El último guardián: los tribunales constitucionales y la democracia

La Ley Fundamental de 1949 se redactó con el horror de Weimar muy presente.

The Basic Law of 1949 was drafted with the horror of Weimar very much present.

Los nazis llegaron al poder de forma perfectamente legal, ¿no?

The Nazis came to power in a perfectly legal way, right?

Utilizaron los mecanismos democráticos para destruir la democracia.

They used democratic mechanisms to destroy democracy.

Entonces los alemanes diseñaron una constitución que incluía lo que llamaron la 'cláusula de eternidad', artículos que no podían modificarse nunca, ni siquiera por mayoría cualificada.

So the Germans designed a constitution that included what they called the 'eternity clause', articles that could never be modified, not even by a qualified majority.

And the Bundesverfassungsgericht, the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe, becomes one of the most powerful courts in the world.

I've spent time in Germany and people talk about that court with a kind of reverence that you just don't see with other institutions.

La verdad es que esa reverencia tiene una explicación histórica muy concreta.

The truth is that that reverence has a very concrete historical explanation.

Los alemanes aprendieron de la peor manera posible lo que ocurre cuando las instituciones fallan.

The Germans learned the hard way what happens when institutions fail.

Y el Tribunal de Karlsruhe se ha ganado esa autoridad con décadas de decisiones valientes, incluso cuando esas decisiones resultaban incómodas para el gobierno de turno.

And the Karlsruhe Court has earned that authority through decades of courageous decisions, even when those decisions were uncomfortable for the government of the day.

Now, Spain.

Because the Spanish story here is particularly interesting and I know you have strong feelings about it.

The Tribunal Constitucional was created with the 1978 Constitution, after Franco.

Walk me through why that institution was so loaded politically from the very beginning.

A ver, España venía de cuarenta años de dictadura, de un régimen en el que la ley era, en la práctica, la voluntad del dictador.

Look, Spain was coming out of forty years of dictatorship, a regime in which the law was, in practice, the will of the dictator.

Entonces la Constitución del 78 no era solo un documento técnico, era una declaración de intenciones, un pacto entre españoles que habían estado a punto de matarse unos a otros cuarenta años antes.

So the 1978 Constitution wasn't just a technical document, it was a declaration of intent, a pact between Spaniards who had nearly killed each other forty years earlier.

Y el Tribunal Constitucional era el guardián de ese pacto.

And the Constitutional Court was the guardian of that pact.

And the Statute of Autonomy ruling in 2010, which I remember covering, that was the moment when you really saw the limits of what the court could absorb politically.

The court had taken four years to rule on the Catalan statute, stripped out key provisions, and the reaction in Catalonia was, to put it mildly, explosive.

Es que esa sentencia fue un desastre, y lo digo con conocimiento de causa.

That ruling was a disaster, and I say that from personal knowledge.

El problema no era solo el contenido del fallo, sino el tiempo que tardó.

The problem wasn't just the content of the decision, but how long it took.

Cuatro años.

Four years.

Para entonces, el debate político en Cataluña había evolucionado enormemente, y la sentencia llegó cuando ya no había forma de que fuera recibida con serenidad.

By then, the political debate in Catalonia had evolved enormously, and the ruling arrived at a point when there was no way it could be received calmly.

El tribunal había perdido el momento.

The court had missed its moment.

Here's what gets me about that.

A constitutional court's legitimacy depends partly on timing.

A slow court is almost as dangerous as a captured court.

Justice delayed is justice denied, but in constitutional terms, a decision delayed might be a democracy destabilized.

No, tienes razón.

No, you're right.

Pero el problema de fondo en España no era solo la lentitud, era la politización de los nombramientos.

But the underlying problem in Spain wasn't just the slowness, it was the politicization of appointments.

Los magistrados del Tribunal Constitucional son elegidos por el Congreso, el Senado y el gobierno, y los partidos llevan décadas bloqueando renovaciones para mantener mayorías afines.

The Constitutional Court's magistrates are chosen by Congress, the Senate, and the government, and the parties have spent decades blocking renewals to maintain friendly majorities.

Es un sistema diseñado para la parálisis cuando hay desacuerdo político.

It's a system designed for paralysis when there's political disagreement.

Which brings us to the really uncomfortable question at the heart of all this.

If the people who appoint the judges are politicians, and politicians are partisan, then how is the court ever truly independent?

I mean, is the whole thing a kind of elaborate fiction?

Bueno, no exactamente.

Well, not exactly.

Mira, hay una diferencia importante entre que los jueces sean nombrados por razones políticas y que actúen siempre según instrucciones políticas.

Look, there's an important difference between judges being appointed for political reasons and judges always acting on political instructions.

Muchos jueces que fueron nombrados por un partido determinado han sorprendido a todos con sentencias que iban en contra de los intereses de ese mismo partido.

Many judges appointed by a particular party have surprised everyone with rulings that went against that same party's interests.

La independencia no es garantía de imparcialidad perfecta, pero tampoco es una ficción total.

Independence isn't a guarantee of perfect impartiality, but it's not a total fiction either.

I want to go to Hungary, because Hungary is, I think, the clearest case study we have of what happens when a government decides it's done playing by the rules.

Orbán wins a supermajority in 2010, and within two years the Constitutional Court has been systematically dismantled as an effective check.

Lo de Hungría es un manual de cómo destruir una democracia desde dentro, y lo más perturbador es la elegancia técnica con la que se hizo.

What happened in Hungary is a manual on how to destroy a democracy from the inside, and the most disturbing thing is the technical elegance with which it was done.

Orbán no cerró el tribunal de un portazo, que hubiera sido demasiado obvio.

Orbán didn't slam the door on the court, which would have been too obvious.

Lo que hizo fue ampliar el número de magistrados, llenarlos de gente afín, restringir la competencia del tribunal en materia fiscal, y cambiar las reglas de nombramiento para garantizar que las siguientes generaciones de jueces también le fueran leales.

What he did was expand the number of magistrates, fill them with loyalists, restrict the court's jurisdiction over fiscal matters, and change the appointment rules to ensure that future generations of judges would also be loyal to him.

It's what the scholars now call 'autocratization by stealth.' No single moment where you can point and say, 'there, that's when democracy died.' Just a gradual accumulation of small moves that add up to something irreversible.

Y Polonia después, con el Tribunal Constitucional, y la lucha que duró años entre el gobierno del PiS y la Comisión Europea.

And then Poland, with the Constitutional Tribunal, and the battle that lasted years between the PiS government and the European Commission.

Lo que quedó claro en esos casos es que cuando un tribunal constitucional cae, no cae ruidosamente.

What became clear in those cases is that when a constitutional court falls, it doesn't fall noisily.

Cae en silencio, porque ya nadie le escucha.

It falls in silence, because nobody listens to it anymore.

That image is striking.

Cae en silencio.

It falls in silence.

Because there's no army, as you said earlier.

Its only power is the expectation that people will comply.

Once that expectation breaks, the institution is hollow.

Es que así es.

Exactly.

Y por eso la verdadera amenaza para un tribunal constitucional no viene solo de los gobiernos autoritarios.

And that's why the real threat to a constitutional court doesn't come only from authoritarian governments.

Viene también de la erosión lenta de la cultura del constitucionalismo, del respeto por las normas como valor en sí mismo.

It also comes from the slow erosion of constitutional culture, of respect for norms as a value in themselves.

Cuando los ciudadanos dejan de creer que el tribunal importa, el tribunal deja de importar.

When citizens stop believing the court matters, the court stops mattering.

Now, the countermajoritarian problem deserves its own moment here, because I think it's genuinely unsolved.

Alexander Bickel called it 'the countermajoritarian difficulty' back in 1962 and the debate has never really been resolved.

You have nine unelected people in Washington, or twelve in Madrid, overruling the elected representatives of millions.

How do you justify that?

A ver, la justificación clásica es que la constitución no es simplemente la expresión de la mayoría de hoy.

Look, the classic justification is that the constitution isn't simply the expression of today's majority.

Es el resultado de un consenso fundacional, de un momento en que la sociedad decidió, en frío, cuáles eran los valores que no podían negociarse en ningún ciclo electoral.

It's the result of a founding consensus, a moment when society decided, in a cool-headed way, which values could not be negotiated away in any electoral cycle.

El tribunal no se opone a la democracia;

The court doesn't oppose democracy;

protege las condiciones que hacen posible la democracia.

it protects the conditions that make democracy possible.

But here's the thing.

The conditions that made democracy possible in 1978, or 1949, or 1787, may not be the same conditions we need now.

Constitutions age.

The interpretations of rights evolve.

And so you get this enormous debate about whether courts should be 'originalist', reading the text as it was meant at founding, or whether they should interpret it dynamically.

Ese debate existe también en España y en Europa, aunque en términos menos ideológicos que en Estados Unidos.

That debate exists in Spain and Europe too, though in less ideological terms than in the United States.

Pero la verdad es que toda interpretación constitucional implica una elección, una visión de lo que la sociedad debe ser.

But the truth is that all constitutional interpretation involves a choice, a vision of what society should be.

No hay interpretación neutral.

There is no neutral interpretation.

El juez que dice que solo aplica el texto tal cual está haciendo ya una opción política.

The judge who says they're simply applying the text as written is already making a political choice.

And that's exactly what makes the appointment of judges so politically explosive.

Because if every interpretation is ultimately a choice, then the composition of the court is everything.

Which is why you get the kinds of battles we saw in the US with Merrick Garland being blocked for a year, or with the confirmation hearings that have become full-blown political theater.

Lo de Garland fue escandaloso, incluso visto desde Europa.

The Garland affair was scandalous, even seen from Europe.

Y lo que pasó después, con Amy Coney Barrett nombrada a días de una elección después de que le hubieran negado ese mismo derecho a Obama, demostró que cuando los partidos deciden que las normas no escritas ya no les vinculan, la institución entra en una crisis de la que es muy difícil salir.

And what happened afterward, with Amy Coney Barrett appointed just days before an election after they had denied Obama that same right, showed that when parties decide that unwritten norms no longer bind them, the institution enters a crisis that is very hard to escape.

Right, and Spain has had its own version of this, hasn't it.

There were magistrates of the Tribunal Constitucional serving well past the end of their mandates because the political parties couldn't agree on replacements.

Years of blocked renewals.

Años.

Years.

Hubo magistrados que estuvieron ejerciendo con el mandato caducado porque el PP y el PSOE no se ponían de acuerdo.

There were magistrates serving with expired mandates because the PP and PSOE couldn't agree.

Y eso es gravísimo, porque mina la legitimidad del tribunal sin que nadie haya tenido que darle un golpe formal.

And that is extremely serious, because it undermines the court's legitimacy without anyone having to formally attack it.

Lo dejas pudrir desde dentro.

You let it rot from within.

Es una forma de asesinato institucional muy española, muy refinada en su pereza.

It's a form of institutional murder that is very Spanish, very refined in its laziness.

I want to push on the metaphor we've been using, because I'm not sure it holds.

'Last guardrail.' It implies the court is the final line of defense.

But what if the court itself is compromised?

What if the judges are the problem?

Then what?

Bueno, esa es la pregunta que nadie quiere hacerse porque no tiene una respuesta institucional clara.

Well, that's the question nobody wants to ask because it has no clear institutional answer.

Si el guardián necesita un guardián, y ese guardián necesita otro, llegas a una regresión infinita.

If the guardian needs a guardian, and that guardian needs another, you reach an infinite regression.

La respuesta honesta es que en última instancia, la democracia no puede sostenerse solo con instituciones.

The honest answer is that ultimately, democracy cannot be sustained by institutions alone.

Necesita también ciudadanos, prensa libre, sociedad civil, gente dispuesta a salir a la calle.

It also needs citizens, a free press, civil society, people willing to take to the streets.

That's actually something I've thought about a lot since Afghanistan.

We spent years trying to build institutions, courts, constitutions, the whole architecture, and it all collapsed in two weeks in August 2021.

Because the institutions were shells.

The underlying social compact wasn't there.

Exactamente.

Exactly.

Y eso debería ser un aviso para las democracias establecidas también.

And that should be a warning for established democracies too.

No puedes dar por sentado que las instituciones se mantendrán por su propio peso.

You can't take for granted that institutions will sustain themselves by their own weight.

El Tribunal Constitucional español, el Bundesverfassungsgericht, la Corte Suprema americana, todos dependen de que exista una cultura política que los respete.

The Spanish Constitutional Court, the Bundesverfassungsgericht, the American Supreme Court, all depend on the existence of a political culture that respects them.

Esa cultura hay que cultivarla activamente, no heredarla pasivamente.

That culture has to be actively cultivated, not passively inherited.

So let me try to bring something together here.

There's a kind of triangular relationship, isn't there.

The court needs legitimacy from citizens.

Citizens need protection from the court.

And politicians need to feel constrained by the court.

If any one of those three relationships breaks down, the whole thing is vulnerable.

Sí, y añadiría un cuarto elemento: la prensa.

Yes, and I'd add a fourth element: the press.

Un tribunal constitucional que no es cubierto con rigor por los periodistas, cuyas decisiones no se explican al público, cuya labor no se fiscaliza, ese tribunal se convierte en una caja negra.

A constitutional court that isn't rigorously covered by journalists, whose decisions aren't explained to the public, whose work isn't scrutinized, that court becomes a black box.

Y las cajas negras son fáciles de capturar porque nadie está mirando.

And black boxes are easy to capture because nobody is watching.

Which is personal for me, as you know.

Press freedom and judicial independence are not separate issues.

They're part of the same ecosystem.

I've watched countries lose both at the same time, and it's never a coincidence.

No, nunca es una coincidencia.

No, it's never a coincidence.

En Hungría, en Polonia, en Turquía, el patrón se repite: primero los medios, luego los jueces, o los dos a la vez.

In Hungary, in Poland, in Turkey, the pattern repeats: first the media, then the judges, or both at once.

Porque ambos son obstáculos para el poder sin límites, y los que quieren ese poder saben perfectamente lo que están haciendo.

Because both are obstacles to unlimited power, and those who want that power know perfectly well what they're doing.

I want to end on something that's been nagging at me throughout this conversation.

We keep framing constitutional courts as guardrails, as things that hold back the bad stuff.

But the most celebrated decisions of these courts, Brown v.

Board, the German court's rulings on human dignity, have also been creative, expansive, progressive.

They've expanded rights, not just defended them.

La verdad es que sí, y es un punto que me alegra que hayas sacado.

That's true, and I'm glad you raised it.

El mejor constitucionalismo no es solo defensivo.

The best constitutionalism isn't just defensive.

Es también una visión de lo que debe ser la sociedad.

It's also a vision of what society should be.

El Tribunal Constitucional alemán desarrolló la doctrina de la dignidad humana de una manera que iba mucho más allá de lo que los redactores de la Ley Fundamental hubieran podido imaginar.

The German Constitutional Court developed the doctrine of human dignity in a way that went far beyond what the drafters of the Basic Law could have imagined.

No se limitaron a conservar;

They didn't just conserve;

construyeron.

they built.

So maybe the guardrail metaphor is too passive.

Maybe what we're really talking about is an institution that, at its best, holds the line and also points somewhere.

Toward something.

Me gusta esa idea.

I like that idea.

El tribunal como institución que no solo dice 'hasta aquí', sino también 'en esta dirección'.

The court as an institution that doesn't just say 'no further', but also 'in this direction'.

Pero para que eso funcione, los magistrados tienen que ser personas de una talla moral y jurídica extraordinaria.

But for that to work, the magistrates have to be people of extraordinary moral and legal stature.

Y ahí está el problema real: ese tipo de personas son escasas, y los sistemas de nombramiento no siempre las seleccionan.

And there lies the real problem: people of that caliber are rare, and appointment systems don't always select them.

Muchas veces seleccionan a los leales.

Often they select the loyal ones.

And that, I think, is the honest place to end.

These are extraordinary institutions, built at moments of historical crisis, designed to outlast the governments that created them.

But they're only as strong as the people inside them, and the society outside them.

That's both humbling and, I find, genuinely hopeful.

Esperemos que tengas razón.

Let's hope you're right.

Porque la alternativa, un mundo sin esa guardia, sin ese último recurso frente al poder sin límites, es un mundo que ya hemos conocido.

Because the alternative, a world without that guard, without that last recourse against unlimited power, is a world we've already seen.

Y que no nos convenía nada.

And it didn't suit us at all.