Abstract

Military Exemptions - Soldier’s Immunity in Polish -Lithuanian Commonwealth of XVI-XVII Century

Summary

Military exemptions have not been described in the hitherto literature
whereas they constitute an interesting phenom enon allowing to evaluate
the legal position of mercenary soldiers, functioning of legal norms of
a temporary character and the interrelations between the statutory and
customary law. In XVI and XVII centuries both - general exemptions,
granted by Seym, and hetm an’s exemptions, deprived of the Seym’s
sanction, existed. The constitutions on the exemptions always had
a temporary nature. As a consequence o f the advancing paralysis of the
parliament’s works, the exemptions issued by hetm an became more and
more common.

Exemptions were the releases to be applied before all types of courts,
apart from military courts. They withheld the proceedings (even
enforcement proceedings when the verdict did not benefit from the res
iudicata character) with regard to all persons taking part in the military
expeditions and their families. This enhanced the attractiveness of military
service and prevented soldiers from leaving the army.

Exemptions were known to the customary law, however, they were
formulated by Seym by means of constitutions. The parliament,
depending on the circumstances, enlarged or limited the group of the
beneficiaries, applied more or less strict criteria, changed the time limits of
the exemptions’ validity, prevented their abuse, and most importantly, it
firmly opposed a rejection of the releases by courts.