General Sejm - Duration and Frequency

Duration and Frequency

In the mid-15th century the general sejm met about once per year. There was no set time span to elapse before the next session was to be called by the king. If the general sejm did not happen, local sejmiks would debate on current issues instead. King Henry's Articles, signed by each king since 1573, required the king to call a general sejm (lasting six weeks) every two years, and provisions for an extraordinary sejm (Polish: sejm ekstraordynaryjny, nadzwyczajny) that was to last two weeks were also set down in this act. Extraordinary sejms could be called in times of national emergency, for example a sejm deciding whether to call pospolite ruszenie (a general call to arms) in response to an invasion. The sejm could be extended if all the deputies agreed.

No set time of a year was defined, but customarily sejms were called for a time that would not interfere with the supervision of agriculture, which formed the livelihood of most nobility; thus most sejms took place in late fall or early winter.

After the Constitution of May 3, 1791, sejms were to be held every two years and last 70 days, with a provision for an extension to 100 days. Provisions for extraordinary sejms were made, as well as for a special constitutional sejm, which was to meet and discuss whether any revisions to the constitution were needed (that one was to deliberate every 25 years).

It is estimated that between 1493 and 1793 sejms were held 240 times. Jędruch gives a higher number of 245, and notes that 192 of those were successfully completed, passing legislation. 32 sejms were vetoed with the infamous liberum veto, particularly in the first half of the 18th century. The last two sejms of the Commonwealth were the irregular four year Great Sejm (1788-1792), which passed the Constitution of the 3 May, and the infamous Grodno Sejm (1793), whose deputies, bribed or coerced by the Russian Empire following the Commonwealth defeat in the War in Defense of the Constitution, annulled the short-lived Constitution and passed the act of Second Partition of Poland.