The State National Council and the Polish Committee of National Liberation in a State Governed by the Rule of Law: Positions of Legal Scholarly Opinion

Abstract

The establishment of the communist regime in Poland in 1944 is a current subject of reflection in the doctrine and practice of legislation and judiciary. There has been no uniform position on these events, which means that the then sanctioned political and normative order continues to produce controversial assessments and, above all, certain legal effects. This results from the fact that the new people’s power, empowered by force, and not by legal or social basis, has given itself the competence to establish a normative order. The lack of legitimacy for the rightful rule and legislative activity, in principle – from the point of view of the idea of the rule of law – undermines the political and legal status of the people’s authorities. This is all the more so because the system of unified power and sources of law created at that time was evidence of building a totalitarian state modelled on the Soviet Union. The events and legal behaviours of that time led to numerous, often radical changes in many areas of private and public life. They caused certain social and material effects, difficult to reverse today, which Polish society still faces. Therefore, modern standards of the rule of law require that public authorities undertake comprehensive and effective activity. They require that the principles of just and fair compensation for material damage and compensation for moral losses resulting from the rule of this system be implemented. This seems all the more important because some regulations of the people’s power, especially those concerning changes in the ownership structure, are still in force and form the basis of court and Constitutional Tribunal decisions.