THE EQUALITY PRINCIPLE AS A STANDARD FOR TRIAL IN CONSTITUTIONAL AND STATUTE COURTS
IN REGIONS OF RUSSIA 

Ruzlyaev Mikhail Yurevich, Senior prosecutor, the division for Supervision of Investigation in the Main Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Moscow Region, the department for Supervision of Criminal Procedural and Operational Investigative Activities of Internal Affairs and Justice, Prosecutor’s Office of Moscow Region (5 Maliy Kiselniy lane, Moscow, Russia), ruzlyaev@gmail.com

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10.21685/2072-3016-2017-3-8

Background. The equality principle is deemed to be concomitant to the principle of justice since the Antiquity. Both of them are regarded as indispensable for any effective legal order. According to Hans Kelsen, however, there is no necessity to regard both principles as concomitant. Only the equality principle is inherent to any civilized legal order and system of justice, including the constitutional control system in regions of Russia. Moreover, this alleged tie is excessive, because the equality principle is both necessary and sufficient for an effective legal order. As for the justice principle, according to Kelsen it is an ethical, not a legal category. The goal of this brief investigation is to test the instrumentality of this Kelsenian monistic approach as a tool in hands of constitutional judges in Russian regions.
Materials and methods. The investigation task was realized by means of an analysis of two cases adjudicated by the Constitutional Court of North Ossetia – Alania and by the constitutional Court of Saha – Yakutia, correspondingly. The methodology of the investigation includes the normativist, systematic and comparative methods.
Results. The monistic thesis of Hans Kelsen concerning the alleged selfsufficiency of the equality principle was investigated. This principle is regarded by Kelsen as the only fundamental principle of legal order. The question concerning the legal or ethical status of the justice principle was analyzed as well. The author also dwelt upon the question, whether the equlity principle may be regarded as a “pure” legal principle.
Conclusions. It is proved that there is no strict conceptual boundary between the equality principle and the justice principle. When and if a judge appeals solely to the equality principle the justice principle is tacitly involved as well. When a judge applies two techniques, namely a tool of negative discrimination or a tool of positive discrimination, he/she inevitably (though collaterally) may solve the problem of social or individual justice.

constitutional justice, equality principle, negative discrimination, positive discrimination, freedom of labour, dwelling rights

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