The Rule of the Courts

The Role of the Courts in the Protection of the Rule of Law and of Fundamental Rights

in a procedure that was not in line with the requirements of the rule of law. The referring court asked about the consequences for the binding effect of the decisions. In both cases, however, the Court of Justice denied the admissibility of the references and did not answer the questions in substance because it did not deem them necessary for the referring court to give judgment. In the first case, it was not apparent that, under national law, the referring court would be entitled to decide the legal dispute excluding the judge that had been appointed in a questionable procedure. In the second case, the proceedings had been finally concluded with the appeal decision. In both cases, the Court of Justice thus chose to focus on domestic procedural law and the options that existed under the national rules. It avoided to draw the conclusion that either the independence and impartiality of the court or the appointment of the judges, which was contrary to EU law, had an automatic impact on the judgment itself. In a more recent case, in contrast, it held that lower courts are obliged to regard the judgments of higher courts as non-existent if the composition of the latter does not meet the requirements of independence and impartiality and if this is indispensable to enforce the primacy of EU law. 56 The standards which the Court of Justice applies therefore appear similar to those that govern the relationship between the finality of judgments and the requirements of article 4 para. 3 TEU. 57 It follows from the above that, from the point of view of the European level, the protection of the rule of law, which is inextricably linked with the protection of fundamental rights, depends highly on a functioning system of judicial remedies. Even if some of the courts in a Member State are affected by the attempts of the government and the legislator to dismantle their independence and impartiality, the European cooperative judicial IV. Conclusion

56 CJEU, 4 September 2025, Case C-225/22 – „R“ S.A.; Gaudin , JDE 2025, 450; Schwab , EuGRZ 2025, 250. 57 See, e.g., CJEU, 3 September 2009, Case C-2/09 – Fallimento Olimpiclub; 6 October 2015, Case C-69/14 – Târ ș ia; 4 October 2018, Case C-234/17 – XC and Others.

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