the court of appeal as legal transfer – heikki pihlajamäki 225 Art. 6 continued that all cases (criminalia und civilia) were included in the jurisdiction of land courts, except for those belonging to the Appeals Court’s jurisdiction according to the Hofgerichtsordnung or “the Swedish laws.”611 Paragraph 20 of theHofrerichtsordnung, which was by and large an abbreviation of the Swedish Procedural Rules for the Court of Appeal of 1615, provided the following instructions regarding the Court of Appeal’s jurisdiction: The Court was the appeals instance for all civil cases decided by the lower courts in both the countryside and the towns in the provinces of Livonia, Ingermanland, and Carelia. Cases with an interest of less than 50 dalers, however, were not appellable. Cases emanating from the courts in Ingermanland and Carelia were to be decided according to the Swedish law. 1.The Court decided as first instance all crimes against the royal majesty (crimina laesae Majestatis), and against the state or state finances (causae fisci). These cases were, however, to be investigated at the lower courts (although not decided there). 2.The Dorpat Court of Appeal decided as first instance cases of denegatio iustitiae, or cases where justice had been denied or delayed, or in which the lower court was suspected of not being objective or being suspect. 3.Testamentary cases of the nobility were first-instance cases of the Court of Appeal. 4.All cases regarding consistories, church, gymnasiums, schools, hospitals and the like, as well as cases concerning governors, Stadthalter, or royal economic interest, which could not be decided otherwise, belonged directly to the Court of Appeal, as well as 5.all those cases that the Crown itself ordered the Court of Appeal to hear and decide. TheHofgerichtsordnung needs to be read against the context of theLandgerichtsordnung of 1630, which also contained complementary information on the Court of Appeal’s jurisdiction. According to the Landgerichtsord610 LGO1632 Art. V: “An diese Land-Gerichte gehörne alle und jede Personen so in diesen Landen der Königl. Majestät immediate unterworffen, sie seyn Adel oder Unable, Geistlich- oder weltlichen Standes, auch im Burglager liegende Reuter und Soldaten,” Sammlung der Gesetze, vol. 2, ed. Buddenbrock, p. 27. See alsoLGO1630 § 20. 611 LGO 1632 Art. VI: “Imgleichen gehören zu diesem Gerichte, alle und jede Sachen, criminalia und civilia, die allein ausgenommen, so in der Hofgerichtsordnung excipiret und nach Schwedischen Rechten immediate ans Hoff-Gerichte gehören […],”Sammlung der Gesetze, vol. 2, ed. Buddenbrock, p. 27.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjYyNDk=