This article discusses the independent state legislature theory, which has been the subject of interest of an ever-growing group of American constitutionalists in recent years. This theory deals primarily with state legislatures’ power – derived directly from the U.S. Constitution – to regulate federal elections. According to its underlying premises, this fact results in the absence of any tools to control the law enacted in this area as to its compliance with a given state’s constitution. Neither the electoral administration nor the state courts can interfere with these laws. They would therefore be subject to federal courts’ review only. However, the Supreme Court, in applying the political questions doctrine, has excluded many election law matters – other than those concerning funding – from its jurisdiction. As a result, such an important part of state law – one concerning fundamental political rights – would remain without any supervision inherent in modern democracies.

The rule of law does not govern all human interactions. There are times when the state bypasses legal constraints, as documented by the World Justice Project. Other times, jurisdictions may be mutually unfriendly and refuse to enforce foreign laws. Blockchains create trust between contracting parties at the individual level, enabling them to transact freely and increase consumer welfare. Blockchains can only supple-ment antitrust if the legal constraints do not impede their development. The law should thus support the decentralization of blockchains so that blockchain-based mechanisms may take over (even if imperfectly) where the law does not apply. With that in mind, we justify the attractiveness of that approach by showing that blockchain causes an increase in the number of transactions by creating trust (Part 1), and that it may overall increase the decentralization of economic transactions (Part 2). The law should take into account where it applies (Part 3). We conclude afterward (Part 4).

Fixed establishment (FE) is one of the institutions of the EU value added tax system; its structure is essential to correctly determine the right tax jurisdiction of an EU Member State for the purpose of VAT settlement in situations of cross-border provision of services. However, the legal structure of a FE adopted by the EU legislator (and, consequently, adapted to national legislation of the Member States) causes uncertainty when it comes to its interpretation. In the absence of unambiguously defined conditions in EU law to consider a specific presence and activity of an enterprise to be a FE, interpretation rules contained in judicial decisions
issued by the Court of Justice of the EU play an important role. Among attempts
made by the CJEU to clarify the ‘blur areas’ resulting from the dynamics of modern
business processes, one of the most interesting ones is the possibility of considering
a subsidiary to be a fixed establishment for a parent company. The purpose of this
paper is to analyse legal and economic factors, the fulfilment of which may constitute a condition for considering a subsidiary to be a fixed establishment for
a parent company, with particular emphasis on the ruling of the Court of Justice
of 7 May 2020 in the Dong Yang case (C-547/18).

The article attempts to confront the concepts relating to the force of res judicata and its subjective limits present in the doctrine and jurisdiction with the current wording of the provisions regulating this institution and the provisions concerning enforcement-warrant proceedings which ensure a possibility to pursue a claim indicated in a judgment having the force of res judicata through enforcement proceedings. In the following article, the author presents the existing assumptions of the doctrine regarding mutual relations between the validity of judgment and the authority of res judicata. The author also analyses the possibility of granting the enforcement order against as well as in favour of a third party intervener, but also a uniform participant not indicated in the operative part of the judgment from the standpoint of the doctrine and jurisdiction. Taking into account the above mentioned considerations, the author concludes that in the light of the existing regulations, the concept of the force of res judicata whose subjective scope is limited to the parties to the proceedings indicated in the operative part of the judgement seems to be the most adequate.

This article seeks to identify the characteristic features of judicial cosmopolitanism and its product – the emancipation of judges from the constraints of national law. Cosmopolitanism manifests itself in creating normative systems outside and above traditional international law. While the latter draws its binding power from the will of states, cosmopolitan rules are usually created by private actors. Their binding power results predominantly from practical necessity. Such is the status of lex sportiva, of the standards imposed by rating agencies, or of international accreditation bodies. Judicial cosmopolitanism is different, for it rests upon the existing structures and competencies. By resorting to alien legal sources judges free themselves from national constraints, thus enhancing their power and independence. In assessing the impact of cosmopolitanism, one has to differentiate between looking up to foreign laws and precedents as binding sources, and treating them as merely intellectual inspiration. The second, albeit it seems innocuous, entails serious perils to the quality of adjudication. It creates a danger of cherry-picking by selecting foreign inspirations, not necessarily best suited to the case at hand. There is a danger of judicial overstepping of powers by making laws instead of merely applying it. By allowing judges to venture the uncontrolled expansion of their powers we endanger the very essence of the rule of law. On a positive note, drawing on foreign legal sources enables judges to verify the rationality of their decisions, as they were already tested in other jurisdictions.

The creation of a unified empire by Charlemagne required quite a number of victims, one of whom was Tassilo III, the last duke of the Agilolfing dynasty reigning in Bavaria for two centuries. The history of his fall may awake the legal historians’ interest because the Frank monarch dethroned him not by means of a bloody military defeat but by a legal trial (now called show trial1) in 788. Before the trial Charlemagne isolated Tassilo both in foreign and home affairs by means of carefully measured diplomatic steps. Finally, putting him under his jurisdiction in 787, he made him his vassal. The main charges brought against Tassilo were infidelitas, i.e., unfaithfulness to the liege lord and harisliz, i.e., desertion – though the latter was claimed to had been carried out a quarter of a century before the legal trial. The given work aims to enlighten the legal background of this rather opaque case by contouring the historical context. First we consider Tassilo’s reign and the historical background of the trial, then we investigat the Franko-Bavarian conflict and the iuramenta fidelitatis of Tassilo. In the end, after highlighting the question of infidelitas and of harisliz we analyse the show trial itself.

The following article provides an introduction to the issues of legal and political organization of the Roman provinces in the area of conquered territory in the time of the Roman Empire (I-III A.D). It outlines the administrative division of the empire, the relationship between them and Rome. An efficiency and well-organized management of the huge land using structured magistrate, allowed the Romans to create a world Empire which prevailed over a thousand square kilometers. The most important tasks of princeps was to ensure external and internal security of the Empire by structured and efficiency administration, as well as a guarantee of the proper/ correct jurisdiction. Not without significance was the tax collection which enriched the imperial treasury and testified to the power of the ruler. The Roman state was based on provinces, colonies and municipalities, where the last one were the primary form of local autonomy. The organization of official structure was largely modeled on the system of the Republican Rome, while respecting local traditions at the same time. Although their dependence, the residents still had full decision-making in their own affairs.

The Act of 17 December 2009 on pursuing claims in class actions regulating court proceedings in cases which involve claims of at least 10 people, is a kind of novelty in Polish law. Undoubtedly, it is a legal act improving and modernizing Polish civil proceedings. However, one should pay attention to new developments and the lack of their clarification, and therefore to the importance of already issued judgments of the Supreme Court. For this reason, existing jurisdiction on this subject has been presented and analyzed, which allows to precise the subjective scope, the term and extent of the unification of claims, as well as the concept and requirement of a representative of the collective. Without any doubts, the practice, which starts to shape, as indicated on the example of jurisdiction, will allow to clarify the scope of the subject and object of the Act. The ability to limit the claims for liability of the defendant has, without any doubts, a very important role in functioning of the class action, because the unification of pecuniary claims is in practice very difficult. Past court decisions show that unification should be understood as occurrence of a members’ request for the generically same forms of protection. Many practical problems are also raised by the concept of the representative of the collective, and the way, in which the collective should choose one.

This paper presents an analysis of legal issues related to the use of a blockchain in business. Considering the legal aspects at as early a stage as possible is one of the key areas which are crucial for the success and timely realisation of a project. The scope of legal issues depends on the type of the decentralised solution chosen by the organisation. The authors explain the differences between an open blockchain and a closed one, noting the degree of control and the advantages of both solutions. When it comes to the following paragraphs of the paper, the meaning of jurisdiction selection and the manner of managing personal data in projects related to the use of blockchain are discussed. The authors explain what smart contracts are to the reader. They point out sector regulations which may have an influence on the carrying out of blockchain projects in individual sectors that are regulated. They analyse the issues of the cryptocurrency market and explain to the readers why the taxation of cryptocurrencies is controversial. In the final part, they signal that organisations planning to implement a blockchain-based solution should take the Anti-Money Laundering (AML) regulations and related issues concerning Know Your Customer (KYC) into consideration. The paper makes it possible to understand why the legal regulations discussed may turn out to be an essential project risk if they are not recognised in time, and how addressing legal issues smoothly helps in the transformation of a project at the Proof of Concept stage, into a solution that works productively.

The 2018 amendment of the Polish Electoral Code established the institution of electoral officials, who replaced the institution of electoral plenipotentiaries, existing since 1998. One of the main differences between the two institutions is that electoral officials may not work at commune offices in charge of preparing and holding election in the area of their jurisdiction. The aim of the adopted solution was to isolate local government administration from the election process. The article offers a critical analysis of the institution of electoral officials. The subject matter of the discussion is both the legal regulation and the conclusions drawn from the examination of the institution in question, conducted by the Stefan Batory Foundation after the end of the 2018 local government elections, when the electoral officials fulfilled their statutory duty for the first time. The discussion leads to the conclusion that the establishment of the institution of electoral officials was not well thought out, and actually took place without appropriate consultation. The provisions of the Electoral Code are often vague. They have not been clarified to a sufficient extent in the resolutions adopted by the National Electoral Commission either. It is reasonable to have electoral officials appointed for a six-year term of office by the Head of the National Electoral Office. What is surprising, however, is that electoral officials may run for an office during elections taking place in a constituency outside of their area of activity as well as engage in election cam paigns – except for their own campaigns – while they should remain completely impartial during the election. The vague status of electoral officials and of the principles of their remuneration made it very difficult to attract individuals willing to perform this function. The headcount originally assumed had to be reduced by half; now it is 2,600. It is also necessary to reconsider the number of electoral officials assigned to individual communes. A major flaw of the adopted regulation is the lack of a clear division of duties and responsibilities between electoral official and communes. All this casts a bad light on the institution of electoral officials. It is argued that they were poorly prepared to perform the duties they were entrusted with. They also lacked the necessary theoretical knowledge and were not familiar with local conditions and constraints. Therefore, instead of helping, they made the work of commune officials only harder. But the call for dissolving the institution altogether is not legitimate. It is necessary to return to the previous solution, where the electoral officials in a commune were the officials working at commune offices, regular employees of these basic local government units. In communes with larger populations, there may be even more such officials. It is essential to reinforce the status of electoral officials, which is why it is important to clearly definthe nature of their relationships with the commune heads (town/city mayors) as well as to strengthen their position and grant them authority in the field of duties carried out as part of elections and referenda over other commune officials. It is also requisite to appoint them for terms of office of a particular number of years, and remunerate them in fixed monthly amounts – with the amounts increased in periods of preparing and holding elections or referenda. Only this way will it be possible to have a proper Electoral Official Service composed of professional commune officials specialising in organising and holding elections and referenda.

Subjects of rights originating from inherent human rights are among the subjects of public subjective rights. A deliberation on the matter of natural persons and legal persons, perceived as subjects of these rights, makes it possible to determine a number of questionable issues, which are surely reflected in the materialisation of these public subjective rights in legal practice. The subject matter is very complex, if only on account of the necessity to make use of the results of the linguistic interpretation of the notion of citizen. This is vital even though a legal definition of citizen exists. The intricate nature of the problem in question is also a consequence of the need to make a distinction in the area of the possibility to grant public subjective rights originating from inherent human rights to citizens, non-citizens under the jurisdiction of the Polish state, and non-citizens outside the jurisdiction of the Polish state. Another highly problematic aspect is the possibility to apply an analogy in the field of assignment of subjective public rights originating from inherent human rights to legal persons. Since the very application of analogies in this domain is controversial, it seems reasonable to stress the lack of possibility to consider legal persons as subjects of public subjective rights originating from inherent human rights such as life or health.

One of the most effective systems of protection of human rights is the system defined in the European Convention of Human Rights. Until 2010, the European Court of Human Rights had rarely handled tax cases because, in principle, it excluded this category of cases from its jurisdiction in the field of the protection of taxpayer rights. Such cases had always been qualified – in accordance to the requirements of Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights – as criminal or civil (property-related) cases. A major change in the ECHR’s approach to cases featuring tax-related aspects occurred in 2011. Given the protection of the right to property as set out in Protocol No. 1, the ECHR ranted taxpayers protection related to the return of value added tax in situations in which the taxpayer fulfilled their record-keeping obligations. The adopted trend in the issued decisions is seen to be dominant, but to be considered grounded, a greater number of ECHR judicial decisions than at present is needed. There is no doubt that the new tendency in the judicial decisions issued by the ECHR may have a major impact on the decisions issued by administrative courts in Poland.

Even though the proportionality principle is well-established for judicial review in matters pertaining to human rights in modern constitutional law in numerous jurisdictions, it has recently become subject to a growing tide of criticism. The article aims to describe and critically analyze the main arguments raised by the opponents of using proportionality as the tool for adjudicating conflicts of fundamental rights. After briefly describing the typical and the most common structure of the proportionality test as it is used in constitutional law, the author would present – and then dismiss – the three most significant allegations towards the proportionality analysis, namely: the problem of incommensurability, the alleged proportionality’s moral neutrality as well as the scope of judicial discretion that is claimed to be too wide according to some of proportionality’s opponents.

This paper presents an analysis of legal issues related to the use of a blockchain in business. Considering the legal aspects at as early a stage as possible is one of the key areas which are crucial for the success and timely realisation of a project. The scope of legal issues depends on the type of the decentralised solution chosen by the organisation. The authors explain the differences between an open blockchain and a closed one, noting the degree of control and the advantages of both solutions. When it comes to the following paragraphs of the paper, the meaning of jurisdiction selection and the manner of managing personal data in projects related to the use of blockchain are discussed.
The authors explain what smart contracts are to the reader. They point out sector regulations which may have an influence on the carrying out of blockchain projects in individual sectors that are regulated. They analyse the issues of the cryptocurrency market and explain to the readers why the taxation of cryptocurrencies is controversial. In the final part, they signal that organisations planning to implement a blockchain-based solution should take the Anti-Money Laundering (AML) regulations and related issues concerning Know Your Customer (KYC) into consideration. The paper makes it possible to understand why the legal regulations discussed may turn out to be an essential project risk if they are not recognised in time, and how addressing legal issues smoothly helps in the transformation of a project at the Proof of Concept stage, into a solution that works productively.

The problem of „honour"-related (or „honour"-based) violence is a phenomenon that crosses the boundaries of countries, cultures and religions. Usually it is tended to be connected with various regions of the Middle East, such as Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Iraqi Kurdistan. In Europe this issue has appeared in public debates at the beginning of XXI century and it was restricted to the migration context. Such categorization has resulted in the politicization of „honour" - related violence, which is manifested in the strong relation between state's undertaken actions and such factors as political line of a ruling party or public opinions. The aim of this article is to answer the question about legal regulation of this issue in the chosen countries of the Middle East and Europe: Lebanon, Jordan, Iraqi Kurdistan, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Germany. Such comparison will result in the identification of means and methods of combating this kind of violence that are used in practice. Moreover, it will enable the author to indicate whether the migration context has an impact on the differentiation of undertaken actions. The subject of the analysis will be the legal regulation and jurisdiction, as well as activity of various public and non-governmental institutions that are involved in the prevention of this problem. The result of the analysis leads to the reflection on the question if penal law is really the most effective instrument of solving this problem. Discussed matter fits into the wider context of an issue of use of law in order to achieve the aims of public policies.