The President of the Republic Emmanuel Macron announced on July 8, 2025 that France would lend the wool embroidery on linen, known as the “Bayeux tapestry”, to the United Kingdom for an exhibition at the British Museum (London) from September 2026 to June 2027. Considering that the state of conservation of the tapestry did not allow its movement, the Sites & Monuments association had contacted the Council of State.
At the heart of the dispute is a thorny question: is the administrative judge competent to annul the decision of the President of the Republic to lend the tapestry? Public law provides for a dichotomy between: the “non-detachable” decision from the conduct of international relations and which is one with France’s foreign policy or diplomacy; and the “detachable” decision which is taken in the context of international relations but which produces internal or individual legal effects which can be separated from the pure conduct of diplomacy.
In the first case, the administrative judge applies the theory of the “act of government” and declares himself incompetent, in the second case the judge accepts that the decision can be contested and annulled if it is illegal.
Friday June 5, the Council of State cut the Gordian knot by considering that “given the diplomatic context in which it takes place and the symbolic and historical significance for Franco-British relations of the loan by France to the United Kingdom of this work, this decision must be regarded as inseparable from the conduct of France’s international relations”.
For the judges of the Palais-Royal, this loan would not relate to the simple administrative management of a museum but rather to a soft power cultural. In the presence of an “act of government” the administrative judge therefore declared himself incompetent, as he did not have the right to control whether the President of the Republic had acted well or badly, nor even to cancel the loan.
This stop will probably leave a bitter taste for heritage defenders even though the Minister of Culture Catherine Pgard held a press conference on Wednesday June 3 to detail the conditions of transport of the Bayeux Tapestry, of which the insulated box used would be similar “to a cradle in which a newborn is placed”.
