Abstract
It is very interesting, as well as a strange, situation for the French to comment on behalf of the Americans in Lautsi case, especially the decisive pleading of Joseph Weiler in the Grand Chamber of the European Court in 2011. French people heard about Joseph Weiler a few years ago in 2009 when he published: “L’Europe Chretienne?: Une Excursion” (Christian Europr?: An Excursion). The book was prefaced by the French (Catholic) philosopher Remi Brague. The French edition had been translated from its 2003 Italian version. There is no English edition of it. Such a lacking may seem strange, but the fact is that is not an American professor educating Americans about Europe, it is an essay written for Europeans at the time of the framing of the dead-born “European constitutional treaty” by a Jewish law professor who has exhibited complex identity and is deeply rooted in European culture. French or European, the music of the essay sounded very clear to us. However, Joseph Weiler failed in his attempt to convince the European framers that they should mention Christian roots of Europe in the Preamble of their Constitution. He failed, but a couple of years later the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights accepted that crucifixes stay hanging on the walls of Italian classrooms, and there is undoubtedly a close connection between these two events.
First Page
783
Recommended Citation
Pierre-Henri Prelot,
The Lautsi Decision as Seen From (Christian) Europe,
65
Me. L. Rev.
783
(2013).
Available at:
https://digitalcommons.mainelaw.maine.edu/mlr/vol65/iss2/22