The article highlights the peculiarities of the legal regulation formation of land relations in Galicia as part of the Austrian Empire (late XVIII ‒ early XIX centuries). It is argued that the legal framework for the regulation of land relations in Austria (since 1867 ‒ Austria-Hungary) was laid for a long time on the basis of customary and codified civil law, taking into account the experience of individual European countries (France, England, German states). A kind of legal eclecticism was designed to take full account of public, but this often led to the emergence of certain contradictions and conflicts in Austrian law. It is described that Galicia, annexed to the Habsburg monarchy as a result of the first partition of the Rzeczpospolita in 1772, was an agrarian region with a rather low crop culture and a whole set of unresolved problems in the field of agrarian relations. And although the annexed crown land ‒ the Austrian-created Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria (Königreich Galizien und Lodomerien) ‒ was territorially the largest within the Habsburg Empire (total area was more than 83 thousand km 2 with a population of 2.5 million people), its economic weight in the state was insignificant. In the economic system of the empire, Galicia was seen as a potential supplier of bread for the whole state. It is shown that the first steps of the Austrian authorities in Galicia in the field of agriculture can be called the introduction of basic order in order to implement more efficient management. The situation with the settlement of land relations in Galicia turned out to be much more complicated, where there was a significant agrarian overpopulation ‒ significantly more than in other regions of Europe at that time. It is found that between 1785 and 1788 the first general land census was compiled in Austria – the land cadastre, known as the Josephine Metric (named after Emperor Joseph II). The introduction of such a cadastre was determined by the need to obtain information about land as a source of wealth and taxation. The Austrian cadastre was a detailed census and assessment of available land. As a result of the measurement, a protocol of land measurements was drawn up, where land plots were indicated with the establishment of their number, size (in yards), area and yield. Important in terms of reforming land relations in Galicia was the "Urban Patent", issued on February 10, 1789 by Emperor Joseph II. All peasant duties were to be set in proportion to the amount of land in use. It is established that after the abolition of the serfdom of peasants in Galicia and cadastral reform, a number of other orders and patents were adopted, which regulated the sphere of land relations. The innovations concerned the responsibility of lords for restricting and violating the rights of peasants, additional duties, settlement of serfdom on bad days (a situation when a peasant could work serfdom days in the field on rainy days instead of bad weather). The authorities abolished the patrimonial judging of the lords against the peasants and introduced the positions of special judges – justices, who were to deal with the court cases of the peasants. However, the landlords continued to pay for their activities and they acted as their de facto proxies. It is noted that the Austrian reforms in the field of agriculture and land relations in the late XVIII ‒ early XIX centuries guaranteed peasant land ownership and protected it from encroachment by landlords. They clearly outlined the framework of the peasant economy, the peasant community itself and defined their place in the structure and functioning of the state until the mid-nineteenth century. Another change in the legal regulation of agrarian relations in Galicia took place after the "Spring of Nations" revolution. In March 1848, a revolution began in the Austrian Empire, the participants of which sought the proclamation of civil rights and freedoms, the elimination of the remnants of the Middle Ages. Influenced by popular demands and the political situation, Emperor Ferdinand I made concessions and on April 25, 1848, signed the first constitution for the whole empire. The constitution retained the monarchical-constitutional order, but introduced limited democratic rights and freedoms of citizens, declaring the division of power into three branches – executive, legislative and judicial. Under the conditions of the revolution and the signing of the first Austrian constitution in 1848, peasant movements intensified in Galicia, whose representatives, among other things, raised the issue of regulating land relations.
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Dec 9, 2020
Magdolna Rébay 
Open Access
