The Maastricht Judgment, the Democracy Principle, and US Participation in Western Hemispheric Integration

in German Yearbook of International Law, Vol. 37, p. 137, 1994

The Maastricht Judgment of the German Constitutional Court has caused a considerable stir within the German legal community. The Judgment is perceived by some as a step backward in the European integration process, or at least as a halt, because it implies significant residual national constitutional constraints on the exercise of authority by Union institutions. Others view the Judgment as more or less in line with prior German jurisprudence regarding the process of integration in Europe. The Maastricht Judgment is of great interest from an American perspective because it addresses fundamental constitutional questions prompted by a level of regional integration far deeper than that to which the United States is, or might ever be, a party.

This article will concentrate on the principal question addressed by the German Constitutional Court in the Maastricht Judgment. That is, the extent to which the "democracy principle" may limit Germany's participation in the European Union. It will ask whether there is an analogy to the democracy principle in the US constitutional framework, and what the implications of the principle may be for US participation in Western Hemispheric integration. The German Constitutional Court's Judgment contains much that will be important and relevant to the "Constitutional Future" of US participation in the Western Hemispheric integration process.