We all know, even without having entered the doors of a law faculty, the President of the Republic is the guarantor of the Constitution, ensures its respect, in accordance with article 5. But could it be that the Constitution , that of the Fifth Republic in this case, is also the guarantor of the choices, the orientations, even the words, of the President of the Republic in office?
You have four hours… Emmanuel Macron only had about thirty minutes in the podium of the Constitutional Council this Wednesday, October 4 and this is, in small touches, quick remarks, what he seemed to want to demonstrate . To legitimize his action? His vision ? Legitimize yourself? It is not forbidden to think so.
May the disgruntled spirits who deplored the use of article 49.3 to pass the pension reform last March or, more recently, the public finance programming law, hear it, understand it and mourn: ” We must not give in to any debate, any fashion of the moment, which would consist of saying that applying the Constitution would be undemocratic or would no longer be fashionable. […] Our constitution has legitimate tools and their use is always justified, unless we erase our republican history”, reminded them the Head of State, who is preparing to see his Prime Minister draw the tool a good fifteen more times much criticized on the PLF and PLFSS coming this fall.
With a barely concealed smile while uttering the most emblematic formula of Macronism, the president justifies it: it is, as the General wanted, “at the same time, taking into account the pluralism consubstantial with democracies and our nation, and refuse that the quarrels so frequent […] cause public action to drift towards impotence”. And it is an understatement to say that in this context of relative majority and the rise of radicalism, quarrels are frequent…
The President spoke of the Union
As the European elections approach, at the dawn of a battle which will undoubtedly first see the list of the presidential majority and that of the National Rally confront each other, it was undoubtedly not useless, either, to talk about the Union. Because if there is one theme on which the Head of State has placed his hand, developed an overall body of work, it is Europe. Since the camp embodied by Marine Le Pen lays its foundations on the idea of shrinkage, of a sovereignty which would only be embodied within the framework of the nation-state, Emmanuel Macron indicates that he is in the camp of the openness, integration and… the Constitution. “Europe is never a dispossession,” he explains. “On the contrary, it is a stronger seizure of our future, in complete sovereignty. […] This Constitution is so French in its first article, in the History that it summarizes, that it allows us to surpass ourselves with confidence.”
“Sovereignty”. Emmanuel Macron has uttered this term no less than 14 times, which has become so dear to him since the Covid crisis and particularly since his re-election in 2022. It has even become central in the Macronist software, whether industrial, economic, cultural or European. A way, once again, of linking the president’s program to the fundamental values of the Fifth Republic and, even more, of the French Revolution and the declaration of 1789.
The ideal of the Enlightenment
Beyond that, we must notice, in the lace of this speech, other winks which are so many bridges. Is it a happy coincidence that by listing the “four pillars of the ideal of the Enlightenment” and the Republic – indivisible, secular, democratic and social – the president affirms that they are the bulwark against “all forms of ‘oppression or decivilization’? We’ve heard this before somewhere. In May, exactly, when Emmanuel Macron regretted a “decivilization process” within an increasingly violent society, creating a heated debate around the origin of the word… and its merits. Even if it means doing it again, we might as well do it with the approval of the Constitution.
I am an extension of the Republic, of its history and its values, Emmanuel Macron seems to be telling us. This Republic “sister of the Thirty Glorious Years, promoting economic progress which alone guarantees the independence of the Nation. A moment of regeneration – a French breath”, he adds. For several months, this is what has governed the policy put in place by the president: the search for a new French breath, specific, characteristic, almost identity-based in a number of areas. Let us recently remember “French ecology”; or even the “French Art of Living”, which we had to preserve after the Covid crisis. Emmanuel Macron strived to show that he was on the side of the Constitution. Better yet, that she accompanied him. In short, validated it.