From confederacy to convoy: Thoughts about the finality of the Union and its member states

Extract

We as constitutionalists owe it to ourselves and even to the 500 million other citizens of a member state and of the Union at the same time, to come up with a legally and constitutionally readable understanding of the situation. It must not be one suffering from the split between international and domestic public law. It must not mystify the Union as a completely original structure, intelligible only in its own terms. Such understanding should encompass not only the limits but also the logic of the situation; not only its mechanics but also its evolution. It should be intelligible for the public. It should allow for the multiple dualities of loyalty, of function, of legitimacy. It should allow for shared authority. Constitutional thought is well equipped to deal with actual duality and ambivalence. These characteristics of the Union are real and are here to stay.