Los efectos de las sentencias anulatorias de los Tribunales Constitucionales

Abstract

This article reports on the German government’s initiative to draw up a core common European doctrine regarding the complex issue of the time impacts of constitutional annulments of unconstitutional laws. This initiative is intended to persuade the European Court of Justice of the possibility of maintaining the effects of laws declared inconstitutional over time (future pronouncements) when higher legal values are at stake; and the possibility of not automatically declaring ex tunc effects, especially when the criterion of «need to avoid grave financial losses to the State» is at stake, in tax law. It also highlights the German State’s capacity to try to direct or influence the process of European-ising the national law of member States through the influence of jurisprudence from the Luxemburg Court. All this is of All this is of special interest in Spain, where this subject is currently under review.