336 replaced it entirely with the rozysk procedure. The first paragraph of that ukaz included the following statement: Instead of sud and ochnaia stavka, after a plaint {chelohit’e) against people of all ranks {chin) concerning offenses {obida) and destruction {razoren"e), a rozysk shall be commenced in cases of insult {bran’) and slander {bezchest’e), or in cases of brawls {boi) and mutilation {uvech'e), and in all sorts of offences {obida) and in cases of destruction {razoren’e). This measure was defended with the argument that “there is a great deal of untruth and trickery from the plaintiffs and defendents in sud and ochnaia stavka, and many plaintiffs seek their plaints by accusing someone without grounds {zatevaia naprasno), just as the defendents also . . , answer with untruths, with their ingenious lies, and with trickery. The publication of the ukaz of 1697 should be seen in the context of the general political trend of the last decades of the seventeenth century, a trend which pointed in the direction of an absolutist form of government. The general application of inquisitorial trial procedure gave the political organs opportunities to maintain more effective control over the social order. Richard Wortman emphasized that connection, arguing that one must see the legislation of the first years of Peter’s reign as a continuation of earlier legal reforms. Wortman stated, among other things, that: In the last decades of the seventeenth century, the government attempted to centralize control over justice by concentrating responsibility in the hands of the appointive military governor, the voevoda. A decree of 1679 abolished all local offices besides the voevoda, and all cases were left to his discretion. — — — Peter’s decree of 1697 continued the process of increasing the voevoda’s control over the course of the trial. In 1716, a legislative act on legal procedure, the so-called Kratkoe izobrazhenie protsessov, or “Short presentation of trials,” was promulgated as part of the Voennyi LJstav, or military regulation, issued that same year. This act was meant to establish norms for the conduct of trials in the military courts concerning both civil and criminal cases. The type of trial which emerged from this had a thoroughly inquisitorial character. Trials were to be closed and secret; the judge was to inform the persons present in court that “they are to keep what takes place in court secret and not reveal it to anyone, no matter who it might be.” An auditor 130 ” 131 132 PRP, VIII, 571. Concerning the terminology, see Victor Glötzner, Die strafrechtliche Terminologie des Ulozhenie 1649 (Wiesbaden, 1967), 33 {razoren’e), 40 {obida), 59 {uvech’e), 62 {boi), 64 {bran’), 66 {bezchest’e). >3' PRP, VIII, 571. Richard Wortman, “Peter the Great and Court Procedure,” Canadian-American Slavic Studies, 8 (1974), 306. 133 pjip^ VIII, 582. 130 132
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