Religious draft of personal marriage law of 1934

Tomasz Rakoczy

Abstract

In the Interwar period and after World War II a discussion on the shape of marriage law was taking place in Poland. In addition to the notion of uniformity which was guiding its main actors, the concern was also on taking religious elements into account. As the analysis of legislation in force in the partitioned territories shows, religious elements played a significant role there. Poles treated religious marriage as “a real marriage” and civil union was for them often a “mere formality”. The discussion on the future shape of the marriage law (especially personal law) was based on several projects, including mostly private ones, but also on a government draft prepared by the Codification Committee of 28 May 1929. A private project by Zygmunt Lisowski, a professor at the University of Poznań, created 1934, is definitely worth attention. Its author, taking into account the legislation of the partitioning powers, the legal position of the Catholic Church from the Constitution of March, and the number of Catholics and their mentality, proposed three groups of legal regulations. The first of these, a model one, would be a regulation of the Catholic Church fully assimilated into Polish law. The second one would include other denominations with statutory recognition by the state and third non-recognised religions and irreligious people. Lisowski’s draft, however, was never adopted either in whole or in any part. In 1945 Poland adopted a completely secular and alien to its tradition regulation on personal marriage law. However, it did not withstand the test of time and in 1998, after the entry into force of the Concordat, religious elements were introduced to the Polish marriage law, just like they are present in other countries of the world. Lisowski’s draft and other, similar ones, have proved to have more than only historical value - it is still an inspiration for the presence of religious elements in personal marriage law.