One of the fundamental dilemmas in judicial application of the law is to respect the principle of the rule of law and not only the principle of legalism. The principle of legalism as enshrined in Article 7 of the Constitution insufficiently protects the constitutionally guaranteed rights and freedoms of the individual, and therefore judicial activism is required, i.e. a correction of the established law in the process of interpretation and application of the law in order to give the law such content that is consistent with the constitutionally defined values underlying the axiology of the Polish Constitution. The correction of the legislated law involves going beyond the content of the principle of legalism and referring to such values as – equity, justice, goodness, human rights and freedoms.
The judge, due to the fact that under the Constitution he is first and foremost subject to its provisions, and secondarily to the laws, may – if he is able to justify it – reject the content of the statutory provisions and base his decision exclusively on the provisions of the Constitution. This is justified when the Constitution protects individual rights and freedoms to a greater extent than the law. A judge may not invoke the rule dura lex sed lex in the process of interpretation, as it destroys the standards of legal culture. The correction of statute law in the process of its inter-pretation relates to judicial independence and responsibility for the issued decision.

The analysis offered in this paper explores the legal definition of civil status and points out the different meanings of this concept in the basic branches of law as well as its relevance to the application in Poland of the norms of the Act of 28 November 2014 – Vital Records Law. The essence of vital records has also been considered. The discussion addresses the administrative-legal nature of civil status registration activities, highlighting their permissible legal forms. This is followed by a review of the most important features and scope of judicial review exercised by common and administrative courts, which serves as the background for an evalua-tion of the dispersed judicial review. The conclu sion offers de lege ferenda proposals relating to a uniform model of judicial review of civil status registration activities.

This article is a contribution to the biography of Professor Andrzej Kabat – a prose­cutor, legal counsel, judge of the highest courts of the Republic of Poland, and a long­time academic teacher. The study discusses selected jurisprudential achieve­ments of Professor Andrzej Kabat from the period when he held the office of a judge of the Constitutional Tribunal and the Supreme Administrative Court. Moreover, there are also references to his research on the institution of questions of law sub­mitted to the Constitutional Tribunal, which is regarded as pioneering in the science of law, despite the fundamental changes in the political system. What marks the discussed output of Professor Kabat is both the relevance of his ideas and the great significance for the practice of application of the law.

This article is a contribution to the biography of Professor Andrzej Kabat – a prose-cutor, legal counsel, judge of the highest courts of the Republic of Poland, and a long-time academic teacher. The study discusses selected jurisprudential achieve-ments of Professor Andrzej Kabat from the period when he held the office of a judge of the Constitutional Tribunal and the Supreme Administrative Court. Moreover, there are also references to his research on the institution of questions of law sub-mitted to the Constitutional Tribunal, which is regarded as pioneering in the science of law, despite the fundamental changes in the political system. What marks the discussed output of Professor Kabat is both the relevance of his ideas and the great significance for the practice of application of the law.

This article provides only a small contribution to the inevitable scholarly discussion on whether excluding the primacy of the literal rule in favour of the priority of a pro-EU teleological interpretation in the judicial and administrative applications of Polish tax law is really reasonable. Firstly, this article sets out to discuss the stages of the transposition of the concept of a household from EU legislation into the provisions of the Excise Duty Act. Secondly, it presents the evolution in the lines of the interpretation of this term as used by tax authorities and national courts. Thirdly, it demonstrates the negative legal and fiscal consequences that are caused in practice by the definition of this term as framed by the Polish legislator.

The article is devoted to the study of the correct application of the evaluative concepts contained in the norms of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. Attention is drawn to certain difficulties in the application of the evaluative norms in the Convention: despite their objective necessity and usefulness, they create a room for the law enforcement entity’s own discretion up to subjectivism in resolving specific cases; they serve as an objective obstacle to the unification of the case law of the ECtHR and this creates preconditions for unequal implementation of ECtHR judgments in the national legal order; they cause the risk of errors in the application of the provisions of the Convention by the competent authorities of the Contracting States. It is established that the application of legal norms containing evaluative concepts is challenging not only owing to the specific properties of the evaluative concepts themselves, but also due to the peculiarities of adjudication by the ECtHR when applying the evaluative norms. The relevant case law of the ECtHR as well as examples of national legislation are analysed in support of these theoretical conclusions. Since the lack of uniform application of the evaluative norms of the Convention causes divergent use of the ECtHR’s judgments in the domestic judicial system, it is advised to follow a number of rules for reasoning of decisions by the domestic court. These rules will serve as a certain guarantee against ambiguous implementation of ECtHR judgments at the national level.

The paper focuses on the issue of public enforcement of consumer law in Poland. This analysis considers exclusively the stage of administrative proceedings and it does not concern judicial control over the decisions issued. The analysis aims at answering the question whether the phenomenon of legal impossibilism is to be observed in the domain administrative proceedings instituted by the President of the UOKiK with the purpose of implementing consumer policy. The hypotheses to be verified in the foregoing are as follows: (i) there are procedural mechanisms which enable an authority to effectuate protection of consumer rights, operating to the public benefit, and that (ii) it might be reasonable to expect that these mechanisms are exploited in practice by the President of the UOKiK. The first part considers the legal framework for enforcing consumer rights with the use of public law mechanisms in Poland. In the second part, the discussion revolves around the
practical application of the legal instruments by the President of the UOKiK. The
conclusions constitute a starting point to initiate further, in-depth empirical studies
related to the activities undertaken by the President of the UOKiK with the aim
to effectuate protection of consumer rights in Poland.

This article concerns the problem associated with the nature of the institution of a petition for reconsideration of the case in view of regulation No 16 of the Administrative Procedur Code in the version before the amendment dated 3 December 2010, which entered into force on 11 April 2011. Despite the amendment, to this day the provision is the source of many disputes, which is reflected in a very non-uniform judicial practice. On the basis of this regulation can be observed, how defective constructed legal provisions affect the administration of justice and the application of the law by creating situations in which the courts take over the functions of law making. On the selected example is shown, how one decision of the Supreme Court, being the basis of decisions of courts of appeal, causes that victims defective administrative decision are charged with the responsibility for legislative errors. Knowledge of the matter, which is the subject of this publication, is extremely important for all practitioners as well as theorists of the law because of the importance of the issues, which accompany the main theme. The work is based on an analysis of the concept of finality and validity of administration decision and depth on theoretical consideration and extensive discussion of the judicial practice of administrative courts, civil courts and Constitutional Tribunal.