President of the Constitutional Court of Korea

President of the Constitutional Court of Korea
대한민국 헌법재판소장
Emblem of the Constitutional Court
Flag of the Constitutional Court of Korea
Incumbent Yoo Nam-seok since 21 September 2018
Constitutional Court of Korea
Style	Your Honor
Status	Chief Justice
Member of	Council of Constitutional Court Justices
Residence	Heonbeopjaepansojang Gonggwan
Seat	Jongno, Seoul
Appointer	President (Subject to the National Assembly's approval)
Term length	Six years
Constituting instrument	Constitution of South Korea
Inaugural holder	Cho Kyu-kwang
Formation	1 September 1988 (1988-09-01)
Website	Official english website

The President of the Constitutional Court of Korea (Korean: 헌법재판소장; Hanja: 憲法裁判所長; RR: Heonbeopjaepansojang) is the Chief Justice of the Constitutional Court of Korea. As presiding judge of Full bench composed of nine Justices, the President represents the Constitutional Court of Korea.

The President of the Constitutional Court of Korea is regarded as one of two equivalent heads of judicial branch in Government of South Korea. Another is Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of South Korea. The equivalent status of the President to the Chief is guaranteed by article 15 of Constitutional Court Act. The current President of the Constitutional Court of Korea is Yoo Nam-seok.

Appointment

Under chapter 6, article 111(4) of Constitution and article 12(1) of Constitutional Court Act, the President of the Constitutional Court of Korea is appointed by the President of South Korea from among the nine Justices of Constitutional Court, with the consent of the National Assembly of South Korea.

Since the President is selected among nine Justices, and the article 112(1) of Constitution states only as 'term of the Justices shall be renewable six years' yet do not precisely states about exact term length of the President, the Presidents who were newly appointed as both Justice and the President at the same time can serve full six year term, though the Presidents who were appointed while serving as Constitutional Court Justice can only serve remaining of six year term as Justice. It is noteworthy that none of Presidents tried to renew their term because it could harm independence of the Court and judiciary. Under article 7(2) of Constitutional Court Act, President cannot be older than age 70 as other Justices.

Duties

The President's main role is participating in judgment of the Court as one of nine Constitutional Court Justices. According to article 22 of Constitutional Court Act, every cases shall be assigned to the Full bench (Korean: 전원재판부) composed of all nine Constitutional Court Justices in principle. In this case, the President becomes presiding judge following article 22(2) of the Act. However, some of cases can be dismissed in pre-trial stage, due to lack of claim upon which relief can be granted. Whether or not to dismiss in pre-trial stage is called 'prior review (Korean: 사전심사)' under article 72(1) and 72(3) of the Act and is decided unanimously in Panel (Korean: 지정재판부) which consists of three Constitutional Court Justices respectively. As there are three Panels in the Court, the President also composes one of the Panel.

Another role of the President is supervising judicial administration inside the Court. Since the Constitutional Court of Korea has no lower courts, as it is designed as one and only court to rule important constitutional cases including judicial review, its volume of administration task is smaller than that of Supreme Court Chief Justice. Likewise, the President has no power to intervene in appointment of other Constitutional Court Justices, while the Supreme Court Chief Justice can intervene in appointment by exercising power to recommend candidates for other Supreme Court Justices. This difference attenuates hierarchical aspect inside the Constitutional Court, granting more substantial power on Council of Constitutional Court Justices (Korean: 재판관회의) rather than the President.

• The President serves as Chair at the Council of Constitutional Court Justices, composed of all nine Constitutional Court Justices including the President, which supervises administrative tasks of the Court under article 17 of Constitutional Court Act.

• The President appoints Secretary General and the Deputy of Department of Court Administration (Korean: 헌법재판소사무처) with consent of the Council under article 16(4) of Constitutional Court Act, which supervises administrative tasks inside the Court under 17 of the Act.

• The President also appoints every Rapporteur Judges (Korean: 헌법연구관, which has similar role as french Conseiller référendaire) and court officials above grade III with consent of the Council under article 16(4) of Constitutional Court Act. Otherwise, appointment of court officials below grade III does not necessarily require consent of the Council.

• The President present written opinion to the National Assembly, on enacting or revising laws related to administration of the Constitutional Court, under article 10-2 of Constitutional Court Act.

List of Presidents

Further information: List of justices of the Constitutional Court of Korea

No.	Name	Tenure		Appointed by	Education
1	Cho Kyu-kwang	September 1988	September 1994	Roh Tae-woo	Seoul National University
2	Kim Yong-joon	September 1994	September 2000	Kim Young-sam	Seoul National University
3	Yun Young-chul	September 2000	September 2006	Kim Dae-jung	Seoul National University
4	Lee Kang-kook	January 2007	January 2013	Roh Moo-hyun	Seoul National University
5	Park Han-chul	April 2013	January 2017	Park Geun-hye	Seoul National University
6	Lee Jin-sung	November 2017	September 2018	Moon Jae-in	Seoul National University
7	Yoo Nam-seok	September 2018	Incumbent	Moon Jae-in	Seoul National University

See also

• Judiciary of South Korea
• Constitutional Court of Korea
• List of justices of the Constitutional Court of Korea
• Rapporteur Judge

External links

• Official english website of Constitutional Court of Korea
• CONSTITUTION OF THE REPUBLIC OF KOREA, Korean Law Translation Center, Korea Legislation Research Institute
• CONSTITUTIONAL COURT ACT, Korean Law Translation Center, Korea Legislation Research Institute