Funkcjonowanie izb morskich w pierwszych latach Polski Ludowej
The Naval Courts Activities in the Early Years of the People’s Republic of Poland

Summary/Abstract: Tasks of maritime courts included taking evidence from a sea accident and its proper appraisal, taking account of all the facts and causes of the event. The communist authorities, the Ministry of Navigation and maritime offices in particular, used the information obtained from the proceedings or the trial as the basis for new ordinances or legislative acts designed to prevent further accidents at sea. It could be inferred from the decisions of maritime courts whether in order to increase security in sea navigation, more emphasis was to be placed on increasing the qualifications of the crew and maritime pilots, increasing the number of seamen filling specific posts on merchant vessels, removing the defectiveness of ancillary equipment in maritime navigation, or improving the design of merchant vessels. The application of a disciplinary sanction – i.e. depriving the ship's captain or his assistant of the right to practice their profession on the grounds that they did not have the necessary qualifications or by gross negligence – no doubt favoured positive outcomes in terms of reducing the detrimental effect of incidents leading to sea accidents. The growing use of machinery on ships and the increasing capacity of power generators, along with the steady development of maritime navigation and transport in the perilous post-war reality, contributed to reactivation of maritime courts in 1947 based on the interwar regulations. Procedural problems inherent in the operation of those bodies in the first years of Polish People's Republic are illustrated by the fact that the issued rulings were of varying quality, which clearly showed a dearth of experienced staff and experts in Polish and international maritime law. Contemporary scholars are mainly discussing the statutory instruments enacted by the socialist legislator in 1961, which makes it worthwhile to explore the earlier period using the historicallegal and the comparative method.

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