Precedence of European law

SUMMARY OF:

Judgment of the Court of 15 July 1964 — Flaminio Costa v ENEL

WHY IS COSTA V ENEL A LANDMARK JUDGMENT?

In its judgment, the European Court of Justice (now the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) affirmed the precedence of European Economic Community (EEC) (now European Union (EU)) law over the national laws of the EU Member States.
This judgment set a general principle* of Community (now EU) law: the precedence (also referred to as ‘primacy’ or ‘supremacy’) of EU law, which guarantees its superiority over the national laws of the Member States.
The principle of precedence ensures EU law uniformly protects citizens throughout the EU.

KEY POINTS

In a preliminary ruling* regarding the EEC Treaty (now the Treaty on European Union and Treaty on the Functioning of the EU), the Court clarified the following.

By contrast with ordinary international treaties, the EEC Treaty created a European legal system that is an integral part of the Member States’ legal systems and that is binding on them.
With the creation of the EEC, Member States transferred the rights and obligations arising under the treaty from their national legal system to that of the EEC, limited their sovereignty and created a body of law that bound both their nationals and themselves.
Consequently, Member States may not adopt national laws that contradict EU law without calling into question the legal basis of the EU itself. If they nevertheless do, EU law should take precedence over national laws (i.e. override them) in the domestic courts of the country concerned.

Developments before and after the judgment

In another landmark case, in 1963, the Court of Justice had already established an equally important and complementary general principle of EU law: the direct effect principle.

The Court later clarified the scope of the precedence principle in its case-law*.

It applies to all EU acts with a binding force, whether they are primary law (i.e. the treaties), secondary law (directives, regulations, decisions, etc.) or case-law of the CJEU.
It affects all national acts:
- irrespective of their nature (acts, regulations, decisions, ordinances, circulars, etc.) or whether they are issued by the executive or by the legislative powers of a Member State;
- even if they were adopted after the EU act in question (Amministrazione delle Finanze v Simmenthal SpA, 1978);
- including the provisions of a national constitution that contradict EU law (Internationale Handelsgesellschaft mbH v Einfuhr- und Vorratsstelle für Getreide und Futtermittel, 1970 and Wünsche Handelsgesellschaft v Germany, 1984, known respectively as the Solange I and Solange II judgments).

In a declaration concerning primacy, annexed to the Final Act of the Intergovernmental Conference that adopted the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, the conference:

recalled the principle of primacy of EU law over national law;
underlined that it is a cornerstone of EU law regardless of the fact that it is not included in the treaty.

KEY TERMS

General principles. Also called ‘supplementary law’, they are mainly developed by the CJEU and are one of the non-written sources of EU law, as opposed to primary and secondary law.

Preliminary ruling. A ruling by the CJEU in reply to a question from a national court on the interpretation or validity of EU law, thereby contributing to the uniform application of EU law.

Case-law. The law as established by the outcome of former cases.

MAIN DOCUMENT