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recognised that the infringement may be caused by a law, Article 25 of the Zimbabwe Constitution 1979). In federal constitutions, even where the doctrine of the separation of powers is not so complete as it is in the United States of America, there may be provisions for resolving conflicts between the various legislatures (eg Kenya Independence Constitution 1973 and the various Indian constitutions). But the precedents, so far as I am aware, go only to cases where there is an alleged conflict of legal provisions; they do not go to issues which are essentially matters of value judgment, eg whether a provision is repressive or not (see your minute to Mr Clift of 25 June).
2.
On the precedents, therefore, were we to develop the constitutional instruments of Hong Kong during the next 13 years on the lines of the internal self-government constitutions of the 1950s and 1960s with a written chapter of fundamental rights and freedoms, a provision giving jurisdiction to the courts where an infringement of such a right is alleged would be in line with what had been done elsewhere. It would accord with precedent that such a provision would operate only in specific and actual cases and not to test the validity of a law in vacuo; it need not be packaged in such a way as would attract the "US label". If however that is not to be the direction of the constitutional instruments in Hong Kong, there is no more occasion for the courts to be given a specific jurisdiction on these lines than there is at present.
3. Whether we should move this way will, I assume, depend in part on how the Basic Law for the SAR is to be developed, the status it has vis a vis the ordinary legislation of the SAR, the extent to which it includes fundamental rights and
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