The aim of the article is to analyze the freedom of states-parties to the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms of 4 November 1950 in the scope of pre- implantation diagnosis and to answer the question of whether or not the Convention includes the “right to a healthy child”. The analysis of the case law, particularly the Costa and Pavan judgment (application no. 54270/10) confirms a praetorian approach of the European Court of Human Rights to the interpretation of the right to the respect of private life, which comprises, i.a., the right to bring a child into the world who is not affected by the illness that the parents carry as well as the right to technical means to realize it, including preimplantation diagnosis. The Costa and Pavan judgment does not determine whether or not Article 8(1) of the Convention grants “the right to a healthy child” or “the right to a genetically healthy child”, but may be a step in the direction to accept it. According to the author, it raises concerns, because it strengthens the basis for the legitimacy of a certain kind of eugenic pratices.
In previously published papers (Przegląd Sejmowy no. 5(142)/2017 and 2(163)/2021) the authors proposed definitions of notions: normativity, redundancy, and uselessness of the legal text and analysed from a typological point of view the basic units of the integral (articulated) part of normative acts, i.e. legal provisions. In this text, the analysis has been extended to include the other elements of the legal text, i.e.: preambles, titles, subtitles, definitions in brackets, footnotes and attachments, which contain sentences and other elements (tables, equations, graphics, maps, sheet music). The terminology has also been extended to include fragments of provisions, normative acts as a whole, and plural provisions. These elements can (with some definitional amendments) be analysed in the same way as provisions using the categories: “doubles”, “widows”, “orphans”, and “botches”. In their closing remarks, the authors signaled the need to complement the analysis with a theoretical and comparative perspectives: to confront the proposed theses with the leading normative and descriptive theories of legal text drafting and interpretation. The fourth part of this cycle of papers, devoted to these problems, is currently being prepared.
Collegial bodies as well as the sovereign make decisions by voting. The adoption of a legal act or the selection of a candidate depends on obtaining a certain majority of votes. The subject of this study is the majority of votes regulated in the Constitution of the Republic of Poland. The basic types of majority in force in the Polish Constitution are: simple, absolute and qualified majority. The authors present particular types of majority of votes used in votes of the Sejm, the Senate, the National Assembly and the Constitutional Tribunal, but also in elections and referendums. There are as many as eight types of majority required depending on the kind of decision to be made, which results from calculating the majority based on the statutory number of members, and not the actual number of voters. This is a sure sign that the legislator deliberately determined and differentiated the required majorities.
In a previously published article (Przegląd Sejmowy No. 5(142)/2017) the authors proposed definitions of the following concepts: normativity, redundancy and uselessness of a legal text. The article provides a typological review of Polish legal texts. The authors analysed the basic units of the integral (articulated) part of normative acts, i.e. legal provisions, showing their normativity, redundancy, and uselessness. The analyse includes: internal preambles, provisions describing the object and subject scope of the act, legal principles, programme and task provisions, meliorative provisions, emendations, permanently unrealisable regulations, legal definitions. The analyses led to identification of four basic types of errors in legal provisions, which were named: “doubles”, “widows”, “orphans”, and “botches”. In their closing remarks, the authors signalled the need to supplement the analysis with a description of non-integral (non-articulated) parts of normative acts. Another part of the study, devoted to these problems, is currently being prepared.
The purpose of this paper is to present Polish legal regulations aimed at increasing the confidence of voters in the electoral process, primarily in the area of social control of elections, proposals formulated by Ruch Kontroli Wyborów and de lege ferenda remarks of the authors of this paper in this regard. The changes proposed by the authors primarily concern the introduction or modifi cation of mechanisms involving voters in the control of electoral procedure, in particular voting and determining voting results.
The theory of rational lawgiver entails an assumption of normativeness of legal text. The assumption can be expressed in two propositions: (1) articulated parts of legal text are normative, and (2) other parts of legal text (i.e. preambles, titles of acts, parts, chapters etc.) are not normative. Closer examination of Polish legal text shows that propositions (1)–(2) are not necessarily always true. The authors propose several defi nitions and use the enriched vocabulary to express theoretical possibility and to show real cases of non-normative fragments of articulated parts of legal texts and normative fragments of other parts of legal text. The types of normativeness are defi ned: the broadest, broad, and strict. The notion of normativeness is tightly connected with notions of redundancy and superfl uity of legal texts. The distinctions which were made in the article can be used — as the authors hint in the conclusion remarks — to expand contemporary theories of legal interpretation, and to improve the quality of lawmaking process in Poland.
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