One justice in the minority, Nils Wilhelm Stråle (1787-1853), however, declared that the duration of the contract was not a determining factor; the law should, or even could, never prohibit contracts for a shorter period of time. However, according to the “nature of things”, the paying party should have the same right as a master if the serving party was bound to an assistance “of the same character as is in general the case concerning servants”209 The question how to regulate labour contracts outside the traditional master-servant relationship was also discussed in parliament. During the session of the Riksdag 1828-30, all the four estates proposed to the king that the rules of the Statute on Hired Servants should be extended to apply to artisans and workers within trade.When the rather conservative King Karl XIV Johan promulgated the Statute on Hired Servants in 1833, he however did not follow the estates by not letting the groups in question be covered by the statute.210 It was in this debate concerning the change of social relations in general and labour relations in particular, that Fredrik Schrevelius in 1844 tried to adapt Savigny’s ideas to Swedish law by characterising the master-servant relationship as a branch of family law. But, was Schrevelius really a representative of the most “common opinion”? In1849 the law drafting board (Lagberedningen), that in1841had replaced the law committee of 1811, delivered a new proposal of a Civil Code. It seems almost like a reply to Schrevelius, when the board emphasised that the master-servant relationship did not belong to family law. On the contrary, according to the board, the relationship in question emerged as a treaty between free and equal contracting parties. In this context, the board sharply repudiated the master’s century-old right to chastise his servants. c o n t i n u i t y a n d c o n t r ac t 99 209 “(av) enahanda beskaffenhet med hvad för tjenstehjon i allmänhet äger rum” (JR Stråle). Högste Domstolens Protocoll 1836 (Supreme Court 1836, Justice Stråle), pp. 157-159. See also Hasselrot 1919, pp. 18-20. 210 Riksdagens Protocoll 1828-30,, Bihang 10, saml. 2 (Minutes from the Riksdag 1828-30; Appendix 10:2) Underdånig skrifvelse nr 345; Adlercreutz,T1971, pp. 65-89.
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