EU Law Vs. National Law Essay Example

Where the national law of a European Union (EU) member state conflicts with the norms of EU law; the national law must give way. Put another way, EU law is primary to or supreme over the domestic laws it members. Although the Treaty of Rome, which created the EU, does not specifically state the primacy of EU law; the European Court of Justice’s (ECJ) early interpretation of a number of the treaty’s provision focusing on the conflict between EU and domestic law has led to the common belief and continuing precedent of the supremacy of EU law.
The 1963 case Van Gend en Loos v. Netherlands Inland Revenue Administration, established the basis upon which EU law was found to have primacy over domestic laws. In Van Gend en Loos, the issue concerned changes in the taxes that the Netherlands government wanted to impose on imports. Van Gend opposed the tax claiming that it violated EU law. The Dutch government, on the other hand, argued that EU law was not applicable to the case as it was specifically a question of domestic law. In finding for Van Gend, the ECJ held that the Treaty or Rome created a unique and independent legal framework that, in some instances, requires them to allow individuals to make arguments based on EU law against domestic legislation in national courts. The ruling, in essence, found that member states agreed EU law would become part of a state’s legal systems upon their signing and ratification of the Treaty of Rome’s provisions.
The first case to analyze the actual question of what courts should do in the collision of EU and national laws came a year later. In the 1964 case Costa v. ENEL; ENEL was an Italian energy company that sued Costa for failure to pay his electricity bill. Costa’s refusal to pay the bill stemmed from the fact that he used to hold stock in the private energy company that was nationalized and became part of ENEL. His argument was that the nationalization of the company violated EU law. The trial court, before making a decision on the merits, referred the case to both the ECJ and the Constitutional Court of Italy. The Italian court ruled first. Like the Dutch court in Van Gend en Loos, the Italian court held that the trial court had erred in asking the ECJ for clarification. Under the Italian court’s analysis, the question was strictly a question of Italian constitutional interpretation. Accordingly, the ECJ has absolutely no jurisdiction to render a decision. In a finding that supported Costa, the ECJ held that the Italian Constitutional Court was wrong. Expanding the ruling that it made in Van Gend en Loos, the ECJ found that since EU law becomes a part a member state’s law upon ratification not only does it provide causes of actions to citizens on member states in their national courts; more importantly, national laws that are counter to EU law are invalid. The reasoning behind the ECJ’s decision focused on the argument that if a member state’s national laws were supreme to EU law, that could, and most likely would result in a EU law being nothing more than a tool to be manipulated to each nation’s interests as they see fit. In other words, if one nation did not like how the EU law fit in their system; they could just enact legislation that would counter it. Accordingly, some states, those that decided to follow EU law would be restricted by it while others would not, except in those cases when they choose to apply EU law to achieve their own goals. In essence, the ECJ was arguing, what is the purpose of the EU law generally, and the European Union, specifically if there was nit uniformity of the law, including uniformity it how it is interpreted and applied in every state. Only under the conditions in which the understanding and application of EU law in one country is the same as it is in every other country will EU law not only be effective but will also satisfy the underlying principles of creating a European Union in the first place. Accordingly, the ruling told the courts of member states that any domestic laws that opposed to EU law were to be invalidated.
Lastly, in the 1978 case State Finance Directors v. Simmenthal, the ECJ further extended the primacy of EU law in holding that once member states join the EU, EU law: immediately and automatically invalidates all domestic laws and legal procedures that conflict with it, prohibits the future enactment of legislation that conflicts with it, and forbids member state courts from applying conflicting laws.
These three cases, taken together, provide the guidelines and precedent for what member state courts must do when they are confronted with a case that involves the collision of national laws with EU law. Under the law, in every case, EU law is supreme and the conflicting domestic law must be invalidated.