Former Belgian Prime minister annoyed over Hungary’s new Constitution
Posted on | April 19, 2011 by J.C. von Krempach, J.D. |
As my friend and colleague Roger Kiska has noted in a prior contribution, the fact that Hungary has given itself a new Constitution that (a) invokes God in its preamble, (b) protects human life as from the time of conception, and (c) defines marriage as the “conjugal union of a man and a woman based on their independent consent”, has immediately triggered an outcry of rage and anger from the EU’s left-liberal anti-life and anti-family establishment, which is concerned that (a), (b) and (c) might violate “our common European values”.
One of the silliest contributions came from Guy Verhofstadt (picture), a former Prime Minister of Belgium, who now serves as the President of the “Liberal and Democrat” (ALDE) group in the European Parliament. Belgium, it should be noted, is a country which, consequent to a series of mismanaged constitutional reforms, is now at the brink of disintegration – indeed, they seem to be in a good position to lecture other countries on constitutional reforms…
For your enjoyment, here are some excerpts from Mr. Verhofstadt’s rant:
“We call on the Hungarian authorities to submit the text of the new Constitution to the European Commission for evaluation and to revise any parts thereof that do not conform to EU values.”
Now this is patently absurd: in the process of making a new Constitution for Hungary the word of the European Commission (which can hardly claim to draw its legitimacy from a democratic election process) should carry a greater weight than the democratically elected Hungarian Parliament, which has adopted this text with a 2/3 majority. Mr. Verhofstadt, it appears, has a serious problem with democratic procedures… better if unelected “experts for EU values” have the last say.
“Specific details of the document which give rise to concern are: discrimination is not expressly prohibited on the grounds of sexual orientation, ethnicity, age and genetic features; the notions of marriage and family are defined to exclude single-parent families, cohabiting and same-sex couples; the protection of the life of the foetus from the time of conception is tantamount to a ban on abortion.”
Well, at least he does not make a secret of his agenda, does he? With Mr. Verhofstadt, human rights is more and more reduced to three mantras: abortion on demand, same-sex marriage and “anti-discrimination”.
Giving a wider protection to the unborn child (which, in actual fact, is granted in addition to the protection provided for by international law) is therefore a reason for “concern”, if not an outright “violation of EU values”. And the failure to define marriage and family in a way that includes homosexual relationships, or to foresee a specific prohibition agaist “discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation” is a mortal sin by omission!
Mr. Verhofstadt forgets that his own concepts of family, marriage, and “anti-discrimination” are highly controversial in the EU, and that the definitions in the new Hungarian Constitution have precisely the purpose of protecting the countries against the impositions coming from the EU. Having been adopted by a 2/3 majority, these definitions certainly have better democratic credentials than any of Mr. Verhofstadt’s opinions.
“The constitution also provides a list of duties that all citizens should fulfill in relation to each other (the adult offspring’s duty to care for their ageing parents; the duty of workers and employers to cooperate with a view to community goals), which is unusual and lays the ground to perilously broad legal interpretations.”
The idea that rights should be mirrored by duties is certainly alien to a politician like Mr. Verhofstadt, who seems to believe that the legal order should be a “supermarket of rights”, in which citizens have a lot of rights, but no responsibilities. Is it not rather this perspective that gives rise to “perilously broad legal interpretations”?
“Finally, as also pointed out by the Council of Europe’s Venice Commission, the whole process of drafting the Constitution has lacked transparency, flexibility, a spirit of compromise and sufficient time for debate. Surveys in Hungary suggest that a majority of the population considered that it should be subjected to a referendum.”
Now, this is really a good one. In actual fact, 23 new constitutions have been enacted in Eastern and Central Europe since 1990, and only 10 of these were subject to a popular referendum in the country concerned, whereas 13 were adopted by the legislative body alone. Why is this a problem in the case of Hungary, if it was not a problem in the case of any of the other countries? If one takes a look beyond Eastern Europe, one will not avoid noticing that neither the US Constitution, nor the German Grundgesetz, nor the Austrian Constitution have ever been subject to any popular vote – yet these texts enjoy a high reputation and nobody would doubt their legitimacy.
Besides this, it would have been appropriate for Mr. Verhofstadt to remember how the EU Treaty itself – including the ill-drafted EU Fundamental Rights Charter – came into being. The first attempt, the so-called “Constitutional Treaty of the EU”, was subject to a referendum in only four of the 27 Member States: while Spain and Luxembourg voted “yes”, the outcome was negative in France and the Netherlands. And what happened next? A new draft Treaty with identical substance was adopted – the sole difference being that the word “Constitution” was not used any more. This new draft was subject to a referendum only in one of 27 Member States (Ireland), and when the outcome of that referendum was negative, Ireland was pressed (precisely by politicians like Mr. Verhofstadt and similar) to repeat the poll as many times as was necessary to get to a yes.
Once again, Mr. Verhofstadt and the EU political caste are certainly in a good position to give lectures on democratic legitimacy…
An English translation of the draft Constitution is available under this link, but I am unable to tell whether the text has undergone further modifications prior to its adoption.
