I. ÚS 854/23
The complainant is the widow of Karel Des Fours Walderode. As his heir, she is seeking restitution of property confiscated from him after the Second World War under Presidential Decree No. 12/1945 Coll. on the Confiscation and the Expeditious Redistribution of Agricultural Property of Germans, Hungarians, as well as Traitors and Enemies of the Czech and Slovak Nations.
According to Act No. 243/1992 Coll., only those who had their Czechoslovak citizenship restored and who had not committed any offence against the Czechoslovak state could qualify for restitution of property confiscated under the aforementioned decree.
The Supreme Court concluded that Karel Des Fours Walderode did not meet the conditions for restitution because his Czechoslovak citizenship had not been validly restored. Although the Czechoslovak Ministry of the Interior issued him a certificate of citizenship on 16 December 1947, the Supreme Court ruled this to be a null act, having no legal effect.
The District Court in Semily and the Regional Court in Hradec Králové, both bound by the Supreme Court’s legal opinion, dismissed the complainant’s action accordingly. The Supreme Court later rejected her appeal on points of law.
However, the First Panel of the Constitutional Court (Justice Rapporteur Josef Baxa) overturned the decisions of the District and Regional Courts, as well as the Supreme Court’s resolution rejecting the appeal on points of law. It concluded that these rulings violated the complainant’s right to judicial protection.
From a constitutional standpoint, the view of the Supreme Court that the Ministry of the Interior’s act of restoring citizenship was null does not hold. The Ministry of the Interior was authorised to decide on the restoration of citizenship according to the explicit provisions of Section 2(1) of Decree No. 33/1945 Coll.
Furthermore, the Supreme Court based its conclusion of nullity solely on two formal deficiencies (mislabelling of the act and missing reasoning). The Constitutional Court reminded that, according to established case law, only serious formal defects could render an act null. Therefore, the Supreme Court unjustifiably deviated from established case law and tainted its ruling with arbitrariness.
The Constitutional Court found that the Ministry of the Interior’s act of 16 December 1947 was not null. In the restitution proceedings, this decision on citizenship restoration can no longer be reviewed and must be accepted as valid. The Constitutional Court also noted that the complainant had previously successfully secured restitution of some of the property in a case where even the Supreme Court had ruled in her favour.
In further proceedings, the general courts will base their rulings on the fact that the Ministry of the Interior’s act of 16 December 1947 was not null and that this act decided to preserve the Czechoslovak citizenship at hand. These conclusions take precedence over the unconstitutional legal opinion expressed in the Supreme Court’s cassation judgment, even though this judgment could not be annulled for procedural reasons. It will be up to the general courts to examine whether the remaining conditions for restitution have been met.