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CONSTITUTIONAL VALUES IN THE COMMON LAW OF OBLIGATIONS
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 April 2024
Abstract
“Constitutional values” is a term which appears to relate to concepts of what is now called public law. By constitutional values, I mean the basic ideas and interests which structure relations between the individual and the state, and the obligations to which they give rise, which underlie the common law and to which it gives recognition in more or less articulated forms. These are ideas and interests such as liberty, private life, freedom of expression and access to justice. Constitutional values and human rights overlap, but they are not necessarily and always the same, either in content or in effect. In exploring this topic I hope to retrieve and bring to the surface an important aspect of the common law in terms of both private law and public law.
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- © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Faculty of Law, University of Cambridge
Footnotes
This article is based on the Cambridge Freshfields Annual Law Lecture, delivered on 10 March 2023. I am grateful to my former Judicial Assistant, Robert Steele, for his excellent assistance in preparing the lecture and this article and to the Journal’s reviewers for their constructive comments. All errors are my responsibility.
References
1 Sometimes these ideas are expressed in the language of “rights” for rhetorical effect.
2 For analysis in relation to distinct constitutional values, see M. Elliott and K. Hughes, Common Law Constitutional Rights (Oxford 2020).
3 F.W. Maitland, The Constitutional History of England (Cambridge 1908), 23–24.
4 Clause 39 of the original charter of 1215, but numbered 29 in the statutory version of 1225.
5 L. Colley, The Gun, the Ship & the Pen: Warfare, Constitutions and the Making of the Modern World (New York 2021), 97–99.
6 A.V. Dicey, Introduction to the Study of the Law of the Constitution, 8th ed. (London 1915), chs. V–VII.
7 Ibid., at 206–07.
8 J. Baker, Collected Papers on English Legal History, vol. II (Cambridge 2013), 935.
9 Dicey, Introduction, ch. XII; Maitland, Constitutional History, 479. The Crown itself had legal immunity in tort prior to the Crown Proceedings Act 1947, but could be sued in contract under the petition of right procedure: P. Hogg, P. Monahan and W. Wright, Liability of the Crown, 4th ed. (Toronto 2011), ch. 1.
10 See e.g. J. W. F. Allison, A Continental Distinction in the Common Law: A Historical and Comparative Perspective on English Public Law (Oxford 1996); K. Dyson, The State Tradition in Western Europe (Oxford 1980); F. W. Maitland, “The Crown as Corporation” (1901) 17 L.Q.R. 131; P. Sales, “Crown Powers, the Royal Prerogative and Fundamental Rights” in H. Wilberg and M. Elliott (eds.), The Scope and Intensity of Substantive Review: Traversing Taggart’s Rainbow (Oxford 2015).
11 See e.g. S. F. C. Milsom, “The Nature of Blackstone’s Achievement” (1981) O.J.L.S. 1, 3.
12 See e.g. Dyson, State Tradition, 201.
13 J. Varuhas, “Transcending the Public Law-Private Law Divide” in C. Harlow (ed.), A Research Agenda for Administrative Law (Cheltenham; Northampton, MA 2023), 165.
14 S. De Smith, “The Prerogative Writs” [1951] 11 C.L.J., 40–56. See also A. Beever, “Our Most Fundamental Rights” in D. Nolan and A. Robertson (eds.), Rights and Private Law (Oxford 2012), 77.
15 Beever, ”Our Most Fundamental Rights”, 80.
16 F. W. Maitland, The Forms of Action at Common Law: A Course of Lectures, A.H. Chaytor and W.J. Whittaker (eds.) (Cambridge 1909), 2.
17 Allison, Continental Distinction, 127; and S. Milsom, “Law and Fact in Legal Development” (1967) 17 University of Toronto Law Journal 1–19, 1.
18 De Smith, “Prerogative Writs”, 48.
19 Varuhas, “Transcending the Public-Private Divide”, 167, referring to S. De Smith, “Wrongs and Remedies in Administrative Law” (1952) 15 M.L.R. 189, 206.
20 (1765) 19 State Tr. 1029.
21 [1994] 1 A.C. 377.
22 R. (Miller) v Prime Minister; Cherry and others v Advocate General for Scotland [2019] UKSC 41, [2020] A.C. 373, at [32].
23 See A.W.B. Simpson, Human Rights and the End of Empire (Oxford 2001), chs. 13–16.
24 For example, the right to privacy (art. 8), particularly in the home, was protected by a range of property rights and the right to freedom of expression (art. 10) was recognised as a civil liberty.
25 Baker, Collected Papers, 942.
26 Accepted by the UK in 1966.
27 [2005] UKHL 71, [2006] 2 A.C. 221, at [11].
28 [1940] A.C. 1014, 1026.
29 See e.g. Bremer Vulcan v South India Shipping [1981] A.C. 909, 971; Raymond v Honey [1983] 1 A.C. 1, 10; Ex parte Anderson [1984] Q.B. 778.
30 A. Nussberger, The European Court of Human Rights (Oxford 2020), ch. 1.
31 Such as Sunday Times v UK (1979) 2 E.H.R.R. 245; McCann v UK (1996) 21 E.H.R.R. 97.
32 [1990] 1 A.C. 109, 282–84.
33 [1993] A.C. 534, 55.1.
34 See e.g. R. v Secretary of State for the Home Department, ex parte Leech [1994] Q.B. 198; R. v Secretary of State for the Home Department, ex parte Pierson [1998] A.C. 539. For discussion, see J. Varuhas, “Administrative Law and Rights in the UK House of Lords and Supreme Court” in P. Daly (ed.), Apex Courts and the Common Law (Toronto 2019); also P. Sales, “A Comparison of the Principle of Legality and Section 3 of the Human Rights Act 1998” (2009) 125 L.Q.R. 598.
35 For instance, by reference to the idea of “anxious scrutiny” in Bugdaycay v Secretary of State for the Home Department [1987] A.C. 514; and see R. v Ministry of Defence, ex parte Smith [1996] Q.B. 517.
36 The first English treatise on “public law” appeared in the 2000s: D. Feldman (ed.), English Public Law (Oxford 2004). See the discussion of this development in Varuhas, “Transcending the Public-Private Divide”.
37 Lord Woolf, “Droit Publique, English Style” [1995] P.L. 57; N. Johnson, Reshaping the British Constitution: Essays in Political Interpretation (London 2004), 149; P. Sales, “The Interaction of the Rule of Law and the Separation of Powers” [2022] P.L. 527.
38 [1964] A.C. 40.
39 Padfield v Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food [1968] A.C. 997.
40 Anisminic Ltd. v Foreign Compensation Commission [1969] 2 A.C. 147.
41 [1971] A.C. 610.
42 Council of Civil Service Unions v Minister for the Civil Service [1985] A.C. 374.
43 Kleinwort Benson Ltd. v Lincoln City Council [1999] 2 A.C. 347, 378.
44 See e.g. W. Wade and C. Forsyth, Administrative Law, 11th ed. (Oxford 2014), ch. 1; and M. Elliot and J. Varuhas, Administrative Law: Text and Materials, 5th ed. (Oxford 2016), chs. 1, 4.
45 Sales, “Crown Powers”, 365.
46 Inland Revenue Commissioners v Federation of Self-Employed and Small Businesses Ltd. [1982] A.C. 617.
47 [1983] 2 A.C. 237.
48 Sales, “Interaction of the Rule of Law”.
49 Varuhas, “Transcending the Public-Private Divide”, 167.
50 Lord Scarman, “The Development of Administrative Law: Obstacles and Opportunities” [1990] P.L. 490, 491–92.
51 J. Varuhas, “The Public Interest Conception of Public Law: Its Procedural Origins and Substantive Implications” in J. Bell et al. (eds.), Public Law Adjudication in Common Law Systems (Oxford 2016).
52 Varuhas, “Transcending the Public-Private Divide”, 168.
53 D. Oliver, Common Values and the Private-Public Divide (London 1999), 169.
54 [1989] A.C. 53.
55 On immunities, see J. Beatson, “‘Public’ and ‘Private’ in English Administrative Law” (1987) 103 L.Q.R. 34.
56 (1998) 29 E.H.R.R. 245.
57 Oliver, Common Values, 114.
58 [1976] Q.B. 752, 770–71 (Lord Widgery C.J.).
59 [1990] 1 A.C. 109, 256 (Lord Keith of Kinkel).
60 See e.g. R. v Panel on Take-overs and Mergers, ex parte Datafin Plc [1987] Q.B. 815.
61 Allison, Continental Distinction, chs. 5, 6.
62 Ibid., at 100, referring to T.R.S. Allan, “Pragmatism and Theory in Public Law” (1988) 104 L.Q.R. 422; and P. McAuslan, “Administrative Justice: A Necessary Report?” [1988] P.L. 402.
63 Allison, Continental Distinction, 135.
64 Ibid.
65 Varuhas, “Transcending the Public-Private Divide”, 174.
66 There was some irony in this development, as Allison notes, given the growing privatisation of the public sector at the same time: Continental Distinction, ch. 5.
67 (2006) 42 Eur. Ct. H. R. 25.
68 (1979–80) 2 E.H.R.R. 330.
69 M. Cohen-Eliya and I. Porat, Proportionality and Constitutional Culture (Cambridge 2013), ch. 3.
70 There are good discussions of these differences in Dyson, State Tradition, and L. Siedentop, Democracy in Europe (London 2001), ch. 6. See also J. McLean, Searching for the State in British Constitutional Thought (Cambridge 2012).
71 See Dyson, State Tradition, 6, ch. 9.
72 Ibid., at xiv.
73 J. Mathews, Extending Rights’ Reach: Constitutions, Private Law and Judicial Power (New York 2018), 54–55, referring to R. Smend, Constitution and Constitutional Law (Berkeley, CA 1928). See also A. Jacobson and B. Schlink, Weimar: A Jurisprudence of Crisis (Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA 2000), 210.
74 Smend, Constitution, 195.
75 T. Hobbes, Leviathan, R. Tuck (ed.) (Cambridge 1991). See Q. Skinner, “The State” in T. Ball, J. Farr and R.L. Hanson (eds.), Political Innovation and Conceptual Change (Cambridge 1989), 90–131, 121.
76 Q. Skinner, “Thomas Hobbes and his Disciples in France and England” (1966) 8 Comparative Studies in Society and History 153, 154.
77 Allison, Continental Distinction, 74.
78 Ibid., at 73.
79 Sales, “Crown Powers”, 365.
80 D. Oliver and J. Fedtke (eds.), Human Rights and the Private Sphere: A Comparative Study (Abingdon 2007), 495.
81 H.J. Laski, “The Discredited State: Thoughts on Politics before the War” (1919) 32 H.L.R. 447, 447.
82 Dyson, State Tradition, 40.
83 Mathews, Extending Rights’ Reach, 15.
84 For this metaphor, see R. Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously (Boston, MA 1977).
85 J. Thomas, Public Rights, Private Relations (Oxford 2015), 3.
86 See e.g. the discussion in D. Grimm, Constitutionalism: Past, Present and Future (New York 2016), ch. 7, “Fundamental Rights in the Interpretation of the German Constitutional Court”. See also the discussion of rights as values in Mathews, Extending Rights’ Reach, 19.
87 BVerfGE 39, 1, BVerfGE 88, 203.
88 BVerfGE 54, 143, 147. For discussion of “rights inflation” generally, see K. Moller, “Proportionality and Rights Inflation” in G. Huscroft et al. (eds.), Proportionality and the Rule of Law (New York 2014).
89 BVerfGE 7, 198 at [41].
90 Mathews, Extending Rights’ Reach, 50.
91 M. Kumm, “Who Is Afraid of the Total Constitution? Constitutional Rights as Principles and the Constitutionalization of Private Law” (2006) 7(4) German Law Journal 341; J. Fedtke, “Germany: Drittwirkung in Germany” in Oliver and Fedtke (eds.), Human Rights and the Private Sphere, 125.
92 Mathews, Extending Rights’ Reach, 50.
93 D. Grimm, “The Protective Function of the State” in G. Nolte (ed.), European and US Constitutionalism (Cambridge 2005), 137.
94 Allison, Continental Distinction, 82–83.
95 I. Berlin, “Two Concepts of Liberty” in A. Quinton (ed.), Political Philosophy (Oxford 1967).
96 Allison, Continental Distinction, 83, referring to P. Cane, “Public Law and Private Law: A Study of the Analysis and Use of a Legal Concept” in J. Eekelaar and J. Bell (eds.), Oxford Essays in Jurisprudence (Oxford 1987), 57–78, 61.
97 Allison, Continental Distinction, 83.
98 See e.g. K. Ewing, “The Human Rights Act and Parliamentary Democracy” (1999) 62 M.L.R. 79, 89; M. Hunt, “The Horizontal Effect of the Human Rights Act” [1998] P.L. 423, 438; G. Phillipson, “The Human Rights Act, ‘Horizontal Effect’ and the Common Law: A Bang or a Whimper?” (1999) 62 M.L.R. 824, 827; B. Markesenis, “Privacy, Freedom of Expression and the Horizontal Effect of the Human Rights Bill: Lessons from Germany” (1999) 115 L.Q.R. 47, 73; R. Singh, “Privacy and the Media after the Human Rights Act” (1998) European Human Rights Law Review 722, 724–26; and W. Wade, “The United Kingdom’s Bill of Rights” in J. Beatson, C.F. Forsyth and I. Hare (eds.), Constitutional Reform in the United Kingdom: Practice and Principles (London 1998), 62–64.
99 (2005) 41 E.H.R.R. 13.
100 See P. Sales, “Proportionality and the Margin of Appreciation: Strasbourg and London” in S. Vogenauer and S. Weatherill (eds.), General Principles of Law: European and Comparative Perspectives (Oxford 2017).
101 Odievre v France (2004) 38 E.H.R.R. 43; Evans v UK (2008) 46 E.H.R.R. 34, at [77]. Chassagnou v France (2000) 29 E.H.R.R. 615.
102 Re: S (Identity: Restrictions on Publication) [2004] UKHL 47, [2005] 1 A.C. 593, at [17].
103 Which is aligned with and shares historical roots with the American model discussed in Cohen-Eliya and Porat, Proportionality and Constitutional Culture, based on a culture of authority, by contrast with a German culture of justification, and which is “characterized by categories and bright-line rules and distinctions”, where the notion of balancing “has been marginalized” (p. 8); see also the discussion at pp. 52–60 of the individualistic and suspicion-based conception of the state in America and the emphasis upon liberty and a negative conception of “rights as trumps”, which has historic affinities with English common law.
104 The margin of appreciation is itself a principle of interpretation of Convention rights: see R. (Elan-Cane) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2021] UKSC 56, [2023] A.C. 559, at [76]–[78].
105 R. Spano, “Universality or Diversity of Human Rights? Strasbourg in the Age of Subsidiarity” (2014) 14(3) H.R.L.R. 487–502; also E. Bates, The Evolution of the European Convention on Human Rights (Oxford 2010), to which Spano refers. See also Sales, “Proportionality and the Margin of Appreciation”, 184–89, describing the ECtHR’s “withdrawal to a more supervisory role”.
106 Mathews, Extending Rights’ Reach, 13.
107 A similar approach applies in relation to the interpretation of statutes. The first stage of analysis is to determine the meaning of a statute according to ordinary domestic canons of construction, and it is only if that meaning is found to be incompatible with Convention rights (including after allowing for the margin of appreciation) that section 3 of the Human Rights Act may apply to change that meaning: R. (Z) v Hackney LBC [2020] UKSC 40, [2020] 1 W.L.R. 4327, at [114].
108 [2013] Q.B. 618, at [88].
109 [2015] A.C. 455, at [46].
110 See also at [133] (Lord Toulson).
111 [2023] UKSC 4.
112 Ibid., at [113], [206].
113 [2004] UKHL 22, [2004] 2 A.C. 457.
114 In addition to the direct potential impact of Convention rights on the common law via section 6 of the Human Rights Act, Convention rights may be given horizontal effect through a conforming interpretation under section 3 of the Human Rights Act of statutory provisions applicable as between private individuals: see e.g. Ghaidan v Godin-Mendoza [2004] UKHL 30, [2004] 2 A.C. 557.
115 M.A. Eisenberg, The Nature of the Common Law (Cambridge, MA 1988); cf. Oliver, Common Values.
116 J. Laws, “Is the High Court the Guardian of Fundamental Rights?” [1993] P.L. 59, 64.
117 Chief Constable of the Hertfordshire Police v Van Colle [2008] UKHL 50; [2009] 1 A.C. 225, at [58], referring in particular to the Court of Appeal decision in D v East Berkshire Community Trust [2003] EWCA Civ 1151; [2004] Q.B. 558, at [55]–[88].
118 [2004] 2 A.C. 457, at [11].
119 [2001] 2 A.C. 127.
120 See discussion in P. Sales, “Rights and Fundamental Rights in English Law” [2016] C.L.J. 86, 104–05.
121 See generally P. Sales, “The Common Law: Context and Method” (2019) 135 L.Q.R. 47, 56.
122 P. Sales, “Equity and Human Rights: A Commentary” in P. Turner (ed.), Equity and Administration (Cambridge 2016), 419.
123 See e.g. AG v Guardian Newspapers Ltd. (2) [1990] 1 A.C. 109, 281; and Hellewell v CC of Derbyshire [1995] 1 W.L.R. 804, 807 (Laws L.J.).
124 Lord Nicholls described it as a tort in Campbell v MGN Ltd. [2004] 2 A.C. 457, at [13]–[15].
125 A. Young, “Horizontality and the Constitutionalisation of Private Law” in K. Ziegler and P. Huber, Current Problems in the Protection of Human Rights: Perspectives from Germany and the UK (Oxford and London 2013), 83. In Campbell v MGN Ltd. [2004] 2 A.C. 457, at [44]–[51], Lord Hoffmann characterised the change as one from an equitable duty of good faith to the protection of human autonomy and dignity with respect to control over private information about oneself.
126 See e.g. S. Sedley, Lions Under the Throne (Cambridge 2015), 205.
127 London Regional Transport v Mayor of London [2001] EWCA Civ 1491, [2003] E.M.L.R. 4, at [62].