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THE ROLE OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL COURT IN THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONTROL OF LEGISLATION
of the formalized procedure (...)." It was expressed by the Constitutional Court
as a general rule in a 1997 decision that “on the basis of an appropriate motion,
a formally erroneous legislative procedure shall, in the future, provide a basis for
the retroactive annulment of the law to the date on which it was promulgated.”
In Decision No. 39/1999. (XII. 21.), based on the above-cited case-law, the
Constitutional Court concluded that “the observance of certain procedural rules
of the legislative procedure is a requirement of the rule of law for the validity of the
law that can be deduced from Section 2 (1) of the Constitution.”’ In Decision No.
8/2003. (III. 14.), the Constitutional Court determined already as a constitutional
requirement that “legislation may be enacted only in accordance with the
constitutional principle of legal certainty. The principle of legal certainty requires
that legislation (...) is enacted in a reasonable order (...).° In the evolution of the
relevant jurisprudence another milestone was the constitutional review of the
adoption of the so-called “Hospital Act”. In this case, the Constitutional Court
annulled the law by its Decision No. 63/2003. (XII. 15.) because the meeting of the
National Assembly was convened in violation of the applicable procedural rules
(not all members of the National Assembly were notified of the convening of the
meeting and of the proposed agenda, and the draft agenda was not sent to the
members of parliament in due time) and, as a result, the law, which was returned to
the National Assembly by the President of the Republic for further consideration,
could not be renegotiated on the merits by the members of parliament.’ Finally,
Decision No. 109/2008. (IX. 26.) of the Constitutional Court [Decision ] should be
mentioned, which stated that a violation of any provision of the Rules of Procedure
does not automatically constitute a violation of Section 2 (1) of the Constitution,
and thus leads to unconstitutionality.
THE RECENT PRACTICE OF THE DECLARATION OF INVALIDITY
UNDER PUBLIC LAW — PROPOSAL FOR AMENDMENT BEFORE THE FINAL VOTE
The first petition alleging the unconstitutionality of the new Church Act’ was
primarily based on procedural grounds, namely that the proposal for amendment
No. T/3507/98 submitted before the final vote was contrary to the Rule of
5 Decisions of the Constitutional Court 1992, 77., 85.
§ Decision No. 29/1997. (IV. 29.) of the Constitutional Court, Decisions of the Constitutional
Court 1997, 122.
7 Decisions of the Constitutional Court 1999, 325., 349.
8 Journal of the Constitutional Court March 2003, 90.
° Decisions of the Constitutional Court 2003, 676., 685-689.
4 Case No. of the Constitutional Court: 1279/B/2011.
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