欧美国家宪法中政党定位的变迁——以英美法德四国为例

The Change of Places of Political Parties in Constitutions: Taking the UK, US, France and Germany as Examples

资产阶级革命以后二战以前,传统制宪思想和实践基本上都视政党为宪法之敌,对政党活动采取抑制态度。以英美法三国为例,英国宪法以限制大众参与并逐渐扩大选举权的方式来限制政党影响,美国宪法利用分权原则和联邦主义在限制政党活动空间上做出了大量制度安排,大革命后初期的法国宪法实践更是对政党极端憎恶。但这些抑制努力从未成功,政党活动依然在宪法的重重限制下发展开来,相反,政党活动有时还会对宪法实施稳定发挥积极作用,如美国宪法对在总统选举中加强政党作用的第十二修正案,政党活动对法国第三共和稳定的支持。这种将政党视作宪法之敌的思想与启蒙思想家对政党的轻视与偏见,以及一些启蒙思想家将多数人等同于全体的理论诡辩存在联系。德国基本法在继承传统制宪思想的基础上在政党制度上有所创新,将政党引入宪法并强化其宪法地位,但是在实践中也引起了政党垄断民主政治、政府与政党过度纠葛的问题。面对这些经验和教训,制宪者应当以一种积极的态度承认政党的宪法地位,在此基础上考虑政党否需要入宪、入宪后应该采取何种支持的问题,与此同时还应保证大众民主政治发展的开放性。

After the bourgeois revolution and before the World War II, political parties were basically regarded as the enemy of the constitution in all classical constitutional ideas and practices. As a result, political parties＇ activities were subject to control. Let us take the UK, US and France as an example. The British Constitution restricted influence of political parties by sup- pressing its population＇ s participation while gradually extending suffrage. The US Constitution mapped out a great number of institutional arrangements to restrain activities of political parties by making use of doctrine of separation of powers and federalism. French picture demonstrated that during early days after the French Revolution, French Constitution was extremely hostile to politi- cal parties. However, none of these curbing efforts had ever met with success, since political par- ties＇ activities expanded as usual under multiple restrictions imposed by constitutions. On the con- trary, political parties＇ activities sometimes even played a positive role in benefiting the smooth implementation of constitutions, such as the US Constitution Amendment XII which has strength- ened the role of political parties in presidential election and strong backing to the stability of the Third Republic given by French political parties. Regarding political parties as the enemy of the constitution has links with bias and scorn taken by thinkers of enlightenment towards political par- ties and theoretical sophistry in which the majority was regarded as the all by some enlightenment thinkers. As for German experience, based on party state theory, the Basic Law of Germany, while carries on classical constitutional ideas, has also brought forth new ideas in the system of po- litical parties. It has introduced political parties in German Constitution, thus enhancing their con- stitutional status. Nevertheless, in practice, some problems have arisen, including monopoly of political parties over democratic politics and complicated relationship between government and po- litical parties. Taking into account these experiences and lessons, when confronted with issue of position of political parties in modern constitution, framers of constitution should adopt a positive approach to recognize the constitutional status of political parties. Based on this approach, framers then should consider issues such as whether to introduce political parties in constitution, what sup- ports they should provide and how to guarantee the openness and development of popular democrat- ic politics.