Italian Constitutional Court (Corte costituzionale italiana), No. 57/2014, 27 March 2014

Electoral law and expression of preference for individual candidates.

Art. 1, par. 2, Constitution
Art. 3, Constitution
Art. 48, para. 2, Constitution
Art. 3, Prot. 1, ECHR
Art. 4, par. 2, Presidential Decree 30/03/1957, No. 361
Art. 14, par. 1, Legislative Decree 20/12/1993, No. 533

1. The election of the members of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate of the Republic must allow the citizen to express a preference for individual candidates and not leave him the sole possibility of ratifying the choice of candidates already decided by the parties, through a game of procedures in the formation of electoral lists, thus unilaterally determining the choice of candidates, who, therefore, come to assume the status and role of appointees and not of elected persons.
(The questions of constitutionality of Articles 4(2), 59(1), 83(1)(5) and (2) of Presidential Decree No. 361 of 30 March 1957 and of Articles 14(1) and 17(2) and (4) of Presidential Decree No. 361 of 20 December 1993, No. 361 of 30 March 1957 and of Articles 14(1), 17(2) and 17(4) of Presidential Decree No. 361 of 30 March 1957 are manifestly inadmissible. Legislative Decree No. 533 of 20 December 1993, challenged with reference to Articles 1, second paragraph, 3, 48, second paragraph, 49, 56, first paragraph, 58, first paragraph, and 67 of the Constitution and Article 3 of the Additional Protocol to the ECHR).