Chapter Twelve. The Court of Justice of the European Communities and the Spanish Constitutional Court: a Comparison

Abstract

This chapter deals with a comparative study on the most important competences of the Court of Justice of the European Communities, as the custodian and interpreter of the Community’s ‘Constitution’ that is its founding treaties and of the constitutional jurisdiction of the National Constitutional Courts. Of the latter, it selects the Spanish Constitutional Court as a reference. Both Courts are in essence supervisors and supreme interpreters respectively of the Constitution and of the founding treaties of the Community. Both Courts, within their jurisdiction, are not only the supreme interpreters of their respective ‘supreme norms’, but also guards of their respective legal systems that they are required to uphold. One of the answers delivered by Community law has been to create new organs, as for example the Court of First Instance and to modify, and then to expand their competences, particularly in the Treaty of Nice. Keywords: Community law; Court of Justice; European Communities; Spanish Constitutional Court; Treaty of Nice