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The Charter of Rights of the European Union
When in 1999 the EU Heads of State and Government proposed that a body consisting of 2 national parliament representatives, 15 representatives of the European Union and by a EU Member State, government European Commission representative would be set up to draft a Charter of Rights of the European Union there were all good reasons to rejoice. Indeed, this decision was rightly understood as an epochal change. The way to the European Federation which Robert Schuman had described as the goal of integration in the May 9 1950 Declaration, whose 60th anniversary celebrations are due soon, had finally been paved. On the one side, the decision acknowledged that the EU’s further development required the enhancement of its common founding values; also in acknowledgement “of its spiritual and moral patrimony”, as indicated in the Charter’s Preamble. On the other, the decision of tasking a body with drawing up a Charter according to democratic -parliamentary principles, implied that the value of the object of the consultations was such that diplomatic negotiating procedures could no longer be applied to a governments Conference. The European Union thus undertook a process whose outcome envisaged the establishment of a permanent democratic Constitution. With the unanimous decision of describing the body set up by the heads of government and state as a “Convention”, EU members underlined their capacities as members of a constituting assembly, even though not all – albeit a fundamental portion of the future European Constitution – were on the agenda. After one year of activity under the direction of the ex-President of Germany’s Federal Republic Roman Herzog, the Convention presented the “Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union”, consisting of 7 chapters and 54 Articles. It was officially ratified in December 2000 in Nice by the presidents of the European Parliament, of the Council and of the European Commission, and from then onwards it was viewed as an unbinding declaration of intents, which however could exert a crucial influence over institutional performance, due to its peculiarity and status. The Charter of Fundamental Rights became legally binding only ten years later, with the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty on December 1st 2010. The present and future actions and decisions of the European Union are thus bound to the values, principles and fundamental values sanctioned by the Charter. All EU citizens have the faculty of appealing to the Charter. Anyone who protests fundamental rights’ violation by EU policies can lodge a complaint by appealing to the Charter’s principles and resolutions. The Preamble of the Charter states, “The Union is founded on the indivisible, universal values of human dignity, freedom, equality and solidarity”. To these fundamental values are dedicated the first four chapters, which define political, social, economic and cultural rights. Two chapters are devoted to civil and judicial rights, while the final chapter provides for the general instructions. The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union clearly and univocally reaffirms the EU’s founding values stemming from the “common constitutional traditions”, from multifold European conventions and treaties and from the legal framework of reference. It exemplifies the adoption of an inalienable element of the European Constitution in the making. After the failed draft drawn up by the constitutional Convention (2002/2003) in the French and Dutch referendums, the EU still awaits a real and true democratic Constitution that will overcome a transient political system based on international treaties. At present, the Lisbon Treaty represents an acceptable surrogate, since it encompasses most of the instructions envisaged in the draft constitution.
