This article analyzes whether the much-touted independence of the Conseil Constitutionnel (CC), the French Constitutional Court, is genuine. We construct a data set that comprises all the rulings of the CC between 1959 and 2006, taking into account the composition of the CC as well as the characteristics of the legislation reviewed by the judges. We find that the judges mainly rendered independent rulings when the polity was divided between left-wing and right-wing parties. (JEL D72, D73, K40) The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Yale University. All rights reserved. For permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org, Oxford University Press.
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