The Alarm State at the Autonomous State Legal Framework

Abstract

In situations of constitutional normality, the defence of the Constitution is entrusted to the ordinary powers of the State and to the mechanisms designed to preserve constitutional supremacy. Nevertheless, ordinary constitutional provisions may be insufficient in emergency situations, both of endogenous or exogenous nature. In that case, the Law of the exception arises as a special and transitory legislation with the power to limit the exercise of fundamental rights, alter the balance of powers and displace the ordinary enforcement of the Constitution. When such emergency situations occur in a decentralized State, such as the Spanish «Estado de las autonomías» (a form of politically decentralized State) the constitutional distribution of competences and the autonomous powers remain fully in force, although its provisions may collide with measures adopted by the central competent authority, in which case their validity will be temporarily displaced.