From Portugal to Poland: The Court of Justice of the European Union as watchdog of judicial independence

Abstract

In Associação Sindical dos Juízes Portugueses, the CJEU seized the occasion to uphold the principle of judicial independence as a primary obligation for the Member States under the second subparagraph of Article 19(1) TEU. This newly crafted interpretation of Article 19(1) has crystallized in Commission v. Poland, in which the CJEU declared that the reform of the Polish law on the Supreme Court lowering the retirement age of judges breached the obligation to respect judicial independence. The goal of this piece is to assess the bold interpretation given to the second subparagraph of Article 19(1) as a building block of the EU’s constitutional order. First, the expansion of the substantive content of Article 19(1) TEU will be analysed. How did the CJEU justify the shift from an obligation to establish a system of remedies ensuring effective judicial review to an obligation of respect for judicial independence? Second, the scope of this obligation and its potential reach will be critically examined. I will argue that Article 19(1) TEU may actually trigger the application of the Charter. Eventually, Article 19(1) TEU has the potential to become an open door for enforcing the Charter against the States regardless of its limited scope of application.