Khaberni - Previous articles in this series have mentioned that the Constitutional Court issued the first issue of its magazine late last year, and dedicated it to the rulings and decisions issued since its inception till the end of the year 2024; the rulings are those issued by the court when exercising its role in monitoring the constitutionality of laws and regulations, and the decisions are those issued when exercising its other role, which is interpreting constitutional texts.
Although this issue included the court's rulings and decisions, which had already been published in the Official Gazette in accordance with the Constitution (Article 59), the significance of this issue is highlighted from two aspects; the first is that it compiled those rulings and decisions in a single repository, which facilitates reference to them by court members, researchers, and those related to the court's work, and the second is that it included the legal principles derived from each ruling or decision, which are obligated to be deduced and facilitated for publication by the technical office (Article 4/e of the Technical Office Instructions for the Constitutional Court ).
However, it is noted that some of these principles were characterized by the "literal transfer" of what was stated in the court's ruling or decision, which contradicts the idea of deriving legal principles and deducing them, thus the principle is a repetition of a text in the Constitution, or copying parts of the ruling or decision without including the innovative ruling reached by the court, and this issue was clearly apparent in two cases; in the first, the legal principle for decision number (3) for the year 2013 came as follows:
"It is permissible for the King to postpone the convening of the National Assembly to another date, provided that the postponement period does not exceed the two months stipulated in the Constitution."
This principle was a literal transfer of what was stated in the interpretative decision, and it is noted that this interpretative paragraph was identical to what the legislator stated in Article (78/1) of the Constitution related to the ordinary session, so what added value did the Constitutional Court create with this "interpretative" decision?
Returning to the interpretative decision referred to, it is clear that it came based on: "a request for interpretation of Article (73) of the Constitution, and to clarify whether it permits His Majesty to postpone the convening of the extraordinary session of the National Assembly by implication of Article (78) from the Constitution ...".
The added value of this interpretative decision becomes clear through reading it together with the request for interpretation, as the court intended from its interpretative paragraph the authority to postpone the extraordinary session (by analogy to the text related to the ordinary session), thereby removing the ambiguity about that issue, while the legal principle came devoid of this clarification to the extent that it emptied it of its content.
As for the second case, the legal principle for decision number (5) for the year 2013 came as follows:
"It is not prohibited for the government to propose a new bill to go through the legislative constitutional stages, nor is it prohibited for the legislative authority to exercise its constitutional right to propose laws."
This principle, although a literal transfer of what the Constitutional Court stated in its decision, is also a truncation of the decision and a deprivation of its meaning; the interpretative decision is read with the content of the request for interpretation, thus the interpretative paragraph comes to answer what was stated in the request for interpretation, as it came forth to state: "... Is it permissible for the government to propose a bill before the National Assembly considers the law that the King refused to ratify...".
Based on the above, it can be said that it would have been more prudent for the legal principle to include a reference to the question posed in the request for interpretation in order to make the meaning coherent, as the legal principle should be sufficient in itself, not requiring reference to the court's ruling or decision for its understanding.
Therefore; to ensure that this issue is not repeated, it may be appropriate to entrust the Constitutional Court - or its president - with the authority to approve the legal principles that the Technical Office deduces from the court's rulings and decisions.
Dr. Mohammad Rahamneh/ University of Jordan
