The United States Supreme Court (USSCt), ‘calls some issues from the battleground of power politics to the forum of principle’, or so argued Ronald Dworkin (A Matter of Principle, 1985, 71). The Colombian Constitutional Court (CCC), likewise, has had thrust upon it disputes central to the metaphorical, and literal, political battleground, in deciding the constitutionality of the Justice and Peace Laws.
The Colombia peace process was restarted in October 2012. The government passed the Legal Framework for Peace bill (2012) sanctioning (what amounts in practice to) partial amnesties for FARC and ELN rebels who confess (a practice increasingly discouraged by the UN). This was upheld as constitutional by the CCC to aid the possibility of a lasting peace. The CCC has been, like many Latin American courts, active. However, its role in peacebuilding merits study, which would benefit from a comparison to the USSCt which has likewise navigated divisive politics.
