Establishment and activities of the court of conscious in the Kazan province

The court of conscious was established by the decree of Catherine II during the provincial reform of 1775 and dealt with criminal cases of low social danger, civil cases, where the court of conscious was a mediator between disputing parties, and also considered domestic disputes. The court of conscious was intended to provide additional protection of civil rights and to judge being guided by principles of natural justice, philanthropy, respect and rejection of oppression or harassment of a person. At that its decisions were not a force of state enforcement, but only of recommendation character. Generalizing the legal practice of the court of conscious of the Kazan province, it can be concluded that almost all its decisions were either appealed or made default by parties. This fact proves that the institution of conscious proceedings was founded hasty in the Russian Empire, it had declarative nature, and as a result was ineffective as exemplified by the case of the Kazan province. As an outcome, the government had to refuse the realization of such a legal structure, keeping just the courts that had powers of authority.