You cannot directly apply to the Council. Your application must satisfy strict and specific conditions to be declared admissible and considered by the Constitutional Council.
These conditions are as follows:
The Constitution only allows applications for a priority preliminary ruling on the issue of constitutionality if you are party to a legal proceeding before a court. All courts allow applications, except for the Cours d’assises, the courts dealing with felonies. In felony matters, applications may only be submitted before the trial begins (phase d’instruction) or later, during the appeal.
The Constitutional Council will not examine your application if you complain that the court has misunderstood the facts in your dispute. It will also not examine your application if you complain about a decree. The only provisions you can complain about are ordinary laws, organic laws, and statutory instruments enacted by the Parliament.
The constitutionality of reglementary acts, such as decrees, is subject to a different procedure performed by administrative judges.
The Constitutional Council will only accept and examine an application about an infringement on rights and freedoms. Those rights and freedoms must be of constitutional value. Learn which rights and freedoms are considered of constitutional value.
example Your application will not be accepted if you claim that a law is unconstitutional because its enactment did not follow the correct procedure. Indeed, you must refer to a specific right or freedom of constitutional value in your application.
However, it is important to keep in mind that not all rights and freedoms may be invoked, even if they are of constitutional value. This is determined by the Constitutional Council itself, on a case-by-case basis. Read more about norms that may not be invoked through an application (in French).
The Constitutional Council will not examine your application if you challenge a law that is unrelated to the judicial proceeding you are involved in. The legal provision must be applicable to the proceeding. This condition aims to prevent actio popularis litigation.
You cannot challenge a piece of legislation that has already been declared constitutional by the Constitutional Council, regardless of the nature of the decision (conformity decision or a decision on another priority preliminary ruling). This applies even if you invoke a new basis for your complaint. Read about the list of compatible legal provisions.
The only exception that allows you to challenge a provision that has already been declared constitutional is a change in circumstances.
example The Council has declared in a decision n°2011-120 QPC of 8 April 2011, that a precedent may constitute a change in circumstance allowing for a new application, but only if that precedent has been confirmed by the supreme court of the corresponding order (Conseil d’État for administrative matters and the Cour de Cassation for other matters).
This requirement enables the Council to filter out the requests whose sole aim is to delay the proceedings.
example The supreme court of the administrative order, the Conseil d’État, considers that provisions that have never been the subject of a priority preliminary ruling fulfil the newness criterion.
On the seriousness criterion, the Conseil d’État considers that applications that are manifestly ill-founded or which leave no doubt as to the fact that the Constitutional Council would not censure the provision on the basis of the arguments raised fail to meet that criterion.
Read more about those criteria (French).