Sprawiedliwość konstytucyjna czy polityczne targowisko: kogo i Jak wybierać do sądu konstytucyjnego?
Constitutional Justice or political market: Who and how should be elected to a constitutional court?

Summary/Abstract: The Authors critically analyze two problems associated with the creation of a constitutional court - on the one hand, the substantive qualifications of candidates, on the other hand, the mode of judges election. The considerations are presented against the background of the amendments to the Polish Law on Constitutional Tribunal that has been recently adopted. According to the Authors, the primacy of the Constitution as a legal act and the specifics of its application and interpretation require special qualifications from the candidates for judges. Therefore, the criterion „to possess distinguished legal knowledge” undoubtedly seems to be insufficient. In this context, they also pose the question of whether a constitutional judge should be only “a good craftsman” or also “a wise philosopher”?As the Constitutional Tribunal serves as a guardian of the constitutionality of law it is very important to provide solutions that would release it from current political disputes.However, the mode of the election of judges that have been recently adopted in Poland does not create such a guarantee and does not contribute to building a strong external and internal legitimacy of this authority. In practice, political parties represented in the parliament treat the elections of judges to the Constitutional Tribunal as a struggle for political booty.

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