"Trial" as a Stage of the Russian Adversary Procedure and its Transformation at the End of the 17th - Beginning of the 18th Centuries

Abstract

This paper discusses the main stage of the adversary procedure, taking into account reforms and amendments occurring at the end of the 17th - beginning of the 18th centuries. This stage - the "trial", and after the decree of 21 February 1697 the "interrogation" - was an exchange of statements between the claimant and the respondent (claim, claims response, objections of the claimant and the respondent) followed by the judicial inquiry of the claim and evidence of the parties. The abolition of the "trial" and "confrontments" by Peter I did not mean that the adversary procedure ("court and investigation" in the terminology of the 17th century) turned into an investigative process. In fact, there was only an increase in the role of the judge, a reduction in the ability of the parties to exchange mutual accusations. Court procedure of the "Moscow" period, despite careful study including the minor details of the judicial process, turned out to be ineffective. Peter I's decisive measures to fundamentally break the old forms did not lead to the abolition of the adversarial form of legal procedure and its main element, the "trial". Unification of the court procedure under the Decree of 1723 "On the Form of the Trial" did not take place, and the "form" itself was pushed aside to the periphery of judicial practice.