@StartlinglyOkay I hope you won't mind that this will be a relatively extensive thread on the various issues with full-face (implicitly religious) veil bans. I tried to rein it in a bit, but I would not exaggerate the success of my effort (I failed completely).
@StartlinglyOkay The first thing to consider is the particular piece of legislation, which might be connected with criminal or (more usually in the continent) administrative ("civil" in the anglo-saxon area) sanctions and hence raise different constitutional issues.
@StartlinglyOkay From what I gather from the sources I've found, the statutory provision you're interested in is a "soft" administrative ban on full-face veils in general (religious or not) in closed public areas following the french and belgian cases.
@StartlinglyOkay So, according to the law (if I read about the right law), people wearing clothing that covers their face can receive a fine of up to 150Eur or be denied access to public buildings, public transportation, or independent educational facilities (public universities).
@StartlinglyOkay Since wearing full-face veils is not therefore a criminal offense, the respective articles of the Netherlands' constitution (hereby NC), specifically art. 15 and 16NC, are inapplicable.
@StartlinglyOkay There are two kinds of problems with full-face veil administrative bans, one that is constitutional and one that concerns compliance with international treaties like the european convention of human rights (ECHR).
@StartlinglyOkay Of these, there are at least four batches of constitutional problems, firstly as concerns formally equal treatment and fair due process rights, secondly as concerns direct conflict with constitutionally protected individual rights
@StartlinglyOkay thirdly as concerns indirect conflict with protected private and political rights that require access to these spaces as a necessary and indispensable condition for their exercise.
@StartlinglyOkay 1. I will take these in turn first responding to your actual concerns. Art. 1NC, like most continental constitutions, establishes a principle of proportional (in Aristotle's sense, as opposed to numerical) equality 
@StartlinglyOkay This means that the requirement of equal treatment here is understood as permitting different treatment in cases that are different in some (constitutionally) relevant way.
@StartlinglyOkay This explains the awkward expression of the second sentence of the article which prohibits discrimination "on any other grounds whatsoever", seemingly in tension with the first sentence that requires equal treatment in equal cases.
@StartlinglyOkay Charitably interpreted the meaning of the article is that constitutionally relevant differences permit distinct treatment, that still treats all persons (notice: not just citizens) equally in terms of some constitutional interest/principle/etc
@StartlinglyOkay Unequal treatment based on constitutionally irrelevant factors counts as discrimination (which is always prohibited) and these irrelevant factors count as its grounds (which are exhaustively all inadmissible)
@StartlinglyOkay So laws that introduce unequal treatment must be justified in terms of the equal protection of constitutional rights and fair constraint to pursue the public interest as those are specified in the Netherlands' constitution.
@StartlinglyOkay (In views like mine, the public interest must be interpreted to exhaustively just be the equal protection of constitutionally protected individual and social rights in liberal constitutional orders, but this is besides the point here).
@StartlinglyOkay This must be the case because any other distinguishing factor would be one of so many grounds of discrimination, some of which are indicatively enumerated in 1NC, and all of which are inadmissible as grounds for unequal treatment.
@StartlinglyOkay Now, if the law was prohibiting religious clothing belonging to one or more doctrines, this would be an obvious case of discrimination on religious grounds. However these laws are expressed generally to avoid this charge.
@StartlinglyOkay So the provision doesn't fine just religious veils, but any clothing that fully covers one's face, such as for example ski masks, balaclavas, Michael Myers cosplay or whatever else, under the full-face veil category.
@StartlinglyOkay (that is, even though we know from discussions in the parliaments and the statements of the legislators to the press that the ultimate point is to frustrate the practices of particular small religious groups).
@StartlinglyOkay If these were taken seriously by the administrative courts, they do prove that we have a straightforward case of religious discrimination that contradicts the regulative principle in 1NC on its face, albeit one with some collateral casualties.
@StartlinglyOkay To the extent that they aren't taken seriously, we are not yet cleared by 1NC. At the very least these laws introduce differential treatment between people who want to wear full-face veils, and people who don't, for non-religious reasons.
@StartlinglyOkay However, something like fashion or clothing preference, itself, is not an admissible ground of discrimination. A non-religious ban that targets particular kinds of clothes without further explanation is in straightforward conflict with 1NC. (consider e.g. a ban on mini-skirts!)
@StartlinglyOkay But in general, an eccentric preference for things like kendo protective masks or Zorro! masks as opposed to wearing hats is not of itself and obviously a constitutionally relevant difference permitting unequal treatment, but just another ground of discrimination.
@StartlinglyOkay Albeit it is one less popular for historical reasons (we have not yet had the bright idea to oppress cosplayers and olympic swordfighters, but no reason to be pessimistic about the future)
@StartlinglyOkay What is needed here (and all that is needed here) is to show that the difference is constitutionally relevant, that it is in some way connected with the protected rights, and the constitutional principles and interests specified in NC.
@StartlinglyOkay In other words, that a) the point of the distinct treatment isn't the distinct treatment itself, b) that its point is the pursuit of some constitutionally specified interest and c) that it pursues it within the constraint of the specified rights.
@StartlinglyOkay If, for example, my religious doctrine entailed sacrificing dutch anarchists to Moloch, the law prohibiting homicide would incidentally introduce unequal treatment of this and non-homicidal religious practices that would not constitute religious discrimination.
@StartlinglyOkay To the extent that this argument isn't normally given, we're clued in about the motive behind the legislation. When push comes to shove, four arguments are jury-rigged that supposedly justify full-face veil bans.
@StartlinglyOkay In order from less to most clown, these are a) usually implicitly, public security, b) the feeling of security c) the canard about "a space of socialization that makes living together easier" and d) gender equality
@StartlinglyOkay Obviously, b) isn't protected. Neither is c), the pursuit of which through these policies is at any rate empirically dubious (people wearing full face veils can and do participate in socialization and live together with a disproportional majority that don't)
@StartlinglyOkay It's also not clear for whom the living together would be easier and why. If it is for others, then this might be subsumed under b), if for the people wearing the veil, then they are either electing that difficulty (the state having no right to make people more social
@StartlinglyOkay or less awkward than they want to be, or to pursue easier life-plans or whatever) and having the ability to remove the veil at their discretion, or there are background conditions that constrain them to wear it. If such conditions exist, then they can be legally targeted
@StartlinglyOkay but a) FFVBs can't target them, and b) might aggravate them by forcing these people in the (domestic) private space where said oppressive conditions are most pronounced.
@StartlinglyOkay This is shifting to the very clownest consideration d) that this is about gender equality. As I will try to more briefly show when I get to the individual rights, this is entirely delusional, as it actively hinders various rights of just these women.
@StartlinglyOkay (and only of these women, leaving the men that presumably force them to wear the veils completely untouched legally, just as much as it facilitates their social isolation from the public, and other women or peers).
@StartlinglyOkay The only justification left for the differential treatment is public security, which usually is, at least implicitly, a constitutionally specified interest (and which most states sadly take to be distinct from the protection of rights).
@StartlinglyOkay It would then fall on the proponent of the law to argue how exactly a small minority wearing full-face veils for religious or recreational reasons is actually a security problem (they obviously don't, simply by doing so, infringe on anyone's protected rights).
@StartlinglyOkay My view is that this is exactly a last minute excuse that doesn't correspond to empirical reality even as concerns the expanded notion of public security that I, in any way, reject as a legal abomination relativizing all protected rights.
@StartlinglyOkay So this argument, too, fails, and hence there is no constitutional significance to the difference picked out by the law, which consequently can't constitutionally introduce unequal treatment on these grounds.
@StartlinglyOkay As a last aside on 1NC (which I believe I covered in detail), if the previous argument succeeded and we took it seriously as the justification of different treatment, it would apply to all FFVs, instantly creating regulative absurdities.
@StartlinglyOkay For example, should firemen wearing full protective gear be fined? After all, they are wearing a FFV. Are swordfighters permitted to enter public buildings where a tournament takes place? What about the Myers cosplayers? Are we at least fining the riot cops?
@StartlinglyOkay Of course, no one actually takes the rationale in question seriously, they just trot it out to cover a motive of blatant discrimination, that though unconstitutional, doesn't have these implications.
@StartlinglyOkay Now, moving on to the further issues, with an at least attempted increase in brevity. Assuming that we got over the hurdle of 1NC, to the extent that wearing religious clothing is also an expressive act:
@StartlinglyOkay 2. Prohibiting someone from wearing it is identical to obstructing that form of expression of his religious beliefs. However this seems to be in direct conflict with the individual right protected under art. 6NC.
@StartlinglyOkay which exactly protects one's right to profess his religion freely, publicly, alone (e.g. in a conversation) or together with others (e.g. in a demonstration) The special limits to this right specified by art. 6.2NC seem inapplicable here
@StartlinglyOkay (the paragraph explicitly exempts rules concerning its exercise in enclosed spaces, and wearing a FFV doesn't relate to health, traffic etc) The right (hence also its legal forms of expression) is also generally delimited by the normative strength of other protected rights,
@StartlinglyOkay but wearing an FFV doesn't seem to be in tension with any of them. Of course, conservative courts can appeal to a vague notion of public security as a general limit, or some other abomination like living together with ease, but this would be a bad application of the constitution.
@StartlinglyOkay 3. Moving forth, accessing a variety of buildings is a necessary precondition for exercising a bunch of constitutionally protected rights.
@StartlinglyOkay For example, banning people wearing a full-face veil from entering public buildings seems to blatantly conflict with 17NC, which provides that no one can be obstructed from being heard by the courts.
@StartlinglyOkay However, the courts just so happen to be public buildings, so should someone be obstructed from entering them, they will not be able to press charges, sue someone, appear before court as a witness or plaintiff etc and so can not appeal or be heard by them.
@StartlinglyOkay Therefore the law, without qualification, would block the access of a group of people (FFV wearers) to judicial institutions in a way that is intolerable to constitutional legal orders in general, and to the Netherlands' constitution in particular.
@StartlinglyOkay And how about elections? Elections take place in public buildings. If one can't enter them, then one can't vote. However article 4NC prescribes an equal right for all nationals to elect members of the parliaments.
@StartlinglyOkay Here FFV-wearing nationals are obstructed from entering the buildings where the vote takes place, and hence are prevented from voting, as against other nationals who are permitted to vote.
@StartlinglyOkay Whatever limitations can be specified here, in accordance with article 4NC, to facilitate identification of the voter etc, can not reach the point of disenfranchising a group of voters as that would erode the core of their right (and of course of their equal right) to vote.
@StartlinglyOkay But the core of protected rights is inalienable in continental constitutionalism, it is a so-called limit to the limits of rights. In better words, we can interpretively specify, but we can't interpretively extinguish a right for some.
@StartlinglyOkay Similarly, what about 3NC, or 4NC as concerns the appointment of representatives to the representative bodies. Can an elected FFV wearer, or one dully appointed to a civil service be denied entry to the body?
@StartlinglyOkay Or, perhaps, is it the case that they are ineligible to be elected or appointed despite being nationals? The latter conflicts with the text of the articles, the former rids them of normativity. Both seem to be strikingly unconstitutional.
@StartlinglyOkay Notice that perhaps the fine would be constitutional from the perspective of these articles, but actually denying entry to elected representatives to the representative body, or to voters to the election or to appointed civil servants to their office. are blatantly infringing,
@StartlinglyOkay 4. Finally, continental constitutions protect a bunch of social rights specifying at minimum interests of the public and mixed social/individual rights. Take for example art. 22 specifying a right to healthcare for the populace.
@StartlinglyOkay Or the articles specifying a right to education as a mission of the state. To the extent that these entail a formal individual right to access education and healthcare without legal obstruction then barring people from entering educational and healthcare facilities
@StartlinglyOkay would obviously conflict with them for the reasons I've detailed under points 3 and 1. To the extent that they are also interpreted as social rights then they express their normativity in three ways:
@StartlinglyOkay the state can not nominally reject them as its mission, the courts must take them under consideration as constitutive parts of the public interest and thirdly, legislation can not erode what we may translate as the relative social precedent
@StartlinglyOkay (that is, the state can not degrade the quality of services or the extent of their provision to the public at its discretion). The second consideration here weighs, in combination with 1NC against the justification of FFVBs in terms of the promotion of the public interest
@StartlinglyOkay since it obstructs part of what we must interpret to be constitutive of that public interest, access to healthcare, education etc. The third consideration, though more controversial
@StartlinglyOkay (the courts are infamously shy about recognizing legislation as infringing on relative precedent) would imply that barring people that could previously access healthcare from doing so without responding to a necessity, infringes on the social right in question, as well.
@StartlinglyOkay 5. To conclude this extremely overkill thread, FFVBs are in tension with art. 8 and especially 9 of the ECHR. 9ECHR consolidates the right also found in 6.1NC, here expressed as a right to "to manifest one's religion or beliefs"
@StartlinglyOkay The same points I made under point 2 can be made here as well. Sadly, the european court of human rights, in the two previous cases brought before it concerning the belgian and french full-face veil bans, ruled them consistent with the convention.
@StartlinglyOkay because it facilitates "living together" (as mentioned under point 1 as a justification for FFVBs). However, this purpose is absent from both continental constitutions and the ECHR
@StartlinglyOkay and it is absent both as a specification of the public interest and as a general or special limit to the protected rights under the constitutions and the convention. Furthermore, as previously explained, it's empirically dubious that this legislation can promote this interest
@StartlinglyOkay rather than, in fact, further obstruct it by aggravating the social situation and isolation of FFV wearers and especially those coerced into the practice. Therefore this line of argument is in multiple ways pernicious nonsense.
@StartlinglyOkay The ECHR otherwise accepts that religious clothing or accessories are religious expressions protected under 9ECHR, but it "balanced" it away with the help of the aforementioned concoction of "living together with ease", as is tradition for them.
@StartlinglyOkay (i.e. it found expressing one's beliefs in this way to be a legitimate interest, found it in conflict with "living together" as another legitimate interest, then, typically without much judicial reasoning, it balanced the rights in accordance with the principle of proportionality
@StartlinglyOkay -how they do that is a trade secret- and concluded that the ban is consistent with both interests when they're properly balanced in light of efficacy, necessity, and stricto sensu proportion, Amen). This is an aside on how illuminating the ECHR's decisions (good or bad) are.
@StartlinglyOkay Barring this argument, they would have to accept that the ban blatantly conflicts with at least 9ECHR (if not 8ECHR), besides, possibly, with the national constitutions of Belgium and France.
@StartlinglyOkay I believe that is all.
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