One of the oldest dedicated constitutional courts in the world, empowered to annul statutes and regulations that breach the constitution and to decide complaints about violations of constitutionally guaranteed rights, including the constitutionally ranked ECHR. Since 2015 individuals can bring a direct complaint against a law applied in their own case.
How the court is constituted
- Tier
- supreme
- Court type
- Constitutional court
- Jurisdiction
- National — constitutionality of laws and constitutional rights
- Seat
- Vienna
- Established
- 1920
- Composition
- Fourteen members and six substitutes, sitting part-time, including senior judges, officials and academics.
- Appointment
- Appointed by the Federal President on nominations from the government and the two chambers of parliament.
- Languages
- German
Where an appeal goes next
None domestically; the European Court of Human Rights may follow.
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