The king’s war plans. The extraordinary sejm in Warsaw. 1647.

The sejm was convened in March and the pre-sejm sejmiks were held in April of 1647. The sejm began debating on 2 April 1647. Stanisław Sarbiewski, starost [“starostwo” was a Polish term for eldership office] of Grabowiec, was elected the marshal of the Chamber of Deputies. The debates focused mainly on the king Władysław IV’s plans of war against the Ottoman Empire, which were taken in a rather left-handed manner. Another issue were king’s debts, directly affecting the finance condition of the state. The proceedings were also perturbed by accusation of the Lithuanian hetman Janusz Radziwiłł, a Calvinist, casted by the bishop of Vilnius, Benedykt Wojna, insinuating that Radziwiłł committed desecration of crosses in a village belonging to him. The turbulent discussion was ended by the marshal Sarbiewski. Moreover, a huge uproar in the Chamber of Deputies was caused by the proposal of the Crown Sword-bearer, Jan Jabłonowski, on restricting the unanimity rule in voting. The sejm was prolonged, with consent of the Chamber of Deputies, for a few additional days and dissolved on 27 May 1647.

See: A. S. Radziwiłł, Pamiętnik o dziejach w Polsce [Memoirs of Polish history], t. 3 1647-1656, Translated and edited by A. Przyboś i R. Żelewski, Warszawa 1980, s. 15-42; W. Czapliński, Sejm w latach 1587-1696 [Sejm in period 1587-1696], in: Historia sejmu polskiego [The history of Polish sejm], t. 1, Warszawa 1984, red. J. Michalski, s. 217-299. E. Opaliński, Sejm srebrnego wieku 1587-1652. Między głosowaniem większościowym a liberum veto [Sejm of the Silver Age 1587-1652. Betwixt majority voting and liberum veto] , Warszawa 2001; Ustawodawstwo zob. Volumina Constitutionum, T. 4, cz. 1, Design and layout prepared by S. Grodziski, Marcin Kwiecień, K. Fokt, Foreword W. Uruszczak, Warszawa 2015, s. 90-121.