The right to a fair trial becomes a guarantee for all of the other human rights. Therefore, the discussions concerning the development of a contemporary charter of fundamental rights, which was the purpose of the 4th International Conference on Human Rights in Bari, had to include a reflection on this highly important human right: the right to a fair trial. The right to a fair trial, is normatively guaranteed both in international law and in domestic legal systems. However, it turns out that these numerous normative guarantees of the right to a fair trial, i.e. the right to have the case examined by a “competent,” impartial, and independent court, are not always sufficient. One type of cases that pose problems in terms of implementing these normative declarations are cases concerning administrative sanctions. The court’s control over cases in which public administration authorities decide about penalties cannot be limited to controlling legality. This raises the question of whether the Polish solution consisting in court control over the imposition of administrative sanctions being entrusted to administrative courts ensures proper implementation of the right to a hearing of one’s case before a “competent” court, as provided for in Article 45 of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland. The doubts are related to the fact that Polish administrative courts are courts of law and not courts of fact. The Polish system of administrative courts has two instances: the first instance are the regional administrative courts (there are 16 of them, one per region) and the second instance is the Supreme Administrative Court. However, the task of these courts is not to adjudicate on administrative cases, but only to control the activities of public administration authorities. Polish administrative courts do not adjudicate on the subject matter, they do not decide about the rights and obligations of individuals; they only control if, in the given case, public administration authorities acted in accordance with legal regulations.