THE CONSTITUTIONAL LEGAL ORDER AS A LEGAL FORM OF STATESHIP IN THE NATIONAL SECURITY SYSTEM

Abstract

The focus of the study is the constitutional legal order, considered as the legal form in which public power is established and validly exercised within the framework of Bulgarian statehood. The main question posed by the author is: can the state protect its national security in a constitutional sense if the chosen means weaken the legal conditions that make its own power competent, responsible and controllable? The answer is sought through doctrinal and interpretative legal research, limited to the Bulgarian constitutional model. The Constitution of the Republic of Bulgaria, the Law on the Management and Functioning of the National Security Protection System, selected decisions of the Constitutional Court and legal doctrine are analyzed.
The analysis shows that the constitutional legal order is not only an external border in front of an already existing power. Through it, political will is transformed into legal competence, procedure and responsibility, and the exercise of power remains linked to the fundamental rights of citizens and independent control. It does not follow from this that the legal order exhausts statehood or proves institutional capacity. In the national security system, it has a direct normative support as an “object” of protection, a legal “instrument” for organizing protection and a “limit” to state action. Its definition as a “resource” is permissible only in a narrower sense, where the legal framework creates conditions for continuity and predictability, but does not establish operational efficiency. National security and the legal organization of the state are not opposing requirements. The invocation of security does not give rise to powers that are not expressly delegated, nor does it constitute a blanket ground for intervention. Measures taken in its name must emanate from a competent authority, following the established procedure, while remaining under effective and independent control. The contribution of the study consists in deriving these relations from the current Bulgarian law and in distinguishing their different normative weight. In the study, the concept of “constitutional legal order” is used as a working category that encompasses the constitutionally established organization of power, considered together with the substantive and procedural requirements of the rule of law. Thus, the constitutional legal order emerges not as an abstract ideal, but as a foundation through which the protection of national security remains an action of the legally organized state.