Case Law: Case C-60/00. Mary Carpenter v. Secretary of State for the Home Department (E.C.J. July 11, 2002)


9 Colum. J. Eur. L. 447 (2003)

Laurent Jadoul. Researcher at the Institute for European Law, KU Leuven, and a jurist at the Centre for Equal Opportunities and Opposition to Racism, Belgium. 

Frédéric Vanneste. Researcher at the Institute for Human Rights, KU Leuven.

Does the ECJ have jurisdiction to deal with a Member State’s refusal to grant a right to residence to a third country national who has married an EC-national, when the latter resides in his country of origin and frequently provides services in other Member States? Contrary to the Court’s holding in the Carpenter case, such situations should be considered purely internal under current Community law. Consequently, such measures may only be subjected to the Member State’s internal system of protection of fundamental rights and not to the particular fundamental rights protection of the European Community.