Subjects of the federation and common constitutional space. Some aspects

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:41

At a recent meeting in Kazan of the Consultative Council of Chairmen of Constitutional Courts of the Subjects of the Russian Federation, Deputy Chairman of the Constitutional Court Sergey Mavrin said that the subjects of the federation, more precisely, the constitutional justice of the republics, actually ensure the unity of the constitutional space in our country. A rather controversial statement, however, not devoid of a certain logic. And here are the reasons.

According to the accepted legislative norms, the constitutional statutory courts of the subjects of the Russian Federation are a legal institution that allows making decisions in the field of constitutional law directly at the regional level. Since the launch of the judicial reform on the territory of the Russian Federation, eighteen such institutional formations have already been operating, mainly in the national republics.

At the same time, at the Kazan meeting there wereit was emphasized that the regional authorities should cooperate with the federal Constitutional Court in resolving relevant issues, as well as problems related to the social protection of the population. In this case, it turns out that Mr. Mavrin indirectly speaks of the absence of a single Russian constitutional space and, which seems even more significant, of a clear functional delimitation between courts of various levels.

According to the accepted logic, the subjects of the federation have the right (but not the obligation) to create statutory courts that determine the constitutionality of all regional legal acts, including the legislative one. In this case, local constitutional courts are automatically included in the general system of the judiciary, but are not directly subordinate to the Constitutional Court of Russia. That is, the subjects of the federation get the right to create their own internal constitutional space, only formally corresponding to the all-Russian principles of constitutionalism. This is very similar to limiting the sovereignty of the entire state, but in no way to expanding the federal rights of the regions of the Russian Federation. And, as we understand, we are talking about the reform of the judicial system, but not about the new federal model of the Russian state.

From this follows another problem - this is a discrete administrative device. Different types of subjects of the Russian Federation have unequal federal rights with different,functionally blurred powers, economic potential and political significance. Thus, if we proceed from the norms of international law, it turns out that the subjects of the federation are unequal. The principle of equality of territorial subjects is violated. In this sense, the call of the Deputy Head of the Constitutional Court for the formation of a common constitutional space is quite logical and justified, both from a legal and political point of view. Another question: what to do if there is a constitution, but there is no constitutionalism?