Ruling No. 142/2025 of the Italian Constitutional Court (July 31, 2025)- The Tajani Law: The King Is Cornered, the Law Is in Check
On 31 July 2025, the Italian Constitutional Court published Judgment No. 142/2025, which addressed the constitutional challenges raised by the Courts of Bologna, Rome, Milan, and Florence, primarily concerning Article 1 of Law No. 91 of 1992—that is, the legal framework in force prior to the current Law No. 74, which emerged from the controversial Tajani Decree of 28 February. Although the Court has not yet ruled directly on Law No. 74/2025, it has drawn very clear red lines that seriously question its future constitutionality, as the foundations upon which this reform rests appear to be in direct conflict with the founding values of the Italian constitutional order.
“...the applicable law has emphasized that the status civitatis based on the parent-child relationship possesses a permanent, imprescriptible, and enforceable character at any time, requiring only simple evidence of the constitutive fact—namely, being born to an Italian citizen.” “...the Constitution refers to the notion of citizenship as belonging to a community that shares common cultural and linguistic roots, while at the same time being an open community, respectful of pluralism and protective of minorities. Lastly, the constitutional provisions suggest a correlation between citizenship and the State's territory, understood as the space that reflects a shared cultural humus and a common adherence to constitutional principles.” On 31 July 2025, the Italian Constitutional Court published Judgment No. 142/2025, which addressed the constitutional challenges raised by the Courts of Bologna, Rome, Milan, and Florence, primarily concerning Article 1 of Law No. 91 of 1992—that is, the legal framework in force prior to the current Law No. 74, which emerged from the controversial Tajani Decree of 28 February. Why is this ruling significant, and why begin by quoting these two particular paragraphs? From a practical standpoint, judicial proceedings initiated before 27 March 2025 remain governed by the previous legislation. In other words, they are not subject to the new provisions introduced by the reform, nor to additional requirements such as effective residence in Italy, knowledge of the Italian language, or certification of cultural integration. The referring courts questioned the constitutionality of Article 1 of Law No. 91/1992, on the grounds that it failed to impose any limitation on the recognition of citizenship iure sanguinis (by descent), thereby allowing automatic access to Italian citizenship even in cases lacking any territorial, cultural, or social connection with the country. This spirit of “limitation” is deeply embedded in the Tajani Law, currently in force, which seeks to restrict the right to citizenship based on the existence of a genuine link, applying clearly arbitrary and exclusionary criteria. Although the Constitutional Court declared the referring courts’ petitions inadmissible, in doing so it sent a direct signal to the intellectual framework of the Tajani Decree, exposing the constitutional vulnerabilities of the new citizenship regime, in effect by decree since 28 March, and formally codified into law as of 24 May. While the Court did not explicitly rule on the Tajani Law, as it was not under review in the case, by reaffirming fundamental and long-standing principles of citizenship law and introducing new interpretative lines, it has effectively placed the entire new legislative framework promoted by the current government under constitutional scrutiny—or, in legal terms, has put it in check. Let us now examine the core principles established in Judgment No. 142/2025 of the Italian Constitutional Court. First—and most fundamentally—the Court strongly reaffirms the principle of ius sanguinis. According to the ruling, the constitutive requirement for Italian citizenship is being the child of an Italian citizen, with no need for “additional requirements.” As a result, citizenship is acquired by original right, and it is sufficient to provide simple evidence of the constitutive fact—namely, having been born to an Italian citizen. In stark contrast to this clear principle, the Tajani Law introduces significant restrictions: it not only limits the right to two generations, but also requires that the ancestor may transmit citizenship only if they are “exclusively” Italian. If the ancestor holds dual citizenship, for example, the descendant must fulfill additional conditions, such as having resided in Italy for at least two years. In such cases, the child of an Italian is no longer recognized as Italian, but merely classified as an “oriundo”—a category that diminishes the legal and symbolic bond with the Italian state. The result is that millions of “original” Italian citizens—as defined by the Court itself—have been excluded from formal recognition of their status as citizens due to the effects of the Tajani Law. Nonetheless, the Court was unequivocal: the “original” right to citizenship is permanent, imprescriptible, and enforceable at any time. This means it cannot be made conditional upon retroactive measures or upon requirements that conflict with the principle of equality before the law, such as the exclusive nationality of the ancestor or the requirement of residency in Italy. The second fundamental concept expressed by the Constitutional Court in its Judgment No. 142/2025 is that citizenship is not merely a formal legal bond but rather represents membership in a community sharing common cultural and linguistic roots, which must be open to pluralism and protective of minorities. Within this framework, the Court establishes that there is an intrinsic correlation between citizenship and territory, the latter understood not only as a physical space but as a “cultural humus.” The concept of cultural humus—explicitly used in the judgment—refers to the underlying substrate of social, spiritual, cultural, symbolic, and linguistic factors that promote, condition, or foster the emergence of ideas, behaviors, values, creativity, and traditions. Just as in agriculture humus is the fertile soil that nourishes plant growth, on the social and cultural level this “humus” represents the shared context in which a community builds its identity, shares memories, transmits languages and traditions, and from which new forms of cultural expression emerge. This approach allows for the understanding that citizenship cannot be restricted exclusively to a physical territorial dimension—such as current residence in Italy—but must encompass a broader, transnational, dynamic, and culturally vibrant dimension. As demonstrated by the historical experience of Latin America, the United States, and Australia, millions of descendants of Italians have “reconstructed” a living Italian identity there, sharing language, memories, customs, and traditions, forging a new dimension, a new cultural and economic space for thousands of Italian entities and companies. Far from having dissolved, this identity remains alive, generating new ways of being Italian in the world. Denying this broad cultural dimension of citizenship, in favor of a selective, closed, and almost exclusively biological vision, reduces the political meaning of belonging to a criterion of mere genealogical purity. This type of approach is in open tension with the constitutional principles of equality, inclusion, and pluralism, and it empties of democratic content the sense of national community enshrined by the Italian Constitution. The Constitutional Court completes the pluralistic, dynamic, and broad concept of citizenship with a distinction of functions that must be read simultaneously as a clear and unequivocal institutional warning: “In light of the complex and multifaceted constitutional references to citizenship, it falls to the legislator, who enjoys a particularly wide margin of discretion, to determine the conditions and requirements for acquiring the status of status civitatis.” However, and here lies the core of this warning, the Court reminds that not all exercise of discretion is permissible. It is incumbent upon the constitutional judge to verify, through the lenses of non-arbitrariness and proportionality, that the rules regulating the acquisition of citizenship do not resort to criteria that are “foreign or incompatible” with constitutional principles, nor with the multiple elements that — as previously emphasized — define and give substance to the contemporary notion of citizenship: its original character, pluralism, protection of minorities, and the connection to the cultural humus. The Court cannot substitute itself for the legislator by means of a “manipulative intervention” in the system. However, it does have a supervisory role that precludes validating norms which, under the guise of regulatory order, introduce arbitrary restrictions incompatible with constitutional values. The explicit reference to “foreign or incompatible criteria” could be perfectly aligned with the provisions introduced by the Tajani Decree, which includes — among other measures — the retroactive loss of citizenship for persons born abroad solely because their ancestors were not exclusively Italian citizens or because they exceed a certain number of generations, without regard to their identity, cultural ties, or rootedness. This represents a rupture with the principle of the “original right” to citizenship by descent, as reaffirmed by the Court in this very ruling. It is a policy that directly violates the principle of equality, disregards pluralism, and denies the cultural richness of Italian communities abroad, ultimately constituting an exclusive and regressive vision of citizenship. We now come to a part of the ruling of enormous significance, whose implications, as we will see at the end of this article, could prove decisive in any future assessment of the constitutionality of the Tajani Law. The Constitutional Court issues a clear and specific warning regarding European Union law, which stands as an additional limit on the discretion of the national legislator, especially in light of the well-established jurisprudence of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU). Indeed, the judgment recalls that the CJEU has repeatedly censured national regulations that resulted in the loss of the status civitatis with respect to a Member State, thereby directly causing the loss of European citizenship as well. National citizenship functions as a gateway and a necessary condition for the exercise of fundamental rights within the EU legal framework. The Italian Court emphasizes a key point: the provisions contained in the Treaties are incompatible with national rules that do not provide at any point for an individualized assessment of the personal consequences that the loss of citizenship might cause for the persons affected, in light of European law. This approach reinforces the principle of proportionality as a cornerstone of the Union’s legal order: any measure restricting a fundamental right must correspond to a concrete need, pursue a legitimate aim, and not be excessive. From this perspective, the Tajani reform — by establishing a mechanism of citizenship loss that operates automatically, indiscriminately, and collectively — risks being incompatible with the founding principles of the Treaty on European Union, especially proportionality, reasonableness, and effective protection of individual rights. Why is this assessment crucial from a European perspective? Because the first judicial ruling directly challenging the constitutionality of the Tajani Law — issued by the Court of Turin and currently pending before the Constitutional Court, which will hear the case in February 2026 — was made possible thanks to a submission developed from a distinctly European perspective. This constitutional challenge was driven by AGIS (Associazione Giuristi Iure Sanguinis) and AUCI (Avvocati Uniti per la Cittadinanza Italiana), two legal organizations that presented a sophisticated, multi-layered argument grounded not only in Italian constitutional principles but also in the jurisprudence of the Court of Justice of the European Union and the applicable European law regarding citizenship as a derived right. It has been only four months since the announcement of the so-called “Decree of Shame,” the controversial Tajani Decree of February 28, 2025, which seeks to retroactively revoke the citizenship of millions of Italians abroad by imposing additional conditions contrary to the original nature of ius sanguinis and the pluralism that defines the republican community. Thus, although the Court has not yet ruled directly on Law No. 74/2025, it has drawn very clear red lines that seriously question its future constitutionality, as the foundations upon which this reform rests appear to be in direct conflict with the founding values of the Italian constitutional order. The board has now seemingly changed — and swiftly. The King already feels trapped, and the Tajani Law is formally in check. Pablo Munini Attorney Buenos Aires Bar Association