58 in the Swedish Lawof 1734 and the prevailing contemporary scientific notions concerning the concepts of fact and truth.^ As for legal science itself, the repercussions of the scientific revolution and the opposition to traditional Aristotelian thinking can be traced in the way attitudes towards natural law evolved among Swedish jurists and legal faculties of the time. Natural lawwas introduced early in Sweden, and Grotius and AIthusius were studied inTurku as well."* At the timewhen absolutismwas introduced in the 1680s, Aristotelian-scholastic views had already been seriously challenged at the Uppsala University, despite resistance from the theologians on certain points.^ As elsewhere, in Uppsala the Cartesians and the natural law theorists shared the same rationalist-based basic antagonismtowards the Aristotelian philosophy It is generally recognized that Roman law had to cede its position as the dominant legal ideology in Sweden in the 1680s. Howis it possible, then, that the statutory theory of proof was incorporated into the Swedish Lawof 1734? In Sweden, natural law^ was a markedly conserv^ative phenomenon. It has even been claimed that the victory of natural law over Roman law at the end of the 1600s occurred only as a change of ideological justification. Whereas, according to Heikki Ylikangas, Roman law had supported the aspirations of the higher nobility before the 1680s, natural law suited the interests of absolutist royal power, supported by the lower nobility, better; in fact, the law behind the ideologies changed little.® According to Päivi Paasto, however, to reduce ^ In older legal historiography, the Lawof 1734 has often been described as a mere recording c>f the legal changes that had taken place in the previous century, see Hemmer 1954 pp. 54, 103. More recently, however, the active role of the makers of the Law has been emphasized; see Ylikangas 1986 pp. 26-27. Klinge - Knapas - Leikola - Strömberg 1987 p. 675. ^ Lindberg 1976 p. 115; Kallinen 1995 pp. 218, 312. ^ Lindberg 1976 pp. 15-16. ^ Natural law theorists included forceful supporters of absolutism, such as Hobbes and Pufendorf. This strand of natural lawcame to have the strongest effect in Sweden, as the newer strand of natural law emphasizing the idea of social contract as the origin of societal living (Locke, Rousseau) was rejected - and even banned outrightly in 1693. Royal lawpower was now explained, by natural law theorists as well, as originating directly fromGod, not fromthe people. Lindberg 1976 pp. 140-155; Klingc - Knapas - Leikola - Strömberg 1987 p. 675. * According to Ylikangas, thus, natural lawper se did not play a decisive role in the dowmfall of Roman law. Instead, Ylikangas reduces the problemto group interests, claiming th.at n.atural law gained a victory over Roman law because of the better justification that the former offered to the rising lower nobility aspiring to political power. Ylikangas 1984. Ylikangas’s view is a refutation of the “ideological” explanation of Stig Jägerskiöld who has interpreted the downfall of Roman law and the subsequent rise of natural law in terms of the growth of nationalistic ideas; these new ideas coincided with the rise of absolutism. Consequently, for Jägerskiöld, the absolutist king started to foster a kind of statutory positivism as against the principles of Roman law and the relatively open conception of legal sources that the former legal thinking presupposed. Jägerskiöld 1963 pp. 101-104.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjYyNDk=