It related to "certain aspects of the laws on the use of languages in education in Belgium", was decided by the European Court of Human Rights in 1968.
The applicants, whose children totalled more than 800, asserted that the law of the Dutch-speaking regions where they lived did not include adequate provisions for French-language education.
The Government argued that the right to education in one's own language was not included in the Convention and the Protocol, and that the applicants did not belong to a national minority within the meaning of Article 14.
The case is significant because of the Court's willingness to find a breach of Article 14 without a concurrent violation of another Convention right.
It was not clear from the early case law of the court whether Article 14 could be interpreted to carry any independent force in the absence of a breach of another Convention right.
It relied, inter alia, on the general nature of the opening terms employed in Article 14, "the enjoyment of the rights and freedoms set forth in this Convention shall be secured"[3] (emphasis added).
Thus, it sufficed that State action fell within the ambit of another Convention right, without violating it, for Article 14 to be engaged.
To determine the scope of the 'right to education', within the meaning of the first sentence of Article 2 of the Protocol, the Court must bear in mind the aim of this provision.
There neither was, nor is now, therefore, any question of requiring each State to establish such a system, but merely of guaranteeing to persons subject to the jurisdiction of the Contracting Parties the right, in principle, to avail themselves of the means of instruction existing at a given time.
The Court will deal with this matter in greater detail when it examines the last of the six specific questions listed in the submissions of those who appeared before it.
The Convention therefore implies a just balance between the protection of the general interest of the community and the respect due to fundamental human rights while attaching particular importance to the latter....