The Police Authority of the President of Parliament
PhD student: Ref. iur. Luca Manns, LL.B., M.A.
The exercise of police authority is considered a typical task of the executive branch. Nevertheless, the Basic Law breaks with this assignment at an important point. It grants the German Bundestag not only domiciliary rights, but also the autonomous exercise of police power within its premises. The constitutions of the federal states confer similar powers on the state parliaments or on the House of Representatives. In the parliaments, therefore, it is not the federal or state governments, but the respective parliamentary presidents who are the guardians of law and order.
From a historical point of view, this shift of authority may seem to be a lesson learned from the all too easy penetration of the Reichstag by the "SA" and Prussian police in the course of the Nazi “seizure of power”. However, the special assignment of tasks to the legislature, described in the literature as an "accentuation of parliamentary autonomy", can also be found in other states in Europe and around the world. Thus, the "sergeants-at-arms" of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives not only exercise police authority within Congress, but, according to the literature, are also the only ones able to place the President of the United States under arrest.
The dissertation is intended to examine from what the described special position within and outside of Germany has arisen. Furthermore, the organization and tasks of the deployed forces are analyzed, using the example of the Bundestag as well as selected parliaments of the German states. In this context, it will also be discussed whether the exercise of police authority by parliamentary presidents can still meet today's legal and actual requirements. On the one hand, the permanently tense security situation and increasingly digital crimes require a particularly functional networking of the security organs.
In addition, there is criticism of the operational capability of the parliamentary police forces, most recently during the attempted storming of the Reichstag building in the fall of 2020 by so-called "lateral thinkers" and in view of the successful storming of the U.S. Capitol at the beginning of 2021. On the other hand, the dismantling of the rule of law and separation of powers, currently taking place in many (democratic) states, argues for the retention of special defensive rights of the elected representatives of the people.