The French identity card is getting a makeover. Entered into force since last August, it is today at the center of a controversy.
With a new format, it is above all fully translated into English. You can find words such as “name” next to the mention “name” or “given names” next to the mention “first name”. A novelty which does not please at all to the French Academy, which denounces an infringement of the Constitution, and more precisely of its article 2.
The council of state should decide
“The language of the Republic is French”: Hélène Carrère d’Encausse, perpetual secretary of the French Academy since 1999, slaps her fist on the table. “We undermine an essential principle,” she declares in Le Point. The Académie Française is in fact ready to bring this case to the Council of State for the first time in its very long history. Because if a European regulation obliges to translate “Identity card” into at least one other official language of the European Union, this text does not provide for other imposed translations.
At the microphone of Europe 1, Hélène d’Encausse specified the action she intends to carry out on behalf of the Academy: “First, we spoke to the Prime Minister. We’ll see what he says. Either he repeals this provision, or we will take legal action. (…) We are going to move forward, that’s all we can do! ”.
Prime Minister Jean Castex’s reaction is expected, and for good reason. The French Academy would have called on a law firm, who would now be ready to seize the Council of State.