From the Presidential Library stock: historical particularities of public prosecutor’s office made it an important part of national security of Russia

On the occasion of the Day of the Russian Federation Prosecutor’s Office, which is celebrated on the 12th of January the Presidential Library features a rare materials that reveal the history of the emergence and formation of the prosecutor's office as an independent government institution, as well as a current research works, reflecting a process of the prosecutor's office joining the national security system of Russia.

During a reign of Peter I the usual well-established for centuries way of life in Russia went through dismantlement; all major government agencies underwent radical changes – the Emperor with firm and sure hand planted new, atypical for Russia state bodies that were getting stronger and gaining competence from day to day. The Governing Senate has replaced the Boyar Duma; with the organization of the Most Holy Synod the Emperor obtained a full subjection of the church to his authority. At times Russian legislation has been significantly updated as well.

“Not being satisfied with the establishing of the new judicial court houses, - P. Ivanov wrote in rare edition of An experience with the biographies of General Prosecutors and Ministers of Justice, published on the Presidential Library website, - Peter cared of the constant supervision of an order and a justice of the cases that were proceeding in there. Before him, there was not any control in this respect here. Accounts and records at the former judicial courts were uncertain, obscure and almost concerned only one, the financial side, thus an introduction of the procedure of control could be rightly attributed to a care of the genius reformer.

Russian Public Prosecutor’s Office was established on January 12, 1722, by the Supreme Decree of Peter I to the Governing Senate, which is reflected in the Collected Works of A. D. Gradovsky. Volume 9. First principles of Russian state law. There were stated in Peter’s decree: “Prosecutor General and Chief Procurator have to remain at the Senate, and all the Boards must have the public prosecutors, who report to the Prosecutor General.” This decree can be found in the 40th volume of the Complete Collection of Laws of the Russian Empire, available on the Presidential Library website. The same document states that initially before the prosecutor's office was a task “to terminate or weaken the evil resulting from a disorder within the cases, injustice, corruption and lawlessness.”

Peter perfectly knew, how a theft and all species and subspecies of corruption can weaken the state; in the above-mentioned book by P. Ivanov the whole extent of his rejection of a bribery, a thievery, the corrupt practices is reflected: “Sitting one day in the Senate and listening to a report on various theft precedents that occurred a few days before, the Emperor had come in such rage that has vowed to stop that immediately, saying to prosecutor Yaguzhinsky: right now go and write a decree on my behalf to all the state of such matter, that if anyone will steal as much that it is enough to buy a rope, he will be hanged on that rope without charge or trial.”

The authors of digitized by the Presidential Library contemporary scientific works, analyzing the important issues of legal regulation and the Prosecutor's Office, continue to explore various aspects of the characteristics of the current law. Among these, for example, “The prosecutor's office and public prosecutor's supervision” by R. Matushevsky; “The Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation as a politico-legal institute of conflict resolution” by D. Dyachkova; “The Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation in the mechanism of protection of constitutional rights and freedoms of a man and a citizen” by A. Uryvaeva. There is a work of the current Rector of the Academy of General Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation Oksana Kapinus entitled “The Prosecutor's Office in the national security of Russia” on the library website.

“Prosecutor's Office is characterized by an absolute discipline and a professionalism in the work of employees, as well as an individual initiative. Therefore, Russian Prosecutor’s Office has its unique appearance, professional culture and reputation, - according to the scientific work of Valery Koshlevsky focused on “Place and role of the Prosecutor’s Office in the Russian state mechanism.”

As Director General of the Presidential Library Alexander Vershinin highlighted at the end of the year gone by, one of the priorities of the institution in 2017 remains adding the author's abstracts on the Law with a focus on the accomplishments of the Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation to the library stock.