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Constitutional law is the study of foundational laws that govern the scope of
powers and authority of various bodies in relation to the creation and execution of other laws by a government. A constitution binds a government or
governments, limiting the contexts in which rules may be created, interpreted and force may be applied. Constitutions may
reference various bodies, including organizations, associations, stateless peoples and nation-states.
Most commonly constitutional law is the law of these foundational laws, customs, and
constitutional conventions in regard to nation-states. Not all
nation-states have constitutions, though all such states have a jus commune,
or law of the land, that may consist of a variety of imperative and consensual rules, that may be customary law, oral law and written law that apply in the various
jurisdictions of such state. Of those nation-states that do have
constitutions, not all are considered strictly written constitutions, as the laws that govern such issues may not be consolidated
into one single constitution document or instrument. The constitutional law may be a matter of interpreting a variety of text
which may also be informed by history, custom and unwritten constitutional conventions . Compare, for example, the written
Constitution of the United States
with British constitutional law, which arises
from multiple sources including the Magna Carta, the common law, and other customary sources. In some countries the constitution is known as
the Basic Law.
Constitutional laws may often be considered second order rulemaking or rules about making rules. Generally speaking
constitutions may be of a federal type (see: federal state), in which
several levels of government coexist with exclusive or shared areas of jurisdiction over lawmaking, application and enforcement.
An example of this kind of contitution is that of the United States. In the European Union, though, there is heated debate about federalism, with some Europeans regarding a federalist Europe as a threat to national identity, while other
Europeans would welcome a federal system. Constitutional laws may also be of a unitary type (see: unitary state) where the powers of government rest in one central administration and legislature,
though in unitary constitutional states, they is often a delegation of power or authority to local or municipal authorities,
however the central legislature retains the right to recall its authority at anytime.
Other types of constitutional law also exist, such as confederations, in which a group of nation-states each with its own
sovereignty create a common body to deal with certain common issues in which limited powers are transferred to the confederation
authority, common in custom
unions. The central authority may be referred to in federal terms though on the clear understanding that it has no powers
other than those specifically delegated to it by the participating states. Two examples of these types of constitutional system
are the European Union and Switzerland. This was also the first form of
government created by the thirteen colonies after the American Revolution in the Articles of Confederation. Some of the southern states of the USA attempted to return from
federalism to confederalism in the nineteenth century but were
prevented by federal military force in the American civil
war.
Areas of Constitutional law
See generally: List of legal topics
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