Dominican Republic 2015 Constitution

Title II. On fundamental rights, guarantees and duties

Chapter I. Fundamental rights

Section I. Civil and political rights

Article 37. Right to life

The right to life is inviolable from conception until death. The death penalty may not be established, pronounced, nor applied in any case.

Article 38. Human dignity

The State bases itself on respect for the dignity of the person and organizes itself for the real and effective protection of the fundamental rights that are inherent to it. The dignity of the human being is sacred, innate, and inviolable; its respect and protection constitute an essential responsibility of the public powers.

Article 39. Right to equality

All people are born free and equal before the law, receive the same protection and treatment from institutions, authorities, and other people and enjoy the same rights liberties and opportunities, without any discrimination for reasons of gender, color, age, disability, nationality, family ties, language, religions, political or philosophical opinion, social or personal condition. Consequently:

1. The Republic condemns all privilege and situation that tends to fracture the equality of Dominicans, between whom differences beyond those resulting from their talents or virtues should not exist;
2. No entity of the Republic may give titles of nobility nor hereditary distinctions;
3. The State should promote judicial and administrative conditions so that equality may be real and effective and shall adopt methods to prevent and combat discrimination, marginalization, vulnerability and exclusion;
4. Women and men are equal before the law. Any act that has the objective or result of diminishing or annulling the recognition, enjoyment or exercise of fundamental rights of woman and men in conditions of equality is prohibited.
5. The State should promote and guarantee the equal participation of women and men in candidate lists to the offices of popular election for the instances of guidance and decision in the public sphere, in the administration of justice, and in the State-controlled bodies.

Article 40. Right to liberty and personal security

All people have a right to liberty and personal security. Accordingly:

1. No one may be sent to prison or denied his liberty without an order caused and written by the appropriate judge, except in cases of flagrante delicto;
2. Every authority that exercises measures to deprive liberty is obligated to identify himself.
3. All people, at the moment of their detention, shall be informed of their rights;
4. All detained people have the right to communicate immediately with their families, lawyer, or trusted people, who have the right to be informed of the location of the detained person and of the reasons for the detention;
5. All people deprived of their liberty shall be submitted to the appropriate judicial authority within forty-eight hours of their detention or freed. The appropriate judicial authority shall notify the interested person, within the same time period, of the decision dictated to that effect.
6. All people deprived of their liberty without cause or without the legal formalities or outside of cases provided for by law, shall be immediately freed at his request or at that of any other person.
7. All people may be freed once the imposed penalty has been completed or an order for freedom has been given by the appropriate authority;
8. No one may be submitted to methods of coercion unless by his own making;
9. The methods of coercion, restrictive of personal liberty, are of special character and their application should be proportional to the danger that they attempt to guard against;
10. Physical constraint may not be established for debts that do not come from an infraction against the penal laws;
11. Every person that has a detained person under their guard is obligated to present him as soon as is required by the appropriate authority;
12. The transfer of any detained person from a prison to another location without an order written and caused by the appropriate authority is strictly prohibited;
13. No one may be condemned or punished for actions or omissions that at the time of taking place did not constitute a criminal or administrative infraction;
14. No one is criminally responsible for that done by another;
15. No one can be obligated to do that which the law does not order nor kept from doing that which the law does not prohibit. The law is equal for all: it may only order that which is just and useful for the community and it may not prohibit more than what is harmful.
16. Punishments that deprive freedom and the means of security shall be oriented towards reeducation and social reinsertion of the condemned person and may not consist of forced work;
17. In the exercise of the sanctioning power established by law, the Public Administration may not impose sanctions that implicate the deprivation of liberty in a direct or subsidiary form.

Article 41. Prohibition of slavery

Slavery, serfdom, and the trade and traffic of persons are prohibited in all their forms.

Article 42. Right to personal integrity

All people have the right to have their physical, psychic, moral integrity and the right to live without violence respected. They shall have the protection of the state in cases of threat, risk, or violation of the same. Consequently:

1. No one may be submitted to punishments, tortures, or degrading proceedings that imply the loss or decrease of his health or of his physical or psychic integrity;
2. Familial and gender based violence in any of its forms is condemned. The State shall guarantee through the law the adoption of necessary methods to prevent, sanction, and eradicate violence against women;
3. No one may be submitted, without prior consent to experiments or proceedings that do not conform to internationally recognized scientific and bioethical norms, nor to examinations of medical proceedings, except when his life is in danger.

Article 43. Right to free development of the personality

All people have the right to the free development of their personality, without more limitations than those imposed by judicial order and the rights of others.

Article 44. Right to privacy and to personal honor

All people have the right to privacy. The respect and non-interference into private and family life, the home, and private correspondence are guaranteed. The right to honor, good name, and one’s own image are recognized. All authorities or individuals who violate them are obligated to compensate or repair them in accordance with the law. Thus:

1. The home and domicile and all private premises of the person are inviolable, except in ordered cases, in accordance with the law, by the appropriate judicial authority or in cases of flagrante delicto;
2. All persons have the right to access to the information and facts about them or their property that reside in official or private registers, as well as to know the destination and the uses of the same, with the limitations fixed by law. Treatment of personal facts or information or that regarding property shall be made respecting the principles of quality, lawfulness, loyalty, security, and finality. One may solicit the updating, oppose the treatment, rectification, or destruction of that information that illegitimately affects his rights from before the appropriate judicial authority;
3. The inviolability of private correspondence, documents, or messages in physical, digital, electronic, or all other formats is recognized. They may only be taken, intercepted, or searched by order of an appropriate judicial authority through legal proceeding in the substantiation of matters that are made public in the case and preserving the secrecy of private matters that are not related to the corresponding process. The secrecy of telegraphic, telephonic, cable, electronic, teleprocessing communication or that established by another mode is inviolable, unless by authorities authorized by a judge or appropriate authority, in accordance with the law;
4. The management, use, or processing of data and information of official character gathered by authorities tasked with the prevention prosecution, and punishment of crime may only be processed or communicated to public registers, after the opening of a trial has intervened, in accordance with the law.

Article 45. Freedom of conscience and religion

The State guarantees the freedom of conscience and religion, subject to the public order and respect to good customs.

Article 46. Freedom of travel

All persons that find themselves in the national territory have the right to travel, reside, and leave freely from the same, in accordance with legal dispositions.

1. No Dominican may be deprived of the right to enter the national territory. Nor may he be expulsed or exiled from the same, except in the case of extradition pronounced by an appropriate judicial authority, in accordance with the law and international agreements in effect on the subject;
2. All persons have the right to apply for asylum in the national territory in the case of persecution for political reasons. Those who find themselves in the condition of asylum shall enjoy protection that guarantees the full exercise of their rights, in accordance with the international agreements, norms, and instruments signed and ratified by the Dominican Republic. Terrorism, crimes against humanity, administrative corruption, and transnational crimes are not considered political crimes.

Article 47. Freedom of association

All persons have the right to associate with legal purposes, in accordance with the law.

Article 48. Freedom of assembly

All persons have the right to meet, without prior permission, with lawful and peaceful purposes, in accordance with the law.

Article 49. Freedom of expression and information

All persons have the right to freely express their thoughts, ideas, and opinions by any medium, without having allowed for prior censorship.

1. All persons have the right to information. This right encompasses searching for, researching, receiving, and spreading information of all types, of a public character, by any medium, channel or way, in accordance with the determinations of the Constitution and the law.
2. All information media have free access to the official and private sources of information of public interest, in accordance with the law.
3. The professional secret and the conscience clause of the journalist are protected by the Constitution and the law.
4. All persons have the right to reply and to correction when they feel damaged by information that has been spread. This right shall be exercised in accordance with the law.
5. The law guarantees the equal and plural access of all the social and political sectors to the means of communication that are property of the State.

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The enjoyment of these liberties shall be exercised respecting the right to honor and to privacy as well as the dignity and morale of people, especially the protection of youth and children, in accordance with the law and the public order.

Section II. On economic and social rights

Article 50. Freedom of enterprise

The State recognizes and guarantees free enterprise, commerce, and industry. All persons have the right to freely dedicate themselves to the economic activity of their preference, without more limitations than those prescribed in this Constitution and those established by the law.

1. Monopolies shall not be permitted, except in favor of the state. The creation and organization of these monopolies shall be made by law. The State favors and safeguards free and loyal competition and shall adopt the necessary methods to avoid the harmful and restrictive effects of monopoly and of the abuse of the dominant position, establishing by law exceptions for cases of national security.
2. The State may dictate methods to regulate the economy and to promote national plans for competitiveness and to spur the integral development of the country
3. The State may grant concessions for the time and the form determined by law, when they are about the exploitation of natural resources or the extension of public services, always ensuring the existence of adequate remuneration or compensation in public interest and for the environmental equilibrium.

Article 51. Right of property

The State recognizes and guarantees the right of property. Property has a social function and implies obligations. All persons have the right to the full use, enjoyment, and disposal of their assets.

1. No one may be deprived of his property, unless for a justified cause of public utility or social interest, previous payment of its just value determined by an agreement between the parties or the ruling of the appropriate court, in accordance with that established by law. In the case of the declaration of a State of Emergency or of Defense, the compensation may not be made previously.
2. The State shall promote, in accordance with the law, access to property, especially to titled real estate.
3. The dedication of land to useful ends and the gradual elimination of the system of large estates is declared to be in the social interest. Promoting agrarian reform and the integration of the rural, farming population into the process of national development in an effective way through stimulation and cooperation for the renewal of their methods of agricultural production and their technological training is a principal objective of the social policy of the State.
4. There shall not be confiscation of the assets of physical or judicial persons for political reasons.
5. The assets of physical or judicial persons, either nationals or foreigners, having their origin in illicit acts committed against the public patrimony, as well as those used in or coming from the illegal traffic of narcotics and psychotropic substances or relative to transnational organized crime and all crimes provided for in the penal laws may only be the object of confiscation or decommission through definitive ruling.
6. The law shall establish the regime of the administration and disposal of assets seized and abandoned in criminal processes and in cases of forfeiture of domain, provided for in the judicial order.

Article 52. Right to intellectual property

The right to the exclusive property of scientific, literary, and artistic works, inventions, and innovations, names, brands, distinctive marks, and other productions of the human intellect for the time are recognized and protected, in the form and with the limitations established by law.

Article 53. Rights of the consumer

All persons have the right to enjoy quality goods and services, and objective, true, and opportune information about the content and characteristics of the products and services that they use or consume, under the previsions and norms established by law.

Article 54. Food security

The State shall promote research and the transference of technology for the production of foods and primary materials of agricultural origin, with the goal of increasing productivity and guaranteeing food security.

Article 55. Rights of the family

The family is the basis of society and the fundamental space for the integral development of people. It is formed by natural or legal ties, by the free decision of a man and a woman to enter into marriage or by the responsible willingness to conform to it.

1. All persons have the right to form a family, in whose formation and development the woman and man enjoy equal rights and duties and owe one another mutual understanding and reciprocal respect.
2. The State shall guarantee the protection of the family. The good of the family in unalienable and unattachable, in accordance with the law.
3. The State shall promote and protect the organization of the family on the basis of the institution of marriage between a man and a woman. The law shall establish the requirements to enter into it, the formalities of its celebration, its personal and patrimonial effects, the causes of separation or dissolution, and the regime of the property, rights, and duties between the spouses.
4. Religious marriages shall have civil effects in terms established by law, without prejudice to that dictated in international treaties.
5. The singular and stable union between a man and a woman, free from matrimonial impediment, that form a real home, creates rights and duties in their personal and patrimonial relationships, in accordance with the law.
6. Maternity, whether the social condition or the civil state of the woman, shall enjoy the protection of the public powers and causes the right to official assistance in the case of need.
7. All persons have the right to have their personality, their own first name, and the surnames of their father and mother recognized, and to know the identities of the same.
8. All persons have the right from their birth to be inscribed without payment in the civil register or in the book of foreigners and to obtain the public documents that prove their identity, in accordance with the law.
9. All sons and daughters are equal under the law, have equal rights and duties, and shall enjoy the same opportunities for social, spiritual, and physical development. All mentions of the nature of parentage are prohibited in the civil registers and in all identity documents.
10. The State promotes responsible paternity and maternity. The father and the mother, even after separation and divorce, have the shared and non-renounceable duty to feed, raise, train, educate, support, and provide safety and assistance to their sons and daughters. The law shall establish the necessary and appropriate methods to guarantee the effect of these obligations.
11. The State recognizes work at home as an economic activity that creates aggregate value and produces social richness and well-being, therefore it shall be incorporated into the formulation and execution of public and social policies.
12. The State shall guarantee, through the law, safe and effective policies for adoption.
13. The value of young people as strategic actors in the development of the Nation is recognized. The State guarantees and promotes the effective exercise of their rights, through policies and programs that assure, in a permanent manner, their participation in all spheres of national life, and in particular, their training and access to first employment.

Article 56. Protection of minors

The family, society, and State shall give preference to the superior interests of male and female children and adolescents, and shall have the obligation to assist and protect them in order to guarantee their harmonious and integral development and the full exercise of their fundamental rights, in accordance with this Constitution and the laws. Consequently:

1. The eradication of child labor and all types of mistreatment or violence against minors is declared of the highest national interest. Male and female children and adolescents shall be protected by the State against all forms of abandonment, kidnapping, states of vulnerability, abuse or physical, psychological, moral or sexual abuse, commercial, labor, economic exploitation or risky jobs.
2. The active and progressive participation of male and female children and adolescents in family, community, and social life shall be promoted.
3. Adolescents are active subjects to the process of development. The State, with the participation in solidarity of families and society, shall create opportunities to stimulate their productive movement towards adult life.

Article 57. Protection of the elderly

The family, society, and the State shall come together for the protection and the assistance of elderly people and shall promote their integration into active community life. The State shall guarantee the services of integral social security and food subsidies in the case of poverty.

Article 58. Protection of disabled persons

The State shall promote, protect, and ensure people with disabilities’ enjoyment of all human rights and fundamental freedoms, in conditions of equality as well as in the full and autonomous exercise of their abilities. The State shall adopt the positive means necessary to foster their family, community, social, labor, economic, cultural and political integration.

Article 59. Right to housing

All persons have the right to dignified housing with basic essential services. The State should determine the necessary conditions to make effective this right and promote plans for housing and human settlements in the social interest. Legal access to titled real estate is a fundamental priority of public policy and the advancement of housing.

Article 60. Right to social security

All persons have the right to social security. The State shall stimulate the progressive development of social security in order to ensure universal access to adequate protection in sickness, disability, unemployment, and old age.

Article 61. Right to health

All persons have the right to integral health. Consequently:

1. The State should safeguard the protection of the health of all persons, access to potable water, improvement of nutrition, sanitation services, hygienic conditions, environmental cleanliness, as well as procure means for the prevention and treatment of all sicknesses, ensuring access to quality medication and giving medical and hospital assistance for free to those who need it.
2. The State shall guarantee, through legislation and public policies, the exercise of the economic and social rights of the low-income population and, consequently, shall lend its protection and assistance to vulnerable groups and sectors, shall fight social vices with the appropriate means and with the aid of international agreements and organizations.

Article 62. Right to work

Work is a right, a duty, and a social function that is exercised with the protection and assistance of the State. It is an essential purpose of the State to foment dignified and paid employment. The public powers shall promote the dialogue and agreement between workers, employers, and the State. Consequently:

1. The State guarantees the equality and equity of women and men in the exercise of the right to work.
2. No one may impede the work of others nor obligate them to work against their will.
3. Union freedom, social security, collective negotiation, professional training, respect for one’s physical and intellectual abilities, privacy, and personal dignity are, among others, the basic rights of male and female workers.
4. Union organization is free and democratic, should adjust itself to its statutes, and be compatible with the principles inscribed in this Constitution and the law.
5. All kinds of discrimination in access to employment or during the extension of services are prohibited, excluding the exceptions provided for by law with the goal of protecting the worker
6. In order to resolve peaceful work conflicts, the right of workers to strike and of employers to halt private enterprises are recognized, always that they are exercised with respect to the law, which shall dictate the means to guarantee the maintenance of public services or those of public use
7. The law shall dictate, according to what is required by the general interest, the workdays, the days of rest and vacations, the minimum wage and its forms of payment, the participation of nationals in all work, the participation of workers in the benefits of the business and, in general, all the minimum means that are considered necessary in favor of workers, including special regulations for informal work in the home and any other form of human work. The State shall make use of the means at its disposal so that workers may acquire the tools and instruments that are indispensable to their work.
8. It is the obligation of all employers to guarantee their workers adequate conditions of safety, health standards, hygiene, and work environment. The State shall adopt means to promote the creation of petitions integrated by employers and workers for the attainment of these goals
9. All workers have the right to a wage that is just and sufficient to permit them to live with dignity and cover the basic material, social, and intellectual needs of themselves and their families. The payment of equal wages for work of equal value is guaranteed, without discrimination by gender or of another type and in identical conditions of ability, efficiency, and seniority.
10. The application of labor norms in relation to the nationalization of work is of high interest. The law shall determine the percentage of foreigners that may lend their services to a business as salaried workers.

Article 63. Right to education

All persons have the right to an integral education that is of quality, permanent, equal in conditions and opportunities, and without more limitations than those derived from their aptitudes, vocation, and aspirations. Consequently:

1. The goal of education is the integral formation of the human being for the length of his entire life, and should be oriented toward the development of his creative potential and his ethical values. It seeks access to knowledge, science, skill, and the other assets and values of culture.
2. The family is responsible for the education of its members and has the right to choose the type of education for its minor children
3. The State guarantees free public education and declares it obligatory in initial, basic, and intermediate levels. The offer for the initial level shall be defined in the law. Superior education in the public system shall be financed by the State, guaranteeing a distribution of resources that is proportional to the educational offer of the regions, in accordance with that which the law establishes.
4. The State shall safeguard the free nature and quality of general education, the fulfillment of its goals and moral, intellectual, and physical formation of the educated. It has the obligation to offer the number of hours of instruction that assure the achievement of the educational goals.
5. The State recognizes the exercise of the teaching career as fundamental for the full development of the education and of the Dominican nation and, consequently, it is its obligation to tend to the professionalization, the stability, and the dignifying of teachers.
6. The eradication of illiteracy and the education of people with special needs and with exceptional abilities are obligations of the State.
7. The State should safeguard the quality of superior education and shall finance public centers and universities, in accordance with that established by the law. It shall guarantee university autonomy and academic freedom.
8. The universities shall choose their leadership and shall be regulated by their own statues, in accordance with the law.
9. The State shall define policies to promote and incentivize research, science, technology, and innovation that favor sustainable development, human well-being, competitiveness, institutional strengthening, and the preservation of the environment. Businesses and private institutions that invest toward these ends shall be supported.
10. The investment of the State in education, science and technology should be growing and sustained, in correspondence with the level of the macroeconomic performance of the country. The law shall allocate the minimum amounts and the percentages that correspond to the specified investment. Transferences of funds allotted for the financing of the development of these areas may not be made in any case.
11. The means of social communication, public and private, should contribute to citizen formation. The State guarantees the public services of radio, television, and networks of libraries and computers, with the goal of permitting universal access to information. Educational centers shall incorporate the knowledge and application of new technologies and their innovations, according to the requirements established by law.
12. The State guarantees the freedom on instruction, recognizes private initiative in the creation of educational institutions and services and stimulates the development of science and technology, in accordance with the law.
13. With the end of forming citizens who are conscious of their rights and duties, in all public and private educational institutions instruction in social and civic formation, teaching of the Constitution, fundamental rights and guarantees, national values and the principles of peaceful coexistence shall be obligatory.

Section III. On cultural and sporting rights

Article 64. Right to culture

All persons have the right to participate and act with freedom and without censure in the cultural life of the Nation, to full access and enjoyment of cultural assets and services, of scientific advances and literary and artistic production. The State shall protect the moral and material interests over the works of authors and inventors. Consequently:

1. It shall establish policies that promote and stimulate, in the national and international spheres, the diverse scientific, artistic, and popular manifestations and expressions of the Dominican culture and shall incentivize and support the efforts of people, institutions, and communities that develop or finance cultural plans and activities.
2. It shall guarantee freedom of expression and cultural creation as well as equal opportunity for access to culture and shall promote cultural diversity and international exchange.
3. It shall recognize the value of cultural, individual and collective identity, its importance for complete and sustainable development, economic growth, innovation, and human well-being, through the support and diffusion of scientific research and cultural production. It shall protect the dignity and integrity of cultural workers.
4. The cultural patrimony of the Nation, material and immaterial, is under the safeguarding of the State, which shall guarantee its protection, enrichment, conservation, restoration, and place of value. The assets of cultural patrimony of the Nation, whose property is State owned or has been acquired by the State, are inalienable and unattachable, and that ownership imprescriptible. The patrimonial assets in private hands and the underwater assets of the cultural patrimony shall be equally protected from illicit exportation and plunder. The law shall regulate the acquisition of the same.

Article 65. Right to sport

All people have the right to physical education, sport, and recreation. It is the responsibility of the State, in collaboration with teaching centers and sports organizations to foment, incentivize, and support the practice and diffusion of these activities. Accordingly:

1. The State accepts sport and recreation as public policies of education and health and guarantees physical education and school sports at all levels of the educational system, in accordance with the law.
2. The law shall make available the resources, stimuli, and incentives for the promotion of sports for all males and females, the integral assistance of sports players, support for highly competitive sports, to sporting programs and activities in the country and abroad.

Section IV. On Collective Rights and the Environment

Article 66. Collective and diffuse rights

The State recognizes collective and diffuse rights and interests, which are exercised with conditions and limitations established by law. Consequently, it protects:

1. The conservation of ecological balance, of fauna and flora.
2. The protection of the environment.
3. The preservation of the cultural, historical, urban, artistic, architectural, and archaeological patrimony.

Article 67. Protection of the environment

Preventing contamination, protecting and maintaining the environment for the enjoyment of present and future generations constitute duties of the State. Consequently:

1. All people have the right, both individually and collectively, to the use and sustainable enjoyment of natural resources, to live in an environment that is healthy, ecologically balanced, and adequate for the development and preservation of the different forms of life, scenery and nature.
2. The introduction, development, production, tenancy, commercialization, transportation, storage, and use of chemical, biological, nuclear, and agro-chemical weapons that are internationally banned is prohibited, as well as nuclear residues and toxic and dangerous waste.
3. The State shall promote, in the public and private sector, the use of alternative and non-contaminating technologies and energies.
4. In the contracts made by the State or in the permits that it grants that involve the use and exploitation of natural resources, it shall include consideration of the obligation to conserve the ecological equilibrium, the access to technology and its transference, as well as to reestablish the environment to its natural state, if it were to be changed.
5. The public powers shall prevent and control the factors of environmental deterioration, shall impose legal sanctions, the objective responsibility for damages caused to the environment and to natural resources, and shall demand their repair. Additionally, they shall cooperate with other nations in the protection of ecosystems for the length of the marine and land borders.

Chapter II. On the Guarantees to Fundamental Rights

Article 68. Guarantees of fundamental rights

The constitution guarantees the effectiveness of fundamental rights, through mechanisms of guardianship and protection, that offer to people the possibility of obtaining the fulfillment of their rights, when faced with those subjected, obligated, or owing to the same. Fundamental rights link all the public powers, which should guarantee their effectiveness in the terms established by the present Constitution and by the law.

Article 69. Effective judicial guardianship and due process

All persons, in the exercise of their rights and legitimate interests, have the right to obtain effective judicial guardianship, with respect to the due process that shall be formed by the minimum guarantees that are established in the following:

1. The right to accessible, timely, and free justice.
2. The right to be heard, within a reasonable period and by a competent, independent, and impartial jurisdiction, established previously by law.
3. The right to be presumed innocent and treated accordingly, while not having been declared guilt by an irrevocable sentence.
4. The right to a public, oral, and adversarial trial, in all equality and with respect to the right of defense.
5. No person may be judged twice for the same charge.
6. No one may be obligated to self-incriminate.
7. No one may be judged in any way but in accordance to the laws that preexisted the act for which they are charged, before a judge or competent tribunal, and with observance of the full scope of the customs that pertain to each case.
8. Proof that is obtained through violation of the law is null.
9. All sentences may be appealed in accordance with the law. The superior court may not increase the sanction imposed when the only person to make an appeal is the convicted person.
10. The norms of due process shall be applied to all kinds of judicial and administrative conduct.

Article 70. Habeas data

All persons have the right to judicial action in order to gain knowledge of the existence of and to access the information about them which is held in registries or banks of public data and, in case of falseness or discrimination, to demand the suspension, rectification, update, and confidentiality of those, in accordance with the law. The secrecy of the sources of journalistic information may not be affected.

Article 71. Habeas corpus action

All persons deprived of their liberty or threatened with the same in an illegal, arbitrary or unreasonable manner have the right to an action of habeas corpus before a judge or competent tribunal, by themselves or by those who act in their name, in accordance with law, in order to gain knowledge of and to decide, in a simple, effective, quick, and summary way, the legality of the deprivation of or threat to their liberty.

Article 72. Amparo action

All persons have the right to an action of amparo in order to demand before the courts, for themselves or by those who act in their name, immediate protection of their fundamental rights, not protected by habeas corpus, when they are violated or threatened by the action or omission of any public authority or of individuals, in order put into effect the fulfillment of a law or administrative act and in order to guarantee collective and diffuse rights and interests. In accordance with the law, the proceeding is preferential, summary, oral, public, free, and not subject to formalities.

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The acts adopted during the States of Exception that violate protected rights that unreasonably cause suspended rights are subject to actions of amparo.

Article 73. Nullity of acts that subvert constitutional order

Acts that are issued from usurped authority, actions or decisions of public powers, institutions or persons that alter or subvert the constitutional order and any decision made by requisition of armed force are null of full right.

Chapter III. On the Principles of Application and Interpretation of the Fundamental Rights and Guarantees

Article 74. Principles of regulation and interpretation

The interpretation and regulation of the fundamental rights and guarantees, recognized in the present Constitution, shall be ruled by the following principles:

1. They do not have limiting character and consequently, do not exclude other rights and guarantees of an equal nature.
2. Only by law, in the cases permitted by this Constitution, may the exercise of the fundamental rights and guarantees be regulated, respecting their essential content and the principle of reasonableness.
3. Treaties, pacts, and conventions related to human rights, adopted and ratified by the Dominican State have constitutional hierarchy and are for direct and immediate application by the courts and other organs of the State.
4. The public powers interpret and apply the norms related to fundamental rights and their guarantees, in the sense most favorable to the person in possession of the same, in the case of conflict between fundamental rights, they shall attempt to harmonize the assets and interests protected by this Constitution.

Chapter IV. On the fundamental rights

Article 75. Fundamental duties

The fundamental rights recognized in this Constitution determine the existence of an order of judicial and moral responsibility that rules the conduct of men and women in society. Consequently, the following are declared as fundamental duties of people:

1. To obey and follow the Constitution and the laws, to respect and obey the authorities established by it.
2. To vote, if one is legally capable of doing so.
3. To lend civil and military services that the Homeland requires for its defense and conservation, in accordance with that established by law.
4. To lend services for development, required of male and female Dominicans between the ages of sixteen and twenty-one years. These services may be lent voluntarily by those older than twenty-one years. The law shall regulate these services.
5. To abstain from taking any act damaging to the stability, independence, or sovereignty of the Dominican Republic.
6. To pay taxes, in accordance with the law and in proportion to their contributory ability, in order to fund the public expenses and investments. It is a fundamental duty of the State to guarantee the rationality of public spending and the promotion of an efficient public administration.
7. To dedicate oneself to dignified work, of one’s choosing, with the goal of providing for oneself and one’s family in order to achieve the perfection of one’s personality and to contribute to the well-being and progress of society
8. To attend the educational establishments of the Nation to receive required education, in accordance with that established by this Constitution.
9. To cooperate with the State with respect with social assistance and security, in accordance with its possibilities.
10. To act in accordance with the principle of social solidarity, responding with humanitarian action to situations of public calamity or that put the lives or health of people in danger.
11. To develop and spread the Dominican culture and to protect the natural resources of the country, guaranteeing the conservation of a clean and healthy environment.
12. To safeguard the strengthening and quality of the democracy, the respect for the public patrimony, and the transparent exercise of the public function.