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- Art. 96 para. 1 FC
- Art. 96 para. 2 lit. a FC
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- Art. 3 FADP
- Art. 4 FADP
- Art. 5 lit. d FADP
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- Art. 6 para. 3-5 FADP
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- Art. 2 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 3 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 4 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 5 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 6 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 7 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 8 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 9 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 11 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 12 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 16 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 18 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 25 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 27 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 28 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 29 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 32 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 33 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
- Art. 34 CCC (Convention on Cybercrime)
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- Art. 2 para. 1 AMLA
- Art. 2a para. 1-2 and 4-5 AMLA
- Art. 3 AMLA
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FEDERAL CONSTITUTION
MEDICAL DEVICES ORDINANCE
CODE OF OBLIGATIONS
FEDERAL LAW ON PRIVATE INTERNATIONAL LAW
LUGANO CONVENTION
CODE OF CRIMINAL PROCEDURE
CIVIL PROCEDURE CODE
FEDERAL ACT ON POLITICAL RIGHTS
CIVIL CODE
FEDERAL ACT ON CARTELS AND OTHER RESTRAINTS OF COMPETITION
FEDERAL ACT ON INTERNATIONAL MUTUAL ASSISTANCE IN CRIMINAL MATTERS
DEBT ENFORCEMENT AND BANKRUPTCY ACT
FEDERAL ACT ON DATA PROTECTION
SWISS CRIMINAL CODE
CYBERCRIME CONVENTION
COMMERCIAL REGISTER ORDINANCE
FEDERAL ACT ON COMBATING MONEY LAUNDERING AND TERRORIST FINANCING
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT
FEDERAL ACT ON THE INTERNATIONAL TRANSFER OF CULTURAL PROPERTY
- I. History
- II. Basic principles
- III. Commentary i.e.S.
- Recommended further reading
- Bibliography
- Materials
I. History
1 The comprehensive regulation of access to the Federal Supreme Court in Art. 191 FC dates back to the judicial reform that was approved by the people and the cantons on March 12, 2000, and came into force on January 1, 2007. The constitutions of 1848 and 1874 expressly assigned individual areas of jurisdiction to the Federal Supreme Court in accordance with the principle of enumeration. Art. 191 FC now instructs the legislature to guarantee access to the Federal Supreme Court and at the same time authorizes it to establish barriers to access (see n. 3).
2 Art. 191 FC was one of the most controversial aspects of the judicial reform and is the result of a balance between the desire to keep access to the Federal Supreme Court as open as possible and the need to protect it from overload. The Federal Council originally proposed that access to the highest national court should only be guaranteed under constitutional law in cases where legal issues of fundamental importance arise or where the outcome of the proceedings has serious consequences for one of the parties. The Constitutional Commission of the Council of States, on the other hand, wanted to guarantee access only in disputes concerning legal issues of fundamental importance. The National Council's Constitutional Commission took the opposite view, wanting to grant the legislature the power to restrict access to the Federal Supreme Court only in cases of minor importance or in the case of manifestly futile appeals. It took two difference resolution procedures before Art. 191 FC was finally adopted.
II. Basic principles
A. Purpose
3 Art. 191 FC provides the constitutional framework for the legislature to establish barriers to access to the Federal Supreme Court. Barriers to access are procedural hurdles in the appeal process that are intended to prevent appellate courts from being seized of disputes that are unsuitable for assessment by the appellate court or that could overburden it. Procedural and substantive rules enacted on the basis of Art. 188 para. 2 FC – such as formal requirements for legal documents under Art. 42 BGG – may serve the same purpose. However, they primarily serve to formalize proceedings before the Federal Supreme Court by establishing uniform rules. Barriers to access do not have a comparable formalizing function. Rather, they are actual procedural hurdles designed to exclude certain types of disputes from the Federal Supreme Court.
B. Constitutional context
4 The question of which disputes are unsuitable for consideration by the Federal Supreme Court or could overburden it is assessed on the basis of a preliminary understanding of its functions, which arise from the constitutional context of Art. 191 FC. The legislature takes this as its starting point when restricting access to the Federal Supreme Court.
5 The starting point is the position of the Federal Supreme Court as the “highest judicial authority of the Confederation” (Art. 188 para. 1 FC) and thus its specific functions as the highest court. With this designation, the Constitution assigns the Federal Supreme Court a central role in safeguarding the unity of the law and the development of the law. Its practice should therefore serve as a guideline for the rest of the judicial system (guiding function). On the other hand, this designation means that the Federal Supreme Court is responsible for providing legal protection in individual cases as the court of last instance. In particular, when important legal interests or gross violations of the law are at issue in proceedings, the Federal Supreme Court should be able to intervene in individual cases to correct errors (residual function). The functions of the Federal Supreme Court are further defined by its subject-matter jurisdiction under Art. 189 FC.
6 Furthermore, as the highest domestic court, the Federal Supreme Court has a special role to play in giving concrete form to and enforcing the fundamental legal order. Since the legislature is required to take fundamental rights into account when enacting legislation, it must also take this function of the Federal Supreme Court into account when restricting access to the courts. Furthermore, the special guarantees of legal recourse, which are not actually tailored to supreme courts with limited jurisdiction, may require the legislature to keep access to the Federal Supreme Court open as long as the proceedings before the lower court do not meet the relevant requirements. For example, the guarantee of legal remedy in criminal law guaranteed access to the Federal Supreme Court as the second instance federal criminal court until the Appeals Chamber of the Federal Criminal Court was established.
7 The judicial reform was based on the assumption that the functioning of the Federal Supreme Court was jeopardized by an excessive caseload. However, an increase in the number of court staff was categorically rejected. The constitutional legislator feared that this would jeopardize legal uniformity and that the Federal Supreme Court could degenerate into a “judicial factory.” It assumed that its supreme judicial functions could instead only be guaranteed by a stronger focus on its core tasks. Art. 191 FC enables the legislature to direct the attention of the Federal Supreme Court to disputes that are essential in this context, thereby serving the interest of effective and economical performance of its tasks.
C. Implementation in law
8 With the enactment of the Federal Supreme Court Act (BGG) – which was drafted after the adoption of the judicial reform but came into force at the same time as it on January 1, 2007 – the legislature established barriers to access in accordance with Art. 191 FC. As the table below shows, the BGG restricts access to the Federal Supreme Court exclusively to the three ordinary appeals in Chapter 3 of the BGG. It provides for limits on the value of claims for appeals in civil matters and in areas of public law related to civil law. Certain areas are excluded from appeal, in particular those listed in the catalogue of exclusions from public law appeals.
| Appeals in civil matters | Appeals in criminal matters | Appeals in public law matters |
Exclusion of subject areas | Decisions against trademarks in opposition proceedings (art. 73) | Decisions of the Appeals Chamber of the Federal Criminal Court … with the exception of coercive measures (art. 79) | List according to art. 83 International mutual assistance in criminal matters (art. 84) International administrative assistance in tax matters (art. 84a) |
Limits on the value of the matter in dispute | General limit on the value of the matter in dispute … with special provisions for labor and tenancy law … with exceptions (art. 74) | - | State liability and public employment relationships … with the exception of fundamental questions of law (art. 85) |
Table: Barriers to access in the BGG
9 There are no barriers to access for subsidiary constitutional complaints under Chapter 5 of the BGG, which was created solely to fill gaps in legal protection under ordinary appeals (see n. 27). No restrictions are provided for actions and extraordinary legal remedies in Chapters 6 and 7 of the BGG. Furthermore, the restrictions of public law appeals do not apply to abstract reviews of norms and voting rights appeals (Art. 82 lit. b and lit. c BGG).
III. Commentary i.e.S.
A. Guarantee of access (para. 1)
10 Art. 191 para. 1 FC formulates a mandate to the legislature to guarantee access to the Federal Supreme Court. Paragraph 1 does not establish any individual rights and is not directly justiciable. However, the materials show that the mandate to guarantee access was intended to “limit” the legislature's scope for action. It is a ‘substantive’ mandate that offers a “certain guarantee.” Originally, access to the Federal Supreme Court was only to be guaranteed in cases involving fundamental legal issues and serious disadvantages for the parties to the proceedings. However, Parliament soon elevated the guarantee mandate from an exception for these two cases closely related to the exercise of supreme judicial functions to a general principle, without at the same time limiting its binding effect.
11 The practical significance of the guarantee mandate is disputed in legal doctrine. In our opinion, this primarily gives rise to a principle of access-friendly interpretation of barriers to access. The principle of interpretation is based on the assumption that the legislature guarantees access to the Federal Supreme Court unless it clearly states that it intends to deviate from its constitutional mandate under paragraph 1. Therefore, if no clear meaning of access barriers can be determined in the law using recognized methods of interpretation, we believe that these should be interpreted in such a way that access to the Federal Supreme Court remains as open as possible. This principle is particularly important when interpreting the list of exceptions under Art. 83 BGG, which sometimes allows considerable room for interpretation (see N. 25).
12 It is also disputed whether the legislature may restrict access to the Federal Supreme Court by other means than the limits on the value of the claim and the exclusions of certain areas of jurisdiction specified in Art. 191 para. 2 and para. 3 FC. This power is contradicted by the fact that a motion expressly authorising the legislature to enact “special conditions of access” failed in the deliberations. Furthermore, the National Council committee was of the opinion that paragraphs 2 and 3 were to be understood as exhaustive. However, in our view, these historical considerations are outweighed by the functional argument that the admissibility of a restriction must be determined primarily by its effect on access to the Federal Supreme Court. Other means of restriction are therefore permissible provided they are less severe than the expressly permissible exclusions of subject matter, which is likely to be the case in most instances.
13 Special provisions apply to two specific forms of access restriction. The first is the so-called “admission procedure,” in which a court only accepts legal disputes that it considers admissible at its own discretion or according to specific legal criteria. In international comparison, there are some supreme courts that decide on questions of admissibility autonomously, such as the U.S. Supreme Court. In our opinion, the statutory transfer of such extensive autonomy to the Federal Supreme Court would not be compatible with paragraph 1, which assigns the task of guaranteeing access to the legislature – and not to the Federal Supreme Court. During the constitutional deliberations, concerns were also expressed that the Federal Supreme Court could restrict access more than intended in Art. 191 FC. However, we see scope for creating an acceptance procedure in the law, provided that it is linked to predefined criteria for admission and limited to specific areas. This applies in particular to the so-called “referral procedure,” which entitles or obliges lower courts to refer certain legal questions to a higher court for a ruling, as is the case, for example, with the Court of Justice of the European Union. The creation of such a procedure at the constitutional level has been thoroughly examined in Switzerland – in contrast to the adoption procedure, which was merely mentioned in the dispatch as a conceivable option but was not pursued further – and ultimately rejected. In our view, its introduction into law is therefore out of the question. Preliminary examination procedures for dismissing manifestly unfounded complaints are, incidentally, permissible without further ado. They fall within the scope of Art. 191 para. 4 FC.
B. Limits on the value of claims (para. 2)
1. Principle
14 Art. 191 para. 2 FC authorizes the legislature to set limits on the value of claims – i.e., minimum values – for the Federal Supreme Court. The value of the claim is the monetary value of the subject matter of the dispute in court proceedings. The purpose of limits on the value in dispute is to exclude disputes over minor amounts of money. Only property matters can be quantified in monetary terms. According to the Federal Supreme Court, a property matter exists “if the legal basis of the disputed claim lies in property law and the appeal ultimately and predominantly pursues an economic purpose.” The pursuit of an economic purpose does not presuppose a claim for payment of a sum of money by the parties. In such cases, the Federal Supreme Court may instead determine the value in dispute at its discretion. The calculation of the value in dispute in the law is based on Art. 51 BGG.
15 Under constitutional law, limits on the value in dispute are permissible in all areas of law. However, the BGG only provides for limits on the value in dispute in civil law and in areas of public law that are closely related to civil law. A proposal by the Federal Council to exclude appeals against minor fines from access to the Federal Supreme Court was rejected by Parliament. Limits on the value in dispute in public law are indeed not without problems. The administration of public justice serves to enforce public interests and thus fulfills functions that go beyond the clarification of the respective dispute. The value in dispute in public law disputes cannot therefore be quantified on a regular basis. In criminal proceedings, the monetary value of a penalty is not always related to its severity.
16 According to Art. 74 para. 1 BGG, a general value limit of CHF 30,000 applies to appeals in civil law matters (lit. b). Exceptions are disputes under labor and tenancy law, where the limit is set at CHF 15,000 (lit. a). The privileged status of these two areas stems from the concept of social protection. According to the Federal Supreme Court, a “labor law dispute” is a dispute between an employer and an employee based on an employment relationship. “Tenancy law disputes” include disputes arising from the rental of business or residential premises. However, disputes arising from lease agreements or from the rental of movable property are not covered.
17 Art. 85 para. 1 BGG provides for limits on the value of claims for appeals in public law matters in the areas of state liability (CHF 30,000) and public law employment relationships (CHF 15,000). “State liability” refers to the liability of public-law entities for damage caused. State liability law is modeled on civil liability law and encompasses both general state liability law and special liability provisions. “Public-law employment relationships” are employment relationships that are not based on private law but on public personnel law.
2. Exception: legal issues of fundamental importance
18 According to Art. 191 para. 2 FC, no limits on the value of claims may be set for disputes that raise legal issues of fundamental importance. Art. 74 para. 2 lit. a and Art. 85 para. 2 BGG implement this exception. However, the Constitution and the law deliberately refrain from providing a legal definition of the term. It is clear, however, that “legal question” refers to the disputed interpretation of a norm whose violation can be challenged before the Federal Supreme Court. The message accompanying the BGG states that the legal question must be of “fundamental importance” for the legal system in general – and not only for the specific proceedings. A fundamental question must therefore be capable of serving as a precedent for many similar cases, even if the individual case appears to be trivial. It is irrelevant whether the decision is of high subjective importance to one party or whether the threshold value in dispute was narrowly not reached.
19 The message on the BGG distinguishes three groups of cases involving legal questions of fundamental importance. The first group of cases comprises legal issues that have never been assessed by the Federal Supreme Court. These are of fundamental importance for the unity of the legal system if they have been assessed inconsistently by the lower courts or if they are groundbreaking for the practice of the lower courts – i.e., if they are likely to be assessed in many similar cases. Secondly, a legal issue is of fundamental importance for legal unity if the lower court has ruled on it in contradiction to the practice of the highest court. Finally, a legal issue that has already been decided once is of fundamental importance for the substantive content of the legal system if the Federal Supreme Court sees reason to review its previous practice on the issue in question.
20 The Federal Supreme Court is more restrictive in its practice. According to this, a legal question is only of fundamental importance for legal uniformity “if there is a general and urgent interest in having a disputed question clarified by the highest court in order to bring about uniform application and interpretation of federal law and thus remove considerable legal uncertainty.” However, a question is not fundamental simply because the Federal Supreme Court has never ruled on it or because there are contradictions in the case law of the lower courts. The Federal Supreme Court considers, for example, whether the question could be relevant in a large number of other cases and whether there is consensus on the legal issue in legal doctrine. Grounds for reviewing existing case law may arise in particular from significant criticism in legal doctrine, changes in the law, or international developments.
21 The Federal Supreme Court also takes into account the hypothetical course of proceedings. If a legal question could be reviewed in the context of a subsidiary constitutional complaint with the same jurisdiction, there can be no question of a fundamental issue according to case law. Furthermore, the Federal Supreme Court tends to affirm the fundamental significance of a legal question if there is a very low probability that the question will be brought before the Federal Supreme Court in another case. Conversely, as the doctrine correctly states, a high probability that the same legal question will come before the Federal Supreme Court in the future with a higher value in dispute does not speak against its fundamental significance.
22 The BGG contains two special procedural provisions for legal questions of fundamental significance. Firstly, the Federal Supreme Court should not have to search for indications of the existence of a legal question of fundamental importance itself, but should be able to rely on the arguments put forward by the party. The party claiming that a legal question of fundamental importance exists must therefore justify why the legal question is significant (Art. 42 para. 2 BGG). Secondly, special rules apply to the composition of the court. Legal issues of fundamental importance are decided by five federal judges instead of the usual three, with the exception of appeals against decisions of the cantonal supervisory authorities in debt enforcement and bankruptcy matters (Art. 20 para. 2 BGG).
C. Exclusion of subject areas (para. 3)
1. Constitutional basis
23 Art. 191 para. 3 FC authorizes the legislature to exclude certain subject areas from access to the Federal Supreme Court. In the BGG, excluded areas of jurisdiction are often defined by legal concepts based on a uniform source of substantive law (e.g., decisions on the “type approval of vehicles” under Art. 12 SVG or on “inclusion in the waiting list” for organ transplants under Art. 21 TPG). However, the Constitution does not impose any restrictions on the legislature when choosing the possible points of reference for determining a subject area. Exclusions of subject matter in the BGG therefore also refer to undefined legal concepts with a cross-jurisdictional character (“internal or external security of the country”) and to lower courts of the Federal Supreme Court (“decisions of the Appeals Chamber of the Federal Criminal Court”).
24 The limits of the authorization in paragraph 3 are controversial. In any case, there is agreement that the legislature may not exclude entire branches of law – such as criminal law as such – from access to the Federal Supreme Court, because paragraph 3 only authorizes it to exclude “certain” subject areas. In our opinion, a stricter standard must apply. An exclusion of a specific area can significantly impair the constitutional status of the Federal Supreme Court (see n. 4 ff.) even before it affects an entire branch of law. The legislature is not free to undermine this position, especially not because of its duty to guarantee rights. In our opinion, no clear limit for subject matter exclusions can be derived from the vague constitutional basis. However, the Constitution does at least provide a frame of reference for assessing the constitutionality of specific exclusions in the applicable law.
2. Assessment of the applicable law
25 The BGG excludes certain areas from access to the Federal Supreme Court, particularly in the area of public law appeals. These exclusions do not follow a uniform logic, but are the expression of loosely related individual decisions by the legislature. Some of them were taken over from the old law. The list of exceptions in Art. 83 BGG is of particular practical importance, as it broadly covers exclusions in the areas of migration and infrastructure, as well as exclusions relating to property rights, politics, and other matters. In addition, there are exclusions in the area of administrative and legal assistance under Art. 84 and Art. 84a BGG, as well as certain exclusions for the Federal Administrative Court under Art. 32 para. 1 VGG, which go beyond the BGG and thus indirectly also exclude access to the Federal Supreme Court. Furthermore, Art. 79 BGG largely excludes the decisions of the Appeals Chamber of the Federal Criminal Court from the jurisdiction of the Federal Supreme Court. In civil law, only the selective exclusion of trademarks under Art. 73 BGG applies.
26 The compatibility of a specific exclusion of a subject area with the Constitution depends primarily on its scope. The decisive factor is, on the one hand, how significant the legal issues covered by the exclusion are and how strongly they relate to the fundamental order of law. The more significant the legal issues covered and the stronger their connection to fundamental rights, the more problematic the exclusion is with regard to preserving the supreme judicial functions of the Federal Supreme Court (qualitative consideration). On the other hand, the relief sought by the constitutional legislator for the Federal Supreme Court depends on the caseload associated with the cases covered by the exclusion. From this perspective, the more an exclusion relieves the Federal Supreme Court, the more desirable it is from a constitutional point of view (quantitative consideration). The caseload in a subject area is also related to the nature of the legal issues that arise. However, it is primarily determined by other factors, such as the number of cases arising in the area in question. The qualitative and quantitative approaches are therefore independent approaches to assessing the constitutionality of exclusions. In our opinion, restricting access to the Federal Supreme Court to important legal issues is best compatible with both approaches. The BGG already excludes “legal issues of fundamental importance” and “particularly significant cases” within the scope of certain exclusions in the form of countermeasures. The reform efforts within the framework of the 2018 revision of the BGG were aimed in the same direction (see N. 30).
27 Exclusions based on subject matter have different effects in the BGG's system of legal remedies, depending on whether the excluded decision was made by a cantonal or a federal court of first instance. The reason for this is the subsidiary constitutional complaint, which allows decisions of the highest cantonal courts to be reviewed for violations of constitutional rights if ordinary appeals are excluded (Art. 113-119 BGG). The subsidiary constitutional complaint is an actual exception to barriers to access, which stems primarily from the legislature's concern for the supervisory function of the Federal Supreme Court over the cantonal authorities in the area of constitutional rights. “Constitutional rights” are constitutional provisions that guarantee individuals protection against state interference or, at least in addition to public interests, protect individual interests. These include, in particular, cantonal constitutional provisions and certain principles of the rule of law.
28 The motive for exclusion on the part of the legislature is also relevant to the constitutionality of exclusions. The protection of the Federal Supreme Court from excessive workload almost always plays a role here. Another frequent motive for exclusion is the unsuitability of a matter for judicial review, for example because it is of a political nature or involves a significant degree of discretion. The aim of speeding up proceedings is particularly important in the area of administrative and legal assistance between authorities, where access to the Federal Supreme Court is largely excluded in order to facilitate the implementation of auxiliary measures. All these grounds constitute constitutionally legitimate reasons for excluding certain areas from jurisdiction. On the other hand, occasional references by the legislature to the technical nature of certain areas, to the wide discretion of the lower courts, or to the quality of the proceedings before the lower courts are constitutionally questionable. The reference to existing legal traditions is only convincing in the case of military jurisdiction, whose exclusion was clearly intended by the constitutional legislator.
29 Based on the above, the question of whether specific subject matter exclusions are compatible with the Constitution can be assessed using the test scheme below. We see two problems in particular in the current law. First, due to the far-reaching exclusions under Art. 83 lit. b-d BGG, the Federal Administrative Court effectively replaces the Federal Supreme Court in parts of migration law in the absence of a constitutional complaint. This circumstance is in clear tension with the constitutional role of the Federal Supreme Court, especially since migration law has a close connection to fundamental rights. The second problem we see is the increasing workload of the Federal Court, especially in criminal appeals.
i. How far does the exclusion extend?
Materiality and relevance to fundamental rights of the legal issues covered?
Relief effect
ii. Is the exclusion compensated for?
Counter-exceptions?
Constitutional complaints?
iii. What are the legislative motives behind the exclusion and what constitutional weight do these motives carry?
Test criteria: Compatibility of subject matter exclusions with the Constitution
3. Reform efforts
30 The Federal Council had the administration of federal justice evaluated in 2008–2013. It concluded that legal issues of fundamental importance did not consistently reach the Federal Supreme Court and that the latter had to deal with some minor cases. At the same time, there were gaps in the jurisdiction of the Federal Supreme Court. The Federal Council therefore proposed a fundamental revision of the BGG in 2018. On the one hand, existing exclusions of subject areas were to be broadened. In return, the Federal Supreme Court was to retain a so-called “residual jurisdiction” for the assessment of “legal issues of fundamental importance” and “particularly significant cases,” with the exception of foreign and security policy, asylum matters, and certain disputes under telecommunications law. The exact meaning of these two terms was to be defined in more detail in a list in the law (see Art. 89b E-BGG). Originally, the Federal Council had also planned to abolish subsidiary constitutional complaints. However, due to fierce criticism during the consultation process, where there were fears that legal protection in the area of constitutional rights would be restricted, it withdrew this proposal. Nevertheless, the major revision of the BGG failed in 2020 due to opposition in the National Council to the extension of subject matter exclusions.
31 Shortly after the revision failed, reform efforts were resumed. In response to the Caroni postulate of December 2, 2020, the Federal Council presented a report on January 24, 2024, in which it advocated a two-stage approach. On the one hand, it stuck to the major revision of the BGG, but decided to wait for the parliamentary debate and not to take any steps in this direction for the time being. On the other hand, it initiated a minor revision of the BGG, which is intended to bring about selective, politically uncontroversial improvements to the BGG. On December 6, 2024, the Federal Council opened the consultation procedure on the minor revision of the BGG. It proposes only editorial changes to access to the Federal Supreme Court.
D. Simplified procedure (para. 4)
32 Art. 191 para. 4 FC authorizes the legislature to provide for a simplified procedure for obviously unfounded appeals. This is not a barrier to access, but merely a special type of procedure. A complaint is “manifestly unfounded” if it is clear from the outset that the alleged violation of law does not exist. This is particularly the case if there is no doubt about the interpretation of the law, either because of the clear wording of the law or because of established court practice. Originally, para. 4 was intended to empower the legislature to exclude manifestly unfounded appeals from access to the Federal Supreme Court altogether. The current version of para. 4 was chosen to ensure that, in such cases, those seeking justice receive at least a brief statement of reasons that satisfies the requirements of Art. 29 para. 2 FC.
33 The BGG recognizes two types of simplified proceedings. The Federal Supreme Court first decides on its own whether to dismiss obviously inadmissible, obviously unfounded, abusive, or vexatious appeals, stating briefly the grounds for inadmissibility (Art. 108 BGG). Secondly, it decides with summary reasoning – but in a regular three-judge panel (see Art. 20 para. 1 BGG) – on certain decisions not to hear a case and, if unanimous, on the dismissal of manifestly unfounded appeals and on the granting of manifestly well-founded appeals (Art. 109 BGG). In doing so, the BGG goes beyond the wording of para. 4, which provides for the simplified procedure only for manifestly unfounded appeals. However, Art. 188 para. 2 FC already provides a sufficient constitutional basis for the solution chosen by the legislature.
About the authors
Ivan Gunjic, MLaw, is a law clerk at the Federal Administrative Court.
Natascha Kords, MLaw, LL.M, currently works as a law clerk at a district court in Zurich. She obtained her MLaw from the University of Zurich and her LL.M. from King's College London in 2023. Prior to that, she worked for one year at the chair of Prof. Dr. Kiener.
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Schweizer Rainer J., Reform der Bundesgerichtsbarkeit: Ein heikler Schritt mit gewissen Unwägbarkeiten und Problemen, Justice - Justiz - Giustizia 4 (2018).
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Alle aufgeführten Links wurden zuletzt besucht am 1.1.2025