German court ruling calls into question the entire European project post Lisbon

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German court ruling calls into question the entire European project post Lisbon
http://news.scotsman.com/politics/German-court-ruling-calls-into.5592028.jp
27 August 2009

A RECENT landmark legal ruling in Germany has sent the EU integration project into complete disarray. The German Constitutional Court examined the Lisbon Treaty – the successor to the infamous EU Constitution – and ruled the sovereignty of a member state (in this case Germany), must always take precedence over diktats from Brussels.
The Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe effectively declared itself the highest supervisory body in conflicts between Germany and the EU, thus explicitly placing itself above the authority of the European Court of Justice. As Der Spiegel reported: "This borders on a declaration of war on the European Court, which sees itself as the only authority capable of ruling on the validity and applicability of EU law."

The German judges went further by ruling the German Parliament had been wrong in passing an "accompanying law" to the Lisbon Treaty, which determined the rights of the German parliament to participate in European legislation. By passing the right to monitor the implementation of EU laws to Brussels, the Bundestag was acting unconstitutionally, said the judges, and subjecting people to the "whims of a bureaucracy that lacks sufficient democratic legitimacy". Indeed, the Karlsruhe judges ruled it was clearly not the case that "the EU parliament is a representative body of a sovereign European people" as set down in the Lisbon Treaty. They explained:

"After all, EU members of parliament were not elected according to the principle of electoral equality, in other words, one man one vote, but rather according to national contingents, meaning that a Maltese MEP represents 67,000 Maltese, a Swedish MEP has a constituency of 455,000 Swedes and in Germany, the ratio is 1 to 857,000."

The court saw this as a clear contradiction to the remainder of EU law, which is constructed around the central idea of prohibiting discrimination based on nationality. According to the court's concluding statements, this contradiction can only be explained by the fact that the EU is not a state but rather "an association of sovereign states" and, consequently, "there can be no sovereign citizens' union as well as no completely representative organ in the form of the European Parliament, with the result that the Bundestag must receive substantially more rights".

The Karlsruhe interpretation thus demolishes the old European idea that the recognised democratic deficits in the EU would disappear completely of their own accord by enhancing the rights of the European Parliament, allowing MEPs to assume the role of the national parliaments.

All of this has come as a political bombshell to the newly elected European Parliament, where Europhiles eagerly await the outcome of a second referendum on the Lisbon Treaty due to be held in Ireland on 2 October, praying for a Yes vote. If the highest court in Germany can rule the EU, under the terms of the Lisbon Treaty, is undemocratic, then the project aimed at further and deeper EU integration will be called into question.

UK Conservative MEPs have defected from the large, centre-right, integrationist EPP Group in the European Parliament, to form their own, more eurosceptic, European Conservatives and Reformists group (ECR).

The ECR sees itself as offering a voice to the millions of Europeans who oppose the concept of an EU superstate and instead wish to see the development of a successful economic, rather than political union.

Now, according to the German judges, national identity must take precedence over integration.

Scofflaw

You should really add your personal opinion to that kind of OP. However, let's assume your opinion is the same as the lazy journalist who copied that article from Der Spiegel, and go with that.

regards,
Scofflaw