Review article

The 1930 Notaries Public Act of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia: Participation of Notaries Public in Probate Hearings – Experiences from the Past

Mirela Krešić ; Faculty of Law, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia

Abstract

During the interwar period, the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was characterized by legal particularism, or rather the existence of legal areas with different legal sources. The process of unification of law, although initiated immediately after the establishment of the new state, was not entirely successful, nor was it completed during the state’s existence. An example of the non-uniformity of the legal order was the institution of the notary public. Notaries public existed only in the Kingdom’s former Austro-Hungarian territories (Slovenia, Dalmatia, Croatia and Slavonia, Vojvodina), albeit differently regulated, while the remaining territories had no such institution. The most significant decision which should have been made with reference to notaries public was the decision as to whether or not the notary institution should be expanded to the rest of Yugoslavia’s territory. The conclusion on retaining notaries public resulted in the enactment of the Notaries Public Act of 1930 in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. However, difficulties arose at the very beginning of application of this law, as it did not enter into force in all parts of the state, but only in those areas which already had organized notary public activity. The most significant argument in favour of acceptance of notaries public was the advantage of their participation in probate hearings. Due to the burden on the courts and in the interest of accelerating procedures, notaries public, as officers of the court, conducted probate hearings and handled a series of other tasks linked to the probate process. The participation of notaries in probate hearings was at the same time a point of contention in the ever-present debates on the actual need for this institution’s existence. Thus, an argument against the notaries was that it was unnecessary to expose future heirs to expenses, for the job done by notaries public for a fee could have been done by probate courts free of charge. The debates on notaries public stopped during and at the end of the Second World War, first with the decision of the authorities of the Independent State of Croatia to end the institution of notaries public for the Croatian territories in 1941, and then with the authorities of the new socialist Yugoslavia making a decision to the same effect in 1944.

Keywords

notary public; officer of the court; probate hearings; Kingdom of Yugoslavia

Hrčak ID:

109710

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/109710

Publication date:

6.5.2013.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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