Llengua pròpia i Tribunal Constitucional

Resum

The establishment of jount official  status for languages as stipulated in  Article 3 of the Spanish Constitution  enshrines the right of choice of  language, which includes the citizen's  right both to use and to be  addressed in the language chosen  when dealing with all public bodies:  autonomous, local, State and judicial.  In this article, the author expounds the Administration's duty with regard to acquaintance with the Catalan language, deriving —according to the Constitutional Tribunal— from the recognition of the citizen’s right to use Catalan.  The degree to which personnel must be acquainted with the language varies according to the level of Administration. Thus while in autonomous and local bodies knowledge of the autochthonous language is on an individual level, State bodies located within the Autonomous Community limit themselves to pointing out the necessity to adapt to the «bilingual system». As for the judicial authorities, public powers can set the limits of the concept of joint official status, although the Constitutional Tribunal is biased against Catalan inasmuch as it specifies that knowledge of Spanish is obligatory and that there must be effective judicial protection. This does not rule out the possibility of remembers of the judicial authorities respecting the right of citizens to use their own language. Only ignorance of the language chosen, which could cause a situation of defencelessness, would warrant bilingual proceedings.  The author is of the opinion that Catalan should be obligatory for all employees in public Administration in Catalonia, and concludes with a new definition of the right to choice of language, based on the concept of autochthonous tongue.