Union of Lublin
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The Union of Lublin (Lithuanian: Liublino unija; Polish: Unia lubelska) replaced the personal union of the Kingdom of Poland, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania with a real union and an elective monarchy, since Sigismund II Augustus, the last of the Jagiellons, remained childless after three marriages. In addition, autonomy of Royal Prussia was largely abandoned.
It was signed July 1, 1569, in Lublin, Poland, which united a single State, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The Commonwealth was ruled by a single elected monarch who carried on the duties of Polish King and Grand Duke of Lithuania, and governed with a common Senate and parliament (the Sejm). The Union was an evolutionary stage in the Polish-Lithuanian alliance and personal union, necessitated also by Lithuania's dangerous position in wars with Russia.[1][2][3]
Constituting a crucial event in the history of several nations, the Union of Lublin has been viewed quite differently by many historians. Polish historians concentrate on its positive aspect, emphasizing its peaceful, voluntary creation and its role in the spreading of advanced Polish culture. Lithuanian historians are more critical of the union, pointing out that it was dominated by Poland.
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[edit] History
[edit] Background
There were long discussions before signing the treaty, as Lithuanian magnates were afraid of losing much of their powers, since the union would make their status equal in the eyes of law with that of the much more numerous lower nobility. However Lithuania had been increasingly on the losing side of the Muscovite-Lithuanian Wars and by the second half of the 16th century it faced the threat of total defeat in the Livonian war and incorporation into Russia. The Polish nobility (the szlachta) on the other hand were reluctant to offer help to Lithuania without receiving anything in exchange. Sigismund II Augustus, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania, seeing the threat to Lithuania and eventually to Poland, nonetheless pressed for the union, gradually gaining more supporters.
[edit] Sejm of 1567
The Sejm met in January, 1567, near the Polish town of Lublin, but did not reach an agreement. In protest against heavy pressure by the Poles to sign the Act, the Lithuanians under the leadership of Vilnius voivod Mikołaj "Rudy" Radziwiłł left Lublin on March 1, fearing that Sigismund would make a decision on his own.
After that, on March 26, the king was forced by the szlachta to incorporate [3] [4] the southern Lithuanian-controlled lands of Podlachia, Volhynia, Podolia and the Kiev regions into the Crown of Poland. These historic lands of Rus' make up more than half of modern day Ukraine, and were at that time a significant part of Lithuanian territory. The higher class in these lands was largely Ruthenian at that time and was loyal to Lithuania. All loyal nobles were forced to swear loyalty to the King of Poland. Those who refused had their lands confiscated.
The Lithuanians were forced to come back under the leadership of Jan Chodkiewicz, (father of Jan Karol Chodkiewicz) and continue negotiations using slightly different tactics than Mikołaj "the Red" Radziwiłł. Although the Polish szlachta wanted full incorporation of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania into the Crown, the Lithuanians continued to oppose, and agreed only on the status of a federal state. On 28 June 1569, the last objections were overcome, and the act was signed by the king in Lublin Castle on 4 July [5].
[edit] The end
The Union of Lublin was superseded by the Constitution of the Third May from 1791, when the federal Commonwealth was to be transformed into a unitary state by King Stanisław August Poniatowski. However, the constitution was not fully implemented. The Commonwealth was ended by the partitions of Poland in the late 18th century, with the last one in 1795.
[edit] Aftermath
[edit] Cultural
After the Union, the Lithuanian nobles had the same formal rights as the Polish to rule the lands and subjects under their control. However, political advancement in the Catholic dominated Commonwealth was a different matter.
In culture and social life, however, both the Polish language and Catholicism became dominant for the Ruthenian nobility, most of which were initially Ruthenian speaking and Eastern Orthodox by religion (see Polonization). However the commoners, especially the peasants, continued to speak their own languages and to practise the Orthodox religion, which eventually created a significant rift between the lower social classes of people and the nobility in the Lithuanian and Ruthenian areas of the Commonwealth. Some Ruthenian magnates resisted the attempted Polonization (see, e.g., Ostrogski) by adamantly adhering to Orthodox Christianity, giving generously to the Ruthenian Orthodox Churches and to the Ruthenian schools. However, the pressure of Polonization was harder to resist with each subsequent generation and eventually almost all of the Ruthenian nobility was Polonized.
The Cossack uprisings and foreign interventions led to the partition of the Commonwealth by Russia, Prussia and Austria-Hungary in 1795. The Union of Lublin was also temporarily not active while the Union of Kėdainiai was in effect.
Many historians[who?] also consider the Union of Lublin to have created a state similar to the present-day European Union,[citation needed] thus considering the Union (along with the Kalmar Union, the several Acts of Union in the British Isles and other similar treaties) to be kind of a predecessor of the Maastricht treaty. The former, however, created a state of countries more deeply linked than the present-day EU.
[edit] Economic
The union brought about the Polish colonization of Ruthenian lands and enserfment of Ruthenian peasantry by the szlachta.[4][5][6][7] Despite the situation of peasants in the Commonwealth being pretty dire compared to the West (see second serfdom), the peasants in the Commonwealth had more freedom than those in Russia; hence peasants (as well as to a lesser extent nobility and merchants) escaping from Russia to the Commonwealth became a major concern for Russian government, and one was of the factors leading to the partitions of Poland.[8]
A common coin (złoty) was introduced.
Execution of crown lands was not expanded to Grand Duchy.
[edit] Geographical
The Union created one of the largest and most populous states in 17th century Europe (excluding the states not completely in Europe, i.e. the Russian or Ottoman Empires).[9]
Within the Union Lithuania had to accept the loss of Podlachia, Volhynia, Podolia and the Kiev regions, formerly the territories of GDL annexed by the Polish Crown.
[edit] Legal
Legal systems of Crown of Poland and Grand Duchy of Lithuania according to the Union were to be unified, although it never happened.
The drafters of the Union of Lublin expected that the countries of Lithuania and Poland would be linked together more closely[citation needed] than they actually were, because the 1566 Second Statute of Lithuania had not lost its power, and some of its provisions substantially differed from the acts of the Union of Lublin.[citation needed] Eventually the Third Statute of Lithuania was adopted in 1588, which however still contradicted the Union of Lublin on many points.[citation needed]
The Polish nobility therefore viewed the Statutes of Lithuania as unconstitutional,[citation needed] because at the signing of the Union of Lublin it was said that no law could conflict with the law of Union. The Statutes, however, declared the laws of the Union that conflicted with them to be unconstitutional. The First Statutes of Lithuania was also used in the territories of Lithuania annexed by Poland shortly before the Union of Lublin. These conflicts between statutory schemes in Lithuania and Poland persisted for many years, and the Third Statute of Lithuania remained main law in territories of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania even after partitions until 1840.
Attempts to limit the power of Lithuanian magnates (especially the Sapiehas' family) and unify the laws of the Commonwealth led to the koekwacja praw movement, culminating in the koekwacja reforms of the election sejm of 1697 (May-June), confirmed in the general sejm of 1698 (April) in the document Porządek sądzenia spraw w Trybunale Wielkiego Księstwa Litewskego.[10]
[edit] Military
Poland provided military aid in the war after the union of the two entities, which was crucial for the survival of the Grand Duchy.[2]
Both the Crown and the Grand Duchy were to have common military and defense policy.
[edit] Political
The Union of Lublin provided for a merger of the two states, although they retained significant degrees of autonomy, each having its own army, treasury, laws and administrations[6]. Although the countries were equal in theory, the larger and more culturally attractive Poland would became the dominant partner. Due to population differences, Polish deputies outnumbered Lithuanians in the Sejm by 3:1 ratio[7].
Both Poland and Grand Duchy were to had a single ruler, freely elected by the nobility of both nations and crowned as King of Poland and Grand Duke of Luthuania in Wawel Cathedral, Kraków.
A common parliament - Sejm - was to held sessions in Warsaw; it would contain 114 deputies from Crown and 48 from Lithuania. Senate had 113 Crown senators and 27 Lithuanian ones.
Both the Crown and the Grand Duchy were to have common foreign policy.
[edit] Legacy
The Union of Lublin was Sigismund's greatest achievement and greatest failure. Although it created one of the largest state in contemporary Europe that would endure for over 200 years[8], Sigismund failed to push through the reforms that would create a workable political system. He hoped to strengthen the monarchy with the support of the lesser nobility, and balance the power of lesser nobility and magnates. However although all the nobility in the Commonwealth was in theory equal in terms of law, the magnates' political power was not weakened significantly and in the end they could too often bribe or coerce their lesser brethren[9]. In addition, the royal power would continue to wane, and while the neighbouring states continued to evolve into strong, centralized absolute monarchies, the Commonwealth would slide with its Golden Liberty into a political anarchy that would eventually cost it its very existence[10].
Today's Republic of Poland considers itself a successor to the Commonwealth,[11] whereas the pre-World War II Republic of Lithuania saw the old Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth mostly in a negative light.[12]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ Dvornik, Francis, The Slavs in European History and Civilization, Rutgers University Press, ISBN 0813507995, Google Print, p.254
- ^ a b Norman Davies, God's Playground: A History of Poland in Two Volumes, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0199253390, Google Print, p.50
- ^ W. H. Zawadzki, A Man of Honour: Adam Czartoryski as a Statesman of Russia and Poland, 1795-1831, Oxford University Press, 1993, ISBN 0198203039, Google Print, p.1
- ^ Ukraine, Encyclopædia Britannica.
- ^ Nataliia Polonska-Vasylenko, History of Ukraine, "Lybid", (1993), ISBN 5325004255, Section: Evolution of Ukrainian lands in the 15th-16th centuries
- ^ Natalia Iakovenko, Narys istorii Ukrainy s zaidavnishyh chasic do kincia XVIII stolittia, Kiev, 1997, Section: 'Ukraine-Rus, the "odd man out" in Rzeczpospolita Obojga Narodow
- ^ Orest Subtelny. Ukraine: A History, University of Toronto Press, ISBN 0802083900, pp. 79-81
- ^ Jerzy Czajewski, "Zbiegostwo ludności Rosji w granice Rzeczypospolitej" (Russian population exodus into the Rzeczpospolita), Promemoria journal, October 2004 nr. (5/15), ISSN 1509-9091 , Table of Content online, Polish language
- ^ Heritage: Interactive Atlas: Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, accessed on 19 March 2006: At it. apogee, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth comprised some 400,000 square miles (1,000,000 km²) and a multi-ethnic population of 11 million. For population comparisons, see also those maps: [1], [2].
- ^ Jerzy Malec, Szkice z dziejów federalizmu i myśli federalistycznych w czasach nowożytnych, "Unia Troista", Wydawnictwo UJ, 1999, Kraków, ISBN 83-233-1278-8, Part II, Chapter I Koewkwacja praw.
- ^ A. stated, for instance by the preamble of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland of 1997.
- ^ Alfonsas Eidintas, Vytautas Zalys, Lithuania in European Politics: The Years of the First Republic, 1918–1940, Palgrave, 1999, ISBN 0-312-22458-3. Print, p78
[edit] External links
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