 In the feudal system it is difficult to find a court of justice which would resemble a supreme court. The division of the society into social states, being the principle of feudalism, resulted in the appearance of a legal structure in which each of those states was governed by its own law and, as a matter of fact, underwent the jurisdiction of its own courts of justice. Besides, to be able to speak of the supreme court one would need to distinguish a hierarchy of the courts of appeal, which, however, did not exist in the medieval times. The then principal legal system in Poland, that is that of the noble state, had a relatively modern system of court appeals as introduced in 1523 by the code of procedure (both civil and criminal) called Formula Processus. The next step was the establishment, in 1578, of the Crown Tribunal (and, in 1581, the Lithuanian Tribunal) which was a court of justice of the highest instance. It is significant that the Tribunal was a separate body from the legislative and the executive powers and that its judges were elected at annual sejmiks by the noble state. The Tribunal was not the king's court of justice but the one of the noble state which was a political sovereign in the democratic noble Republic. In the 19th century, after Poland lost its independence, autonomous institutions functioned in its territory only temporarily. In the Duchy of Warsaw (1807 - 1815), there was introduced a modern institution of cassation, following French model. The function of the court of cassation was performed by the Council of the State. After 1815, in the Kingdom of Poland, the Court of the Supreme Instance was established to recognise cassation complaints in civil matters. The then cassation, however, began to be more revision like. After the failure of the anti-Russian appraisals, the Russian occupant liquidated the Polish court system and gradually substituted it with the Russian one, which did not know the idea of cassation. |
  After the long period of dependence of Poland and the partitioning of its territory by the three neighbouring powers (Russia, Germany and Austria), at the end of the first world war the Polish people began to rebuild their independent state. The formation of the Polish judicial system in 1917, with the Supreme Court at its top, took place even before the official formation of the independent Polish state and before the reconstruction of the other state institutions. The law of 1917 on the temporary organization of Polish courts of justice placed the Supreme Court at the top of the then formed structure of the judiciary. The Supreme Court was composed of two chambers, civil and criminal. The head of each chamber was a president of the Supreme Court whereas the head of the whole Supreme Court was its first president. At that time, this function was performed by Stanis3aw Orzednicki, the only Polish judge in the former Russian sector who performed the duty of vice president of a court. The justices and the presidents of the Supreme Court were appointed by the then Polish authorities, from among the candidates earlier elected by lawyers' meetings. At that time the Supreme Court was a cassation court. Its task was also explaining of the existing law. It served also as a disciplinary court for the functionary justices or public prosecutors. The idea of formation of the third, administrative, chamber, playing the role of an administrative court of justice, was not implemented at that time. Later on (in 1922) a separate administrative system of judiciary was established in Poland. During the first weeks of regained independence and struggle for its maintenance, the Temporary Commander-in-Chief of Poland, Józef Pi3sudski, issued his decree of 8th February 1919 by which he regulated the organization and jurisdiction of the Supreme Court. Gradually, the Supreme Court took over the duties of the Austrian Supreme Administrative Court and exercised them until the establishment of the Polish Supreme Administrative Court in 1922. After the taking over of the duties of the German and Austrian supreme courts, there took place the reorganization of the internal structure of the Supreme Court, that is, the temporary establishment of three more chambers (which made five of them altogether) including the chamber of administrative matters (which functioned until 1922). The Supreme Court's decisions were made by a bench of three justices, but hey could also be adopted by an entire bench or even by a general meeting of the Supreme Court justices. Public prosecutors of the Supreme Court were appointed by the Supreme Court and the first Supreme Court public prosecutor was their head. At the turn of the year 1919, a separate military judiciary was established. A separate Supreme Military Court was within its structure. Such state of the matters was confirmed by the constitution. It lasted until the end of the Second Republic.
 In 1921, a democratic and liberal constitution was proclaimed. It adopted the Montesquieu principle of three separate powers. An independent judiciary functioning within this system was to guarantee the rights of a person as a subject. Apart from the safeguarding of other principles, the constitution guaranteed that no person could be deprived of a court judgement as provided by the law, nor that any legislative act could bar a citizen's right to court proceedings. The constitution made justices' independent and subject only to legislative acts. Justices were appointed by the president of the Republic and could not be dismissed. The constitution guaranteed the justices' immunity. In its general way it stated only that the system of the courts of justice was to be regulated by legislative acts. It made, however, an exception: the Supreme Court resolutions constituted a norm for civil and criminal matters, which at the same time determined the Supreme Court's competence. Apart from that, the constitution made the Supreme Court competent to determine the validity of the contested parliamentary (sejm and senat) elections. The legal principles of the functioning and structure of the Supreme Court did not undergo major changes in the years to come.
 In 1919 the Codification Committee was appointed by virtue of an act of law. Its task was to draft civil and criminal law codes and, besides, to work out the law on the system of the common courts, published in 1928 and entered into force on 1 January 1929 (Dz. U. 1928, No. 12, item 93). The structure of the common courts was a follows: THE SUPREME COURT The Supreme Court was divided into two chambers, the Civil and the Criminal ones. Initially, there were two civil chambers which were later combined into one. In 1938, still another Chamber, for the Legal Profession (or Bar), was formed. The first president was still the head of the Supreme Court and the presidents were the heads of its chambers. There functioned the Supreme Court Office for Judicial Decisions whose main task was to compile collections of the Supreme Court judicial decisions, which were of importance for the judicial practice. The General Meeting of Justices of the Supreme Court played an important role. Among others, for some time, it was entitled to propose candidates for justices of the Supreme Court, to adopt the Supreme Court rules of internal procedure, to elect members of disciplinary courts and some of the members of the Supreme Court Administrative Kolegium. As the time went on (in 1932), the General Meeting began to have less and less power loosing it to the smaller and more operative Administrative Kolegium, managed by the first president of the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court justices were, as before, appointed by the president of the Republic, upon the motion of the Minister of Justice. They still enjoyed all the rights and privileges they used to enjoy in the past. In order to enable the justices making unbiased, independent decisions, the law of 1928 prohibited the justices' membership in political parties. In principle the Supreme Court decisions were taken by a bench of three justices, they could, however, also be taken by a bench of seven justices, by an entire chamber or by the General Meeting. Since 1917, by the Supreme Court there still was the Supreme Court Public Prosecutor's Office with the first public prosecutor as its head. It was supervised by the minister of justice. The Supreme Court was first of all a cassation court. Apart from that, it still supervised the validity of contested parliamentary elections. It also played the role of a disciplinary court. The principal function of the Supreme Court was that of the supervisor of court decisions. This was to ensure the uniform application of law. The Supreme Court's detailed supervision of judicial decisions concerned particular civil and criminal matters recognised within the course of cassation proceedings, whereas its general supervision took the form of interpretation of the regulations which gave rise to doubts or the application of which was diversified. The Supreme Court, thus, formulated legal principles, collected in the register of legal principles. The legal principles established by the Supreme Court played a very important positive role in the judicial decision making in the Second Republic. The process of making the court law uniform (especially civil one) was very slow in the Second Republic and until 1939, in the territory of Poland there still existed various sources of law of the post-partitioning origin: in various regions of Poland to a significant extent there functioned the remains of the Russian, German or Austrian legislation sometimes as old as of before the first world war. That is why the legal principles formulated by the Supreme Court which enabled making judicial decisions uniform were of special importance. The problem was not only of legal or judicial significance. Its was also of political nature since some of still binding 19th century post-partitioning legal acts were anti democratic and anti liberal in their contents and spirit. This in turn was contrary to the contents and spirit of the democratic and liberal constitution of 1921. The Supreme Court resolved numerous problems and doubts resulting from this situation. Its decisions were in the spirit of the constitution. The Supreme Court exercised supervision also over the judicial decisions in the matters concerning the communist activity. The Communist Party of Poland (KPP) did not legalize itself. In its official programme it was against independent Poland (which in their opinion was to be a Russian republic.) In the dramatic Soviet-Polish war of 1920, the communist leaders fought against Poland, being soldiers of the Red Army. Throughout the whole twenty years' period, KPP was in fact a Soviet agency in Poland. At the same time, however, pursuant to the constitution of 1921, the citizens of Poland enjoyed a wide range of freedom, including freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of association, etc. Yet, there were discussions how to differentiate freedom of speech from political agitation against the state or a punishable propaganda of an anti state activity of an enemy agency from an ideological propaganda allowed in a liberal state. The Supreme Court decisions undertook such challenges. The standard of the Supreme Court judicial decisions was very high. Throughout the twenty years' period the majority of the Supreme Court justices were distinguished lawyers. In 1935 a new constitution entered into force. It rejected the Montesquieu principle of the division of powers, and formally subordinated all the state bodies to the president of the Republic. This, in practice, did not affect the situation or the functioning of the Supreme Court. The courts of justice, including the Supreme Court, were still independent and so were the judges and the justices. The law on the structure of common courts of 1928 was still binding. In 1939 the occupants - the Nazi and the Soviet Union - did not let the Supreme Court continue its work, despite the fact that in some regions of Poland (the so-called General Gubern) the Nazi allowed the functioning of the Polish courts of justice to a certain extent. |
  In 1944, when taking over the rule of Poland, the communists maintained the pre-war legal state to a certain extent. Such policy served presumed legality of their administration. Among others, they maintained the pre-war institutions of justice administration, including the Supreme Court, and by large, the former justices and public prosecutors. The pre-war law on judiciary was kept in force. The former law and lawyers were not able, however, to satisfy the requirements of the new authorities. The communists aimed at making the bodies of justice administration a tool of their power. They changed their staff and adopted many detailed legal acts enabling a slow process of introducing changes into the court procedure and the substantive law. The process ended with the introduction of the final, principal changes leading to the establishment of the Stalinist legislation and relations in the years 1949 - 1950. Beginning from the end of July 1944, the communists established their rule in the Polish territory which was occupied by the Red Army, to the East of the Vistula River. Among others, they organized the judiciary, without, however, the Supreme Court. Warsaw, after the tragic sixty three days' long uprising (with 195 thousand people killed) and the Polish territory to the West of the Vistula River were occupied by the Red Army since January 1945. At that time (February 1945) the work on the reactivating of the Supreme Court began. Warsaw had been the seat of the Supreme Court ever before. At that time, however, in view of the complete destruction of the Polish capital town, the Supreme Court was temporarily moved to LódY (a big town in the central point between the new Polish boundaries, 90 kilometres from Warsaw) and remained there until May 1950. At that time, the Supreme Court performed its functions by two chambers: civil and criminal. The communist authorities (Boles3aw Bierut) appointed Wac3aw Barcikowski the first president of the Supreme Court. He held this office throughout the whole Stalinist era, until the political turnover in the autumn of 1956. Already in 1944, a separate Supreme Military Court was established as the top court of a separate military judiciary. During the first decade of the Polish People's Republic period, the heads of the Supreme Military Court were almost one hundred percent Soviet officers. The Supreme Military Court was liquidated in 1962. Its jurisdiction was taken over by the Military Chamber of the Supreme Court. At first, the Supreme Court acted pursuant to the still binding pre-war legislation, which was undergoing slow and only fragmentary changes. It was, then, still a cassation court. In the second half of 1948, in Poland, similarly to all the other countries being under the communist or the Soviet rule, upon a signal from Moscow a turnover took place within the communist party. The team headed by W3adys3aw Gomu3ka was dismissed and substituted with the one led by Boles3aw Bierut. The worst Stalinist period began with the restructuring of all the institutions and structures as well as the contents of the law, to follow the Soviet pattern. It was at that time ( 27 November 1948) that the general Meeting of the Supreme Court decided that the pre-war decisions and legal principles not being in agreement with the existing regime, were of only historical value. Later on (on 12 February 1955) an ambiguous Supreme Court formula extended this idea onto the pre-war legislation. The main changes in the organization of the administration of justice and the court procedure (both criminal and civil) took place in the years 1949 to 1950. Many of them survived, in whole or in part, until the end of the period of communist regime in Poland, that is, until 1989 or even longer.
 In the years 1949 - 1950 substantial changes were introduced in both of the court procedures (civil and criminal). The pre-war system of three instance proceedings was cancelled (appeal and cassation) and a two instance revision system was introduced, following the Soviet pattern. The lower instance courts of justice were reorganized accordingly. Their structure was now, as follows: THE SUPREME COURT The reorganization of the courts did not as a matter of fact reach the Supreme Court. The procedural changes, however, affected its functioning. Thus, the Supreme Court stopped to be a cassation court and became, among others, an ordinary court of appeal against the judgements pronounced by the voivodeship courts dealing with major cases as the first instance courts. In 1952, a new constitution entered into force. It stated that the Supreme Court "is the main judicial authority and exercises the supervision over all the other courts of justice as far as the judicial decisions are concerned". This constitutional principle used to be violated for another ten years' period to come, for the Supreme Court was the top common court of justice, whereas the military judiciary was headed by its own Supreme Military Court. Besides, the main social insurance judiciary institution was to be the Social Insurance Tribunal. The situation was as such until 1962. The constitutional principle was satisfied by the Act on the Supreme Court as late as on 1962 (Dz. U. No. 11, item 54). Thus, the Supreme Court seized to be a common court. The Supreme Court was still composed of the first president, presidents, who were heads of chambers, and the justices. An important novelty provided for by the constitution was the "election" of the Supreme Court by the Council of the State, for five years, which in practice meant the appointment of the Supreme Court justices rather than their "election" for five years' term of office. The introduction of the system of holding an office for a certain period of time violated the principle of the independence of justices. Its aim was to ensure that the justices were at the disposal of the political authority. In 1962, the Supreme Court was divided into four chambers: 1. Civil Chamber, 2. Criminal Chamber, 3. Labour and Social Insurance Chamber, and 4. Military Chamber. Besides, by the first president of the Supreme Court there functioned the Supreme Court Office for Judicial Decisions. Among its other tasks, it kept a register of legal principles and formulated theses of the judicial decisions for their later publication. As it has already been mentioned, the Supreme Court was a court of appeal from the decisions of the voivodeship courts acting as the first instance courts, that is, it exercised a regular higher instance judicial supervision. Apart from that, it might use special means of judicial supervision, like recognition of extraordinary revisions and adoption of guidelines for the administration of justice and court practice*, which were to answer the legal questions asked by the lower second instance courts. Apart from the above mentioned tasks, the legislative acts imposed on the Supreme Court also other duties, like for instance a restricted supervision over the legal profession. After the introduction of the administrative judicature in 1980, the supervision over the judicial decisions of the administrative court belonged to the Supreme Court. The Civil Chamber was then changed into the Civil and Administrative Chamber. The Supreme Court's interpretation of law was of great importance. It could be made at the recognition of a given matter within the course of instance. It was binding only in that particular matter and bound only the lower instance court to which it returned for another recognition. The Supreme Court adopted also legal principles, that is, explanations of a general character. Formally, they were not binding to the courts either (with the exception of the Supreme Court itself), whereas in practice they functioned as such. Beginning from 1949, the question of the "guidelines for the administration of justice and court practice" issued by the Supreme Court was particularly controversial. The guidelines were formulated by the Supreme Court either by the General Meeting or the entire chamber (since 1962 also by two joint benches) upon a motion of the minister of justice, general public prosecutor or the first president of the Supreme Court. The guidelines were binding to the courts; first, only the common ones and, since 1962, all the other courts as well. The guidelines were to guarantee the uniformity of the judicial decisions of all the courts in civil and criminal matters as well as their conformity with the principles of the "people's rule of law". The guidelines were different from the judicial decisions of the Supreme Court also in that they dealt with not only the interpretation of law, that is, not only the determination of the meaning of legal norms, but also with their application, that is, also the way of the execution by the courts of the general disposition of a legislative act in particular cases. Thus, the problem arises whether or not such guidelines were in compliance with the constitution. This problem, however, was not discussed at that time. In practice, the essence of the guidelines was prepared by political agencies outside the Supreme Court and the Supreme Court was left with the task of writing them properly and supplementing them with their justification. This does not mean, however, that the initiative of the adoption of the guidelines was always that of political character. To the contrary, the guidelines were also often necessary to the courts of justice; they helped the judges in their work, cleared doubts or simply corrected bad written law.  In 1981, the period of the great social movement of "Solidarity", the "Solidarity" of justices postulated the liquidation of the system of holding the justice's office for a specified term of office and the liquidation of the binding character of the guidelines. Together with the changes of law initiated by the authorities of the communist party, the Act on the Supreme Court of 1984 entered into force (Dz. U. No. 45, item 241). It stipulated that the Supreme Court "protects the political and social system", the social property and, finally, the citizens' rights. Thus, the political aspect rather then the rule of law were emphasised in it. It defined the Supreme Court as the main judicial body, exercising supervision over the activity of all the other courts of justice from the point of view of their judicial decisions. The Supreme Court was to guarantee the regularity and uniformity of the interpretation of law and the court practice. The Supreme Court recognised means of appeals, adopted the guidelines concerning the interpretation of law and the court practice (their name was changed), explained the law and resolved the legal questions which gave rise to doubts. According to the category of the matter, the resolutions were adopted by a bench of seven justices, by entire chamber, by joint chambers or by the entire Supreme Court. The guidelines were binding to the courts. Apart from that, the Supreme Court adopted resolutions, which were not to become legal principles and were binding only in the matter in which they were adopted, by a bench of three justices. In practice, the weakness of this system was that the Supreme Court was overloaded with the second instance decision making, that is the recognition of the revisions of the judgements pronounced by voivodeship courts. The Supreme Court was divided into four chambers: 1. the Civil and Administrative Chamber, 2. the Criminal Chamber, 3. the Labour and Social Insurance Chamber, 4. the Military Chamber. The head of the Supreme Court was its first president and the head of its chambers were its presidents. Justices were still appointed by the Council of the State for a five years' term of office. Their were obliged to make an oath that they would first of all protect the regime and the social property. They could be dismissed by the Council of the State if, among others, they did not "guarantee" due performance of duties. This phrase was intentionally unclear in order to allow dismissing the justices who were politically incorrect. The Office for Judicial Decisions was still functioning. So was the General Meeting of justices, the meeting of the justices of the chambers, the Supreme Court Kolegium, which constituted the bodies of restricted competence, having powers to adopt resolutions. A true justices' self-government was not established, some of its elements, however, could be enjoyed by collective bodies. The justices maintained their official immunity (processual) as far as criminal law was concerned and the financial immunity in the domain of petty offences. Despite the declared independence of justices, in fact it is difficult to speak of it in view of the system of holding the office for five years' term. How much politically driven the Supreme Court was one can see from the fact that, for instance, in 1982, among the 113 appointed Supreme Court justices, 88 were members of the communist party, 11 were members of the two parties collaborating with it and 14 were not members of any political party. It should, however, be realized that in the communist regime which was imposed on the nation, it was not rare that the membership in the communist party was as a matter of fact forced by the circumstances. It was often ostensible and did not affect the peoples' everyday life. The Supreme Court, as a rule, kept away from politics and concentrated on the duty of the administration of justice. The work of the Supreme Court received high evaluation as far as the subject matter of its activity was concerned. Formally, the Act of 1984 is still binding, however, significantly amended. In particular, in 1989, after the adequate changing of the constitution, the Act of 20 December 1989 (Dz. U. No. 73, item 436) the five years' term for justice's office was cancelled and the irremovability of the Supreme Court justices was established. The same Act liquidated the institution of the Supreme Court guidelines and, not long later, by resolution of joint chambers the Supreme Court decided that all the previous guidelines seized to be binding. Bibliography: By: Adam Litynski, Prof.Dr.Hab. |
