B.
The application filed by applicants no. 1 and 2 is admissible; the application filed by
applicant no. 3 is inadmissible.
66
I.
[…]
67
II.
[…]
68-71
III.
1. Applicants no. 1 and 2 have the capacity to be a party to Organstreit proceedings,
both in their capacity of a parliamentary group as such (a) and in their capacity of a
collective of all its members (b).
72
[…]
73-80
2. […]
81-83
IV.
Applicants no. 1 and 2 have standing to assert a possible violation of rights
(Antragsbefugnis); applicant no. 3 lacks such standing.
84
1. The Organstreit application is admissible pursuant to § 64(1) BVerfGG if the applicant asserts that an act or omission on the part of the respondent violated or directly
threatened to violate the rights and obligations conferred on the applicant or on the
applicant’s organ by the Basic Law.
85
[…]
86
The applicants challenge the refusal of respondents no. 1 and 2 to comply with the
committee decisions requesting evidence from the respondents. Thus, the Organstreit proceedings concern the scope of the right of the Bundestag to collect evidence, which derives from Art. 44(1) GG, and the corresponding obligation of the
Federal Government to hand over the requested files. […] Even where a committee
of inquiry has been established, the right of inquiry enshrined in Art. 44(1) GG remains vested in Parliament in its entirety (cf. Decisions of the Federal Constitutional
Court, Entscheidungen des Bundesverfassungsgerichts – BVerfGE 105, 197 <220>;
113, 113 <121>).
87
Within the limits set by the Constitution, the Parliamentary Committee of Inquiry Act
(Untersuchungsausschussgesetz – PUAG) and the Rules of Procedure of the German Bundestag (Geschäftsordnung des Deutschen Bundestages – GO-BT), and
within its investigation mandate as defined by the parliamentary plenary decision establishing such committee, a committee of inquiry is free to determine its own procedural approach. Art. 44(1) first sentence GG confers upon the committee of inquiry
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