Tasks within the field of legislation
© BMJ
In the Federal Republic of Germany, as in every parliamentary democracy, responsibility for passing legislation lies with the legislative bodies, namely the German Bundestag and the Bundesrat. The Federal Ministry of Justice participates in this legislative process, primarily in the capacity of drawing up new legislation as well as preparing legislative amendments or the repeal of laws. In this context, the Ministry has overall responsibility above all for the “classical” areas of law:
- civil law (law of obligations, property law, family law, law of succession),
- commercial and company law,
- the law on protection of industrial property and copyright law,
- criminal law,
- courts constitution law and procedural law for the individual jurisdictions (except labour and social jurisdiction, in respect of which the Ministry adopts a merely advisory role),
service or professional law for judges, public prosecutors, lawyers, notaries, patent lawyers and “Rechtspfleger” (senior judicial officers)
The Federal Ministry of Justice also has the task of performing the scrutiny of legislation drafted by all other federal ministries, as well as of international agreements, in terms of their compatibility with constitutional law, international law, European law and existing federal law. The scrutiny of draft legislation also extends to an examination of the drafting methodology and to ensuring that a uniform style and unambiguous legal language has been adopted.
