Abstract

The paper discusses a problem of consistency of the art. 13 sec. 2 point 3 of the Polish Act of 14.4.2000 on international agreements with the Constitution of the Republic of Poland. The provision mentioned above introduces a case, in which a ratified agreement is amended by an agreement approved by the Polish Council of Ministers in so-called “simplified procedure”. That procedure means that the national process of entering into such agreement ends with giving a consent of the Government for signing it and no further steps to be bound by it need to be taken. International agreements adopted in the simplified procedure are not subject of ratification, therefore – according to the Polish constitutional system – they are considered as acts of internal law. Consequently, the application of art. 13 sec. 2 point 3 of the Act of 14.4.2000 on international agreements leads to a situation, in which – in the hierarchy of the Polish national law – an amended agreement is a source of universally binding law, but amendments made to its text are not. In this regard the relation between the amended and the amending provisions becomes unclear. Doubts concerning consistency of the discussed provision of the Act of 14.4.2000 on international agreements with the constitutional rule of indistinguishability of the rank of amended and amending acts of law and the procedure of adopting them are the main subject of deliberations in this paper.