Graph paranomon
The complaint graphē paranomon ( Greek γραφὴ παρανόμων ), also paranomon graphē , was a type of complaint in ancient Athens , which served to review a law ( Greek νόμος , “nomos”) or other resolution ( Greek ψήφισμα , psēphisma ) of the people's assembly (Ekklesia) .
The graphē paranomon was probably introduced after the death of Pericles (429) and can be used from 415 BC. Be occupied. It can be seen as a replacement for the ostracism , which was abolished at the same time. The term means "action against unlawful (laws / decisions)". The idea behind this was that resolutions ( psēphismata ) should not contradict a law and that a new law should not contradict an existing one.
Procedure
The lawsuit could be brought against laws or resolutions ( psēphismata ) that had already been enacted or that had only been proposed. As soon as someone announced under oath that they would bring such a lawsuit, the legislative process or the decision was suspended pending a decision on the lawsuit.
The lawsuit was brought against the person who introduced the challenged resolution or the law to the people's assembly. He was seen as the one who had misled the people and damaged the legal order, for the people's assembly itself was not responsible to anyone and was in a sense always right. The responsibility of the person who proposed a law lasted a year. After this period, the law itself could be attacked and repealed, but the person who proposed it could no longer be punished. After five years, the law itself could no longer be the subject of a lawsuit.
Heliaia was responsible for deciding on the lawsuit .
function
The action served a dual purpose. On the one hand, it represented a means of reviewing and possibly repealing laws and resolutions that had already been passed by the people's assembly (Ekklesia) and intended to prevent them, and thus served to ensure the rule of law.
The second function is to be seen in the fact that the graphē paranomon offered rival politicians a weapon with which they could harm or eliminate one another. The people of Athens could thus favor or punish their leaders.
Legal consequences
If the action was successful, this would not only result in the repeal of the contested law or order, but also a sanction against the person who proposed it. This sanction was usually a fine; it was sometimes so high that it could not be paid for. In this case, the person introducing the bill threatened to lose civil rights ( atimia ), which meant the end of his political career. Politicians therefore began to introduce legislative proposals through straw men.
Known cases
→ See also Demosthenes: Speeches from trials for illegal motions
Many of the known lawsuits did not concern the actual legislation, but rather less significant honorary decisions. Ariston of Azenia was accused 75 times with a graphe paranomon of requesting illegal orders , but was never convicted. Demosthenes did not have that many trials, but Aristogeiton alone brought seven lawsuits against him.
- An example can be found in Demosthenes ' wreath address in response to Aeschines' speech against Ctesiphon from the year 333 BC. Chr.
- In Demosthenes 'speech against Timocrates , Demosthenes asserts that Timocrates' motion is illegal for several reasons: First, he contradicts the law that is already in force. Second, he was not made known through the statues of the Phylenheroen. Third, he does not allow the council to deliberate the law before submitting it to the people's assembly. Finally, he did not follow the procedure provided for by law, which provided for proposing a new law at one meeting of the assembly, not taking action at the next meeting, and voting at the third meeting on whether to convene the nomothets ; Timocrates is said to have proposed the law at a meeting of the assembly and requested that it be referred to the nomothets the next day.
- Another example of a graphe paranomon is Demosthenes' speech against Leptines . Demosthenes contends that Leptines managed to get the nomothets to pass a law without repealing conflicting laws, by giving notice of the motion in advance, or by allowing the congregation to consider the matter before it was turned over to the nomothets.
- Demosthenes himself was once accused of improperly proposing the correction of a law on the maintenance of warships.
Comparative law
- The graphē paranomon lawsuit is similar to a norm review procedure as known in many modern legal systems.
- While the illegality of a psēphisma with a law (which was passed in a more complicated process and was of a higher ranking) is in line with modern ideas, lawsuits directed against a law seem to have focused on the legality of the legislative process, i.e. already a kind of constitutional one Verification to have taken place.
- As with the modern control of norms , with the graphē paranomon, in particular, the formal legality, i.e. compliance with the legally prescribed procedure in legislation or decision-making, could be checked.
- The fact that the initiator (of the resolution or law) is punished for the fact that the legislative assembly has approved his motion is alien to today's legal systems.
- It is significant that with the graphē paranomon responsibility for the legality of state action was placed in the hands of the individual citizen: on the part of the plaintiff through the possibility of prosecuting violations of the laws of the polis in the interests of the community and making them public , on the part of the defendant by being held personally responsible for the legislative decisions of the Ekklesia initiated by him. Such a community-building idea is - as generally with the introduction of the popular lawsuit ( graphē ) by Solon - also recognizable in other legal institutions such as the Antidosis .
- After all, the judges of the Athens court, the Heliaia, like the participants in the popular assembly, were not legal experts but ordinary citizens.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Karl-Wilhelm Welwei : The Greek Polis. Constitutions and society in archaic and classical times. 2nd, revised and expanded edition. Franz Steiner, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-515-07174-1 , p. 186.
- ↑ Victor Duruy, Histoire des grecs, Chap. XV, IV, fn. 28 (French)
- ↑ Dem. 18.
- ↑ Dem. 24.33.
- ↑ Dem. 24.33.
- ↑ Dem. 24.18.
- ↑ Dem. 24.26.
- ↑ Dem. 24.21
- ↑ Dem. 24.28
- ↑ March 20
- ↑ Dem. 20.89; 20.96.
- ↑ Dem. 20.93.
- ↑ Dem. 18.105.