On March 11, the Italian Constitutional Court released a statement anticipating the outcome of its decision regarding the call. Ordinance of Turin, which questioned the constitutionality of Law No. 74/2025 (conversion law of the so-called "Tajani Decree"), with particular reference to the principle of equality enshrined in Article 3 of the Italian Constitution.
First and foremost, an essential methodological clarification is necessary—one that has frequently been neglected in public debate. The aforementioned note does not correspond to the full content of the decision, but constitutes a mere summary of the result reached by the Court. In matters of constitutional review, a correct understanding of the scope of the decision necessarily requires a full examination of the reasoning, which will only be possible after the publication of the judgment.
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This initial clarification is essential to avoid the proliferation of hasty readings and premature interpretations regarding the Constitutional Court's actual position. In particular, it is incorrect to assert, based solely on the released statement, that the Court has declared Law No. 74/2025 to be in accordance with the Constitution.
What can actually be gleaned from the statement is different: the Court understood that the reasons presented by the Turin Court to support the unconstitutionality of the rule, from the perspective of Article 3 of the Constitution, are not well-founded.
The distinction is not merely terminological, but substantial. In the Italian system of constitutional review, the declaration that a question is "unfounded" (non fondata) means that the specific arguments submitted by the lower court judge were not considered sufficient to demonstrate the alleged constitutional violation as formulated.
This conclusion, however, does not amount to a general and definitive affirmation of the constitutional conformity of the norm. The Court may reject a question due to insufficiency, inadequacy, or limitation of the grounds presented, without thereby exhausting the examination of all possible profiles of constitutional illegitimacy.
This stance can be understood in light of a recurring decision-making technique in Italian constitutional jurisprudence, characterized by an approach of self-restraint—often described by legal scholars as a form of "constitutional minimalism."
From this perspective, the Court limits itself to considering the issue strictly in the terms in which it was formulated by the lower court judge, avoiding broad or potentially expansive pronouncements when not strictly necessary for the resolution of the specific case. This is a technique that preserves the space for jurisprudential evolution and avoids decisions with broad systemic effects based on justifications considered insufficient or incomplete.
It is precisely under this interpretative key that the decision regarding the Ordinanza di Torino must be understood. By declaring the issue "unfounded," the Court does not necessarily exhaust the constitutional debate on Law No. 74/2025, but rather signals the inadequacy or insufficiency of the argumentative construction presented in that specific case.
This reading gains even more relevance when considering the imminent analysis of the ordinanza di rimessione from the Court of Mantua. Unlike the Turin case, this new referral presents, according to many legal experts, a broader, more articulated argumentative structure, systematically oriented towards identifying multiple profiles of possible constitutional illegitimacy.
Consequently, the Constitutional Court is given the opportunity to address, in a more comprehensive and in-depth manner, the various issues raised by Law No. 74/2025, overcoming the argumentative limitations identified in the previous precedent.
It is precisely in this context that the important trial scheduled for April 14 before the Supreme Court of Cassation takes place. The Supreme Court will be called upon to rule on the applicability of the so-called "Tajani Decree" in light of the principle of non-retroactivity.
This is a particularly significant moment. The Court of Cassation could reaffirm a line of jurisprudence consolidated over decades: that Italian citizenship iure sanguinis constitutes an original, imprescriptible right that arises at birth and whose recognition is merely declaratory in nature. This understanding, repeatedly affirmed by the Court of Cassation itself, was even reaffirmed by decision no. 142/2025 of the Constitutional Court itself, which reaffirms the non-constitutive nature of the recognition of citizenship.
If this guidance is confirmed in the context of the new legislation, the Supreme Court will, in practice, be delimiting the temporal scope of the restrictions introduced, preventing subsequent rules from affecting legal situations already established at the time of their creation.
In such a scenario, the Cassation Court's decision will also assume a relevant systemic function, offering the Constitutional Court an important interpretative parameter for examining the legitimacy issues related to Law No. 74/2025.
In any case, even in the unlikely event of widespread validation of the new discipline, relevant legal questions remain that require reflection.
A sensitive point concerns those who, before March 27, 2025, attempted to exercise their right to recognition of citizenship but were prevented by administrative obstacles, such as the unavailability of consular appointments or long waiting lists.
In these cases, the rigid application of a time frame may clash with the principles of protecting legitimate expectations and good faith. This becomes even more evident when the difficulties encountered stem from the State's own administrative organization, which, by creating or tolerating such obstacles, has ultimately made the timely exercise of a pre-existing right impossible.
An equally relevant question arises regarding descendants through the maternal line, whose path to recognition has always been predominantly judicial. In these cases, it is worth asking whether the production of documents, the formalization of powers of attorney, or even the beginning of the preparation of the lawsuit would not constitute unequivocal manifestations of the will to exercise the right to recognition of citizenship, capable of overriding the rigid application of the temporal criterion introduced by the new legislation.
Finally, the issue of temporal effects—ex tunc versus ex nunc—deserves highlighting. To admit that the right to Italian citizenship is consolidated only upon completion of the accertamento procedure, and not upon birth, would imply a structural break with the traditional model of transmission iure sanguinis.
Indeed, how can one justify, in this scenario, the recognition of citizenship for descendants whose parents were never formally recognized as Italian citizens? The very historical admissibility of transmission per saltum demonstrates that the system has always presupposed the original existence of citizenship status from birth, with the recognition procedure being merely declarative in nature.
This tension reveals the complexity of the issue and the need for a coherent, systematic reconstruction capable of preserving the internal logic of the legal system.
In conclusion, the Constitutional Court's recent position represents only a first step in a debate that is still evolving. Far from ending the discussion, it inaugurates a new phase of interpretative deepening, which will necessarily involve both the jurisprudence of the Court of Cassation and future decisions of the Constitutional Court itself.
The effective scope of Law No. 74/2025 — especially regarding its temporal application and its compatibility with the fundamental principles of the legal system — therefore remains open to interpretation.
* By Luigi Minari, a lawyer specializing in Immigration Law, registered with the Portuguese and Italian bar associations since 2008.
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