Judicial Adjustment of Land Relations in the Right-Bank Ukraine (1797–1840)

Abstract

The purpose of the article is to determine the mechanisms of land relations settlement in the Right-Bank Ukraine in 1797–1840-ies. The supreme power of the Russian Empire held flexible policy in order to become firmly established in the region by means of obtaining the local establishment’s loyalty. One of its means was to re-establish the Polish-Lithuanian land ownership system. The author studies the pidkomorious and bordering courts, analyses their staffing and social practices.

The methodology of the research is based on a combination of general scientific (analysis, synthesis, generalization) and special-historical (historical-legal, historical-systematic, historicaltypological) methods with the principles of historicism and scientificity, making it possible to specify the role of judicial settlement of land relations in search of a compromise between the state’s supreme power and local elite groups. The author refers to prosopography in order to provide analysis of the judiciary.

The scientific novelty is reached by discovering the imperial expertise in cooperation with the regional Polish nobility by means of preserving the Polish-Lithuanian judicial tradition and providing controlled class autonomy in settling argumentative land ownership and land use.

Conclusions. In order to preserve stability in the right-bank bordering region, Paul I proceeded to cooperate with the local elites mainly by re-establishing a net of governorate pidkomorious courts and, consequently, returning the Polish justice to land use. The overload of cases and the lack of court staff led to the low efficiency of the pidkomorious courts activity. At the request of the elite Alexander I introduced a much more efficient bordering system in the Podillia Governorate in 1814. To speed up the resolution of land disputes, first independent district surveying institutions were created, and then in 1818 – the governorate appeal court Podillia Provincial Ordinary Court of Appeal. The state did not interfere with the delimitation of the landlords’ estates, but controlled the land boundaries of the state property. The pidkomorious and bordering judicial networks reconciled the local elite with the Russian authorities.