| Abstract [eng] |
This article deals with the most noticeable aspects of the implied powers of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania in ensuring the supremacy of the Constitution. Without doubt, the constitutional mission of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania is to ensure the supremacy of the Constitution and, by the same token, the rule of law. According to an analysis of the relevant jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania, the effective implementation of the Constitutional Court’s mission of ensuring the supremacy of the Constitution and the rule of law is only possible if no compromises are made at the expense of the Constitution and the rule of law. For this purpose, in interpreting the Constitution, the Constitutional Court reveals its own implied powers (aspects thereof). Thus, in order to effectively handle the challenges faced by the Constitution and the rule of law, the Constitutional Court, in accordance with the Constitution, possesses all the necessary powers, including those that are not explicitly laid down in the text of the Constitution, but can be justified by the mission of the Constitutional Court to ensure the supremacy of the Constitution and the rule of law, while simultaneously interpreting the Constitution in the context of its other provisions and principles (the limits of these powers are determined by the explicit provisions of the Constitution. For example, those that pertain to setting out the entities that have the right to apply to the Constitutional Court and the law-making entities whose acts may be challenged before to the Constitutional Court). The development of the implied powers of the Constitutional Court can be described by three principles that follow from the necessity to ensure the supremacy of the Constitution and the rule of law. First, no legal act may have immunity from constitutional review. Therefore, although not explicitly mentioned in the text of the Constitution, the objects of constitutional review exercised by the Constitutional Court are, for example, amendments to the Constitution, legal acts adopted by a referendum, individual legal acts passed by the Seimas, the President of the Republic, or the Government, as well as legal acts of a non-normative (programme or conceptual) nature that are passed by the Seimas or the Government. If the Constitutional Court were precluded form verifying the legal acts not explicitly mentioned as objects of constitutional review carried out by it, it would be impossible to effectively ensure the supremacy of the Constitution and the rule of law, as this would create preconditions for “circumventing” the Constitution by adopting such legal acts whose constitutionality could not be verified by anyone (since, according to the Constitution, no other court, but only the Constitutional Court, may verify the constitutionality of legal acts passed by the Seimas, the President of the Republic, or the Government, as well as those adopted by a referendum of the Nation). In other words, preconditions would be created for denying the hierarchy of values entrenched in, and protected by, the Constitution, for amending the Constitution in violation of the procedure established therein, including the carrying out of individual anticonstitutional actions or adopting programme acts of any content, and laying down guidelines for the actions of state institutions that would not necessarily conform with the Constitution... |
