Work on the Polish Civil Code in Stalinist Period (1948–1956)

Abstract

The paper focuses on the course of work on the Polish Civil Code in Stalinist times. Its aim is to indicate the influence of stalinization on the drafts created at that time, mostly on the example of inheritance law. In Poland the Stalinist period started after the political breakthrough in the autumn of 1948 and finished in 1956 with another political breakthrough. The influence of political conditions on legislative proposals followed – with varying strength – the rhythm of breakthroughs and turning points. Ideological pressures were particularly strong in the early 1950s, and the solutions presented at that time constituted a clear victory of the politics over the law, but – as it later turned out – only a temporary victory. The obligatory transplantation of the Soviet standards found the fullest expression in the draft elaborated in 1951 and its later versions of 1954 and 1955. In the course of subsequent work continued after 1956, in the times of political thaw, the restoration of the traditional institutions of the civil law was gradually made possible.