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Procedural Fairness in a Militant Democracy: The “Uprising of the Decent” Fails Before the Federal Constitutional Court

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 March 2019

Thilo Rensmann

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“If there be any among us who wish to dissolve this union, or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed, as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it.” The framers of the German Grundgesetz (Basic Law or Constitution) of 1949 had lost Thomas Jefferson's optimistic faith that the self-healing powers of reason would render a democratic polity immune to totalitarian temptation. The Weimar Republic had proved defenceless against the rise of a totalitarian movement, which availed itself of the democratic process as a Trojan horse in its effort to establish a brutal dictatorship.

Type
Public Law
Information
German Law Journal , Volume 4 , Issue 11 , 01 November 2003 , pp. 1117 - 1136
Copyright
Copyright © 2003 by German Law Journal GbR 

References

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6 Article 21 para. 2 GG.Google Scholar

7 Article 9 para. 2 GG.Google Scholar

8 Article 18 GG.Google Scholar

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26 BVerfGE 104, 63. As to the significance of this procedural step, see, infra, text accompanying notes 37-39.Google Scholar

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28 Id.Google Scholar

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33 BVerfG, supra note 19, at §§ 52-63.Google Scholar

34 In the case at issue the Second Senate was reduced to seven judges because the term of office of Jutta Limbach, the former President of the Court, had ended during the proceedings.Google Scholar

35 BVerfG, supra note 19, at § 52.Google Scholar

36 In a similar vein, Jörn Ipsen, Das Ende des NPD –Verbotsverfahrens, 2003 Juristenzeitung 485, 486 et seq.; Uwe Volkmann, Case Note, 2003 Deutsches Verwaltungsblatt 605, 606 et seq.Google Scholar

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38 Section 45 BVerfGG.Google Scholar

39 Id.Google Scholar

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63 BVerfG, supra note 19, at § 115.Google Scholar

64 BVerfG, supra note 19, at § 111.Google Scholar

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66 BVerfG, supra note 19, at § 115.Google Scholar

67 BVerfG, supra note 19, at § 94.Google Scholar

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76 A general right to procedural fairness is not explicitly laid down in the German constitution but is read into the Rechtsstaat principle (Article 20 para. 1 GG) and Article 2 para. 1 GG.Google Scholar

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85 BVerfG, supra note 19, at § 153.Google Scholar

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87 BVerfG, supra note 19, at § 136.Google Scholar

88 BVerfG, supra note 19, at § 137.Google Scholar

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98 The European Commission's proposal for a regulation on “the statute and financing of European political parties”, COM (2003) 77 final, 19 February 2003, would, however, allow the European Parliament to qualify a European political party as ineligible for financial support from the community budget if the party's statute and activities failed to respect “the basic purposes of the Union with regard to freedom, democracy, human rights, fundamental freedoms and the rule of law”, see Article 3 para. 2 and Article 4 of the proposed regulation. From the perspective of German constitutional law this poses a fundamental challenge to the Parteienprivileg (the privileged status of political parties) which makes any interference with a political party's legal status based on the political contents of its program or activities contingent on a prior decision by the Federal Constitutional Court. On the notion of the Parteienprivileg, see, BVerfG, supra note 19, at § 69.Google Scholar

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102 BVerfG, supra note 19, at § 151.Google Scholar

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107 In a similar vein, Volkmann (note 35), 609.Google Scholar

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114 Treaty of European Union, 7 February 1992, as amended by the Treaty of Nice, O. J. 2002 C 325/5. See, also, Art. I-58 Draft Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe, adopted by the European Convention on 13 June and 10 July 2003, O. J. 2003 C 169/1. On the principle of “militant democracy” in the European Union's draft constitution, see, Thilo Rensmann, Grundwerte im Prozeß der europäischen Konstitutionalisierung, in Die Europäische Union als Wertegemeinschaft (Dieter Blumenwitz, Gilbert H. Gornig, Dietrich Murswiek, eds. forthcoming).Google Scholar

115 See, the detailed analysis in Frank Schorkopf, Die Maßnahmen der XIV EU-Mitgliedstaaten gegen Österreich 119 et seq. (2002).Google Scholar

116 See, also, the European Commission's proposal for a regulation on the statute and financing of European political parties, supra note 97.Google Scholar