Arrêt Jacques Vabre : Le contrôle de conventionnalité (Cour de cassation, 24 mai 1975)

♥️♥️ If you enjoyed this video, please like, comment, and subscribe so you don't miss the next ones. ♥️♥️ If you want to follow our news, join us on our social networks: 📸 Instagram:   / filezdroit   🐦 Twitter:   / droitfilez   ⚠️ Warning ⚠️ This video is only intended to help you understand cases that are sometimes quite complex. It is in no way intended to replace legal doctrine, which constitutes a solid source of knowledge. Remember that plagiarism is prohibited and severely punished in an academic setting. So remember to cite your sources and enclose your quotes in quotation marks. ⤵️ Here is the text of the video ⤵️: Today, we will examine the Société des cafés Jacques Vabre decision handed down by the Joint Chamber of the French Court of Cassation on May 24, 1975. This decision is among the great decisions of French jurisprudence because it recognizes the primacy of international law over French law. Above all, it allows the ordinary courts, for the first time, to conduct a review of the conventionality of laws themselves. The facts are as follows: Two companies (the Jacques Vabre and J. Weigel coffee companies) decided in the 1960s to import a new variety of instant coffee from the Netherlands. However, these coffees were subject to import taxes by an "internal consumption tax" set out in Article 265 of the Customs Code. Both companies therefore paid significant customs duties between 1967 and 1971. However, since the tax in question was specific to imports, this created a competitive imbalance with French coffee, which was not subject to this tax. French coffee sellers were therefore at an advantage, which was contrary to the provisions of the 1957 Treaty of Rome. The applicants therefore asked the domestic court to reimburse the amounts collected and the compensation. The Paris Court of Appeal thus ruled in favor of the applicants and granted their request. According to the appeal judges, the Treaty of Rome should apply in this case, despite the tax set by the Customs Code. The customs administration then filed an appeal in cassation, contesting the Court of Appeal's ability to conduct such a review of conventionality. The question then arose: "Does the domestic court have jurisdiction to interpret the compatibility of a domestic law with an international treaty?" Let's briefly review: French law is subject to a hierarchy of norms. Initially, the Constitution was the supreme norm, since it emanated directly from the will of the people. This Constitution is superior to the law, which in turn is superior to regulations, etc. Thus, all laws must comply with the Constitution, failing which they will be annulled by the Constitutional Council. This review of laws against the Constitution is called "constitutionality review." But since the 1950s, the number of international agreements ratified by France has multiplied. This is particularly the case with its accession to the European Economic Community through the Treaty of Rome, or to the Council of Europe with the signing of the ECHR. The question at one time was where these international norms fit within the hierarchy of norms. Thus, in the IVG decision I mentioned earlier, the Constitutional Council confirmed on January 15, 1975, a few months before this decision, that international treaties were indeed superior to the law according to Article 55 of the Constitution. However, it also clarified that the review of the law's conformity with international conventions, known as "conventionality review," was not within the purview of the Constitutional Council, since it was different from the constitutionality review, of which it is the guarantor. It was therefore necessary to understand who was responsible for this conventionality review. This is where the Jacques Vabre decision came in on May 24 of the same year. In the Jacques Vabre decision, the Joint Chamber of the Court of Cassation dismissed the specific appeal and thus confirmed the power of the ordinary courts to set aside a domestic law that was contrary to a treaty. It is therefore the ordinary courts who have the jurisdiction to conduct a conventionality review. This ruling goes even further, since according to the Court of Cassation, this review is possible even if French law is subsequent to the international standard. The latter will always prevail since international law is hierarchically superior to the law. The ruling: https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/juri/i...