Before the State Police. Formation genesis

Contemporary Polish Police celebrates its jubilee under the slogan of the 100th anniversary of the establishment of the State Police. This took place on July 24, 1919, when the Legislative Sejm adopted the State Police Act. Before this happened, the evolution of Polish organizations and public order services continued, which resulted in the establishment of the first, after Poland regained independence, a centralized police service. In this work, the author points to the then realities of practical activities of organizations and services working for public security, their mutual relations, official pragmatics against the background of legal and political changes at the turn of 1918/1919. The content based on contemporary publications, but also on numerous sources from the 1920s, such as legal acts, departmental press, journalism records and the police practice of that time, constitute the precursor character of this study. This year Poland’s Police force celebrates the centenary of the founding of the Polish National Police. On July 25, 1919, National Police was called into existence by an Act the Polish Diet. Before the National Police was formed, the law and order organizations kept evolving to result in the formation of a centrally controlled police force. This author discusses the functioning of the organizations and units which maintained public safety under the conditions that prevailed at the time. The paper shows how these different services interacted with each other during the period of 1918/1919 in the context of the political and legal transformations the country was undergoing. The novel character of this presentation lies in its use of contemporary sources, in conjunction with archival documents from the second decade of the 20th century, including laws passed, trade publications, diaries, to study developments in police work.