Spory sądowe z zakresu prawa pracy w świetle akt zarządu przymusowego na dobrach fideikomisu pszczyńskiego (1934–1939)
Court disputes in the field of labor law in light of the Compulsory Administration files concerning the Pszczyna Fideicommissum (1934–1939)

Summary/Abstract: The article is devoted to the subject matter of labor law in interwar Poland during the late 1930s. The paper analyzes the files of authentic court disputes using the case study method. The research presented in the article is based on more than forty court case files, which are stored in the Pszczyna Department of the State Archives in Katowice. The files were not obtained from the proper set of court files but from a separate set consisting of the pre- served private archive of the Hochberg Family Fideicommissum in Pszczyna. This particular collection offers the files of almost 300 preserved civil cases from between 1934 and 1939 (back then, according to the provisions of the Polish Code of Civil Procedure, compulsory administration was established on the estates and factories belonging to the fideicommis- sum). The article demonstrates how valuable the remaining archives of aristocratic families are in the process of reconstruction of the lost court case files from the interwar period. The analysis covers a wide range of issues: unlawful dismissal of employees, withholding employees’ remuneration and setting off employer’s receivables from the aforementioned salaries without a legal basis, the specific nature of employing white-collar workers as well as the defects of the declarations of will in the field of labor contracts. This made it possible to present the state of the development of labor law during the 1930s as well as to assess the complicated economic situation of the largest family fideicommissa in interwar Poland.

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