de Derecho Procesal Constitucional,

Editorial Porrúa, Mexico 2004, pp. 3 ff.

416

ALLAN R. BREWER󰜔CARÍAS

In all the systems, the basic principle that can be identified is that Constitutional

Court s, when acco mplishin g their role s, must alwa ys be subordi nated to the

Consti tution, not bein g allowed to inva de the field of the l egislator or o f t he

consti tuent power, Th e contrary wo uld be, as asser ted by Sandra Mor elli the

Colombian National Reporter, to develop an «irresponsible judicial totalitarianism», 6

which of course is a chapter of the pathology of judicial review.

Tha t is to say, C onsti tutio nal Co urts c an as sist t he leg islat ors i n the

accomplishment of their functions, but they cannot substitute the Legislators and

enact legislation, nor they have any discretionary political basis in order to create

legal norms or provisions that could not be deducted from the Constitution itself.

It is in this sense that it is then possibl e to affir m as a general p rinciple, that

Constitutional Courts, still are considered to be 󰜔as Hans Kelsen used to say- «Negative

Legislators»7 or that they are not «Positive Legislators» in the sense that, as affirmed by

Richard Kay and Laurence Claus, the American National Reporters, they are not able to

consider, propound or createex novo pieces of legislation «of their own conception», or

to introduce «reforms» on statutes conceived by other legislative actors.8

4See for example, Francisco Fernández Segado, La justicia constitucional ante el siglo XXI. La progresiva

convergencia de los sistemas americano y europeo-kelseniano, Librería Bonomo Editrice, Bologna 2003, pp.

40 ff.; Francisco Fernández Segado, «La obsolecencia de la bipolaridad 󰜙modelo Americano-modelo

europeo-kelseniano󰜚 como criterio analítico del control de constitucionalidad y la búsqueda de una

nueva tipología explicativa», in his book La Justicia Constit ucional: Una visión de derecho comparado,

Tomo I, Ed. Dykinson, Madrid 2009, pp. 129-220; Guillaume Tusseau, Contre les «modèles» de justice

constitutionnelle: essai de critique métodologique, Bononia University Press, Edition bilingue: français-

italien, 2009; Guillaume Tusseau, «Regard critique sur les outils méthodologique du comparatisme.

L󰜚example des modè les de justice constitutionnelle», in IUSTEL, Revista General de Derecho Público

Comparado, No 4, Madrid, enero 2009, pp. 1-34.

5See Mauro Cappelletti,Judicial Review in Contemporary World, Indianapolis 1971, p.45; Mauro Cappellettiy

and J.C. Adams, «Judicial Review of Legislation: European Antecedents and Adaptations», inHarvard

Law Review, 79, 6, April 1966, p. 1207; Mauro Cappelletti, «El control judicial de la constitucionalidad

de las leyes en el derecho comparado», inRevista de la Facultad de Derecho de México, 61, 1966, p. 28; Allan

R. Brewer-Carías, Judicial Review in Comparative Law, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1989;

Allan R. Brewer-Carías,Étutes de droit pubic comparé,Bruilant, Bruxelles 2000, pp. 653 ff. Regarding the

distinction, it can be said that the only aspect of it that nowadays remains is the one referred to the organ

of control, in the sense that in the diffuse system of judicial review all courts are constitutional judges

without the need for their powers to be expressly established in the Constitution; whether that in the

concentrated system, it is the Constitution the one that must expressly establish the Constitutional

Jurisdiction, assignin g to a single Constitutional Cou rt, Constitutional Tribunal or Constitutional

Council, or to the existing Supreme or High Court or Tribunal of Justice, the power to control the

constitutionality of statutes and to annul them.

6See Sandra Morelli,La Corte Constitucional: un papel por definir, Academia Colombiana de Jurispruden-

cia, 2002; and«The Colombian Constitutional Court: from Institutional Leadership, to Conceptual Audacity»,

Colombian National Report, XVIII International Congress of Comparative Law, Washington, July,

2010, p. 3. See also, Allan R. Brewer-Carías, «Quis Cus todiet Ipsos Custodes: De la interpretación

constitucional a la inconstitucion alidad de la interpretación», in VIII Co ngreso Nacional de derecho

Constitucional, Perú, Fondo Editorial 2005, Colegio de Abogados de Arequipa, Arequipa, Septiembre

2005, pp 463-489, and inRevista de Derecho Público, Nº 105, Editorial Jurídica Venezolana, Caracas 2006,

pp 7-27;Crónica sobre la «In» Justicia Constitucional. La Sala Constitucional y el autoritarismo en Venezuela,

Editorial Jurídica Venezolana, Caracas 2007; and Reforma Constitucional y Fraude a la Constitución,

Academia de Ciencias Políticas y Sociales, Caracas 2009.

7See Hans. Kelsen, «La garantie juridictionnelle de la constitution (La Justice constitutionnelle)», in

Revue du droit public et de la science politique en France et a l󰜚ètranger, Librairie Général de Droit et

the Jurisprudence, Paris 1928, pp. 197-257; Hans Kelsen, La garantía jurisdiccional de la Constitución

(La justicia constitucional), Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico 2001.

8See Laurence Claus and Richard S. Kay, «Constitutional Courts as 󰜙Positive Legislators󰜚 in the United

States», U.S. National Report, XVIII International Congress of Comparative Law, Washington, July

2010, pp. 3, 5.