The Inadmissibility of the Writ for Constitutional Protection. An Operacionalization of Robert Alexy’s Theory

Abstract

This research deals with the analysis of the inadmisibility of the action of constitutional amparo (which is a type of writ for constitutional protection) against judicial decisions in the legal system of the República Bolivariana de Venezuela. The main goal of the research was evaluating the reasons for inadmissibility of that kind of action, in the theoretical frame of legal argumentation theory, applying a content analysis based in the Model of legal discourse, and the Robert Alexy’s model of judicial decision. The research design was a documental one; the data collection was done through the analysis of court judgments, in order to determine which were the arguments posed by the judges. The court judgments were produced by the Higher and First Instance courts in Civil, Mercantil and Traffic, of Mérida, Venezuela, in which the judges declared the inadmissibility of the writ against court decisions, during the term of 2005-2007, for a sample of 13 judgments. Research procedure: there were 2 phases: 1) Stating the amount of court judgments for the sampling, 2) Using of a model of content analysis of the legal decision to the selected court judgments. The instrument was a sheet for the analysis of the fullfilment of the rules of R. Alexy’s model of legal argumentation for each court judgment. Results: in 3 cases the action was admitted; the judges used a same kind of arguments; the actions used to be declared as inadmissible because the legal bases of the action were not accomplished in most cases.