Election of the First President of the Supreme Court in Poland between 1998 and 2020

Since the entry into force of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland, the General Assembly of Judges of the Supreme Court has selected five candidates from among themselves whom the President appointed the First President of the Supreme Court. The voting method, despite the changing normative environment, was similar at all times and consisted of two stages. First, there was the so-called an indicative vote to identify the candidates for candidates, then by casting one vote for a candidate from among those indicated in the first vote who consented to be a candidate. In these votes, it was not possible to vote against the candidate or abstain from voting (except for the stalemate in 2004). As a result of the adopted voting method, the candidates at each General Assembly of the Supreme Court of Judges obtained the number of votes equal to the number of valid votes cast. As a result, on the list of candidates, at most one candidate had the support of more than half of the voters, and it was impossible for the other candidates to obtain over 50% of the votes. In the 1998 elections, none of the candidates presented to the President obtained more than half of the votes. In the 1998 elections, the candidate of some of the judges who obtained the least votes was not presented to the President. In all other elections (2004, 2010, 2014, 2020) the candidates of all voting judges were presented to the President – in other words, representatives of 100% of the voting judges were among the candidates from which the President selected the First President of the Supreme Court. No separate resolutions on individual candidates were adopted in any of the General Assembly of Supreme Court Judges. No final resolution was adopted in any General Assembly of Supreme Court Judges approving the earlier selection of candidates and serving to present candidates to the President in accordance with Art. 183 paragraph. 3 of the Polish Constitution. Selected candidates were presented to the President by way of a technical act of the Chairman of the General Assembly of the Supreme Court of Justice, that is by handing over the documents to the President of Poland. In the years 1998, 2004, 2010 and 2014, the President appointed the candidate who obtained the highest number of votes to the position of the First President of the Supreme Court. In 2020, the President appointed a candidate who obtained the second-best result of the vote.

Keywords: Supreme Court, First President of the Supreme Court, election of the First President of the Supreme Court.

This article is published in Polish.