Andrzej Dziadzio

Opinions of the Professors and Doctors of the Faculty of Law of the Jagiellonian University as a Source for Research on the Application of the Napoleonic Code in the Free City of Krakow

The article describes the consultative activities of the Professors and Doctors of the Faculty of Law of the Jagiellonian University in the years 1817–1833. On the basis of Article 15 of the 1815 Constitution of the Free City of Krakow, they examined whether it was admissible for the parties to the court proceedings to lodge a third instance appeals against the consistent decisions issued by both of the first instance court and the court of appeal. This was deemed to be possible if the judgements were found in violation of substantive civil law or important forms of court proceedings. I briefly describe the form of proceedings by the Faculty of Law, including the appointment of case clerks, the convening of meetings, and the procedure for passing resolutions. Based on extensive archival materials, stored in the Jagiellonian University Archives and the National Archive in Krakow, I reconstruct three such proceedings. They concerned provisions on the form of legal acts for evidence purposes (Article 1341 KN) and contracts with a private signature (Article 1325 KN), as well as a provision on matrimonial property relationships (Article 1443 KN). In the first case, the opinion of the Faculty of Law determined a correct line of jurisprudence, while in the second, its interpretation of the provision narrowed the code dimension of contract freedom and constrained the principle of pacta sunt servanda. The last opinion is an example of an incorrect interpretation of the Napoleonic Code.

* Artykuł został przygotowany w ramach projektu badawczego Narodowego Centrum Nauki nr 2017/27/B/HS5/01308.

The Academic Portrait of the Creator of the Pure Theory of Law was written by Thomas Olechowski, a professor of the University of Vienna, and a historian of law with an established academic position, having outstanding expertise in the field of the history of the system of law in Austria in the 19th and 20th centuries. Olechowski collected impressive source material - mainly archival, including Kelsen’s extensive correspondence, university and administrative files connected with all the stages of his life and academic activity, and interviews with still-living persons (oral history) who had met Kelsen directly or indirectly. Owing to the obtained material, often secured through detailed source query in Austrian, Czech, German, and American archives, the author managed to correct and complete many details from his subject’s life and works. Hence, the reviewed biography of Kelsen provides a great deal of new information, which presents a view of his life and academic achievements through a multithreaded method. Various examples of little-known or completely unknown facts from H. Kelsen’s biography will be presented in the review.