“Postponement of the heating law was more acceptable”

Venerable is the right word for the plenary hall of the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe. The portraits of the former court presidents hang here: most recently it was Andreas Voßkuhle, Hans-Jürgen Papier, Jutta Limbach.

The heavy door of the hall opens and the incumbent enters for the interview. “We speak here under the critical eyes of our predecessors,” says Stephan Harbarth – in order to express himself in the next hour and a half about the difficult situation of the federal government and the necessary limitation of its political power.

The court president defended Karlsruhe’s provisional halt to the heating law: “The law had to be refrained from being passed because the postponement of the conclusion of the legislative process is more acceptable than a potentially irreversible violation of the participation rights of members of parliament.”