ATTORNEY – A PROFESSION IN THE SHADOW OF THE TOTALITARIAN SYSTEM
Abstract
The place in our Society of the profession of a lawyer – someone who is supposed to defend the rights and interests of the citizen and represents one of the unchangeable actors of the legal field of the modern state – is not thoroughly studied and analyzed in the social and political history of our Society. Other aspects, such as the transformation of the legal environment during the last two centuries, the form and practice of the judicial system of the Russian Empire in the Caucasus, the process of reforming the judicial system and establishing a democratic legal environment in the First Republic of Georgia – are just not investigated thoroughly. The question remains beyond the public and scientific discussion – what was the fundamental impact of the 70-year Soviet Russian occupation and totalitarian regime on the idea, theory and practice of law? Therefore, Today, it is difficult for a citizen or a representative of the legal field to look past historical guidelines, to observe the experience of system reform and modernization, to record, understand and overcome the legacy of totalitarianism in this one of the primary areas defining democratic statehood, while analyzing the modern challenges.
In this article, we will review the main elements of the Russian imperial judicial system and the place of attorneys in it. The experience of political and professional mobilization of the lawyers’ community made a significant contribution to the implementation of the fundamental reform of the court after the establishment of the Democratic Republic of Georgia. All of this made it possible to establish a modern judicial system and put it into practice, which was utterly destroyed and replaced by Soviet Russia after military aggression and occupation. These cataclysms also reflected on the legal status and physical existence of the community of attorneys. The article mainly focuses on the description and analysis of the dismantling of the existing democratic legal system by the Soviet Russian occupation regime and its replacement with a totalitarian model, as well as the unsuccessful attempts at professional adaptation of lawyers in this system.
