Robert Lecourt As Judge and Writer: The Legal Philosophy of the Great President of the European Court of Justice

Of all the appointments to the European Court of Justice by the Member States, perhaps the most significant was the appointment of Robert Lecourt, former French Minister of Justice, by the government of Charles de Gaulle in 1962. Lecourt was, we now know, essential to the European Court’s 1963 Van Gend en Loos decision to create European law’s ‘direct effect’ doctrine. As President of the Court from 1967 to 1976, Lecourt was a powerful influence on the Court throughout its foundational period, which ECJ judge Pescatore described as the ‘Lecourt years’. Lecourt, however, was not just a judge, but also a writer, authoring a stream of publications on legal topics, including European law, over a period of many years, including books, scholarly publications, and journalism in venues such as Le Monde and France-Forum. This paper sets out, for the first time, a long term assessment of Robert Lecourt as a writer and thinker about the challenges of the law, demonstrating continuities in his legal philosophy over the decades, and thus helping our understanding of the intellectual roots of the doctrines of the European legal order.