Sejm of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in the context of "Sejm of the Kingdom of Poland"

The szlachta (Polish pronunciation: [ˈʂlaxta] ; Lithuanian: šlėkta; lit. 'nobility') , the nobles, were the noble estate of the realm in the Kingdom of Poland, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. It was the dominating social class in the Kingdom of Poland and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which was exercising political rights and power. Szlachta as a class differed substantially from the feudal nobility of Western Europe. The estate was officially abolished in 1921 by the March Constitution.

The origins of the szlachta are obscure and the subject of several theories. The szlachta secured substantial and increasing political power and rights throughout its history, beginning with the reign of King Casimir III the Great between 1333 and 1370 in the Kingdom of Poland until the decline and end of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in the late 18th century. Apart from providing officers for the army, its chief civic obligations included electing the monarch and filling honorary and advisory roles at court that would later evolve into the upper legislative chamber, the Senate. The szlachta electorate also took part in the government of the Commonwealth via the lower legislative chamber of the Sejm (bicameral national parliament), composed of representatives elected at local sejmiks (local szlachta assemblies). Sejmiks performed various governmental functions at local levels, such as appointing officials and overseeing judicial and financial governance, including tax-raising. The szlachta assumed various governing positions, including voivode, marshal of voivodeship, castellan, and starosta.

Golden Liberty (Latin: Aurea Libertas; Polish: Złota Wolność [ˈzwɔ.ta ˈvɔl.nɔɕt͡ɕ], Lithuanian: Auksinė laisvė), sometimes referred to as Golden Freedoms, Nobles' Democracy or Nobles' Commonwealth (Polish: Rzeczpospolita Szlachecka or Złota wolność szlachecka) was a political system in the Kingdom of Poland and, after the Union of Lublin (1569), in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Under that system, all nobles (szlachta), regardless of rank, economic status or their ethnic background were considered to have equal legal status and enjoyed extensive legal rights and privileges. The nobility controlled the legislature (the Sejm—the parliament) and the Commonwealth's elected king.

In the history of Poland, a royal city or royal town (Polish: miasto królewskie) was an urban settlement within the crown lands (Polish: królewszczyzna).

The most influential royal cities enjoyed voting rights during the free election period in Poland (1572–1791). These cities were Gdańsk, Warsaw, Kraków, Poznań, Lwów, Wilno, Toruń, Lublin, Kamieniec and Elbląg. Other important royal cities included Gniezno (ecclesiastical capital of Poland and former capital of early medieval Poland), Płock (former capital of medieval Poland), Piotrków (second most important political center of Poland in the early and mid-16th century as the main location of the Sejm, and then the main Crown Tribunal location alongside Lublin, thus one of the two judiciary capitals of Poland), Grodno (de facto capital of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in the 1580s and then the general sejm location alongside Warsaw), Bydgoszcz and Kalisz (temporary locations of the Crown Tribunal), and Sandomierz, Przemyśl, Kazimierz.

Stanisław II August (born Stanisław Antoni Poniatowski; 17 January 1732 – 12 February 1798), known also by his regnal Latin name Stanislaus II Augustus, and as Stanisław August Poniatowski (Lithuanian: Stanislovas Augustas Poniatovskis), was King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1764 to 1795, and the last monarch of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.

Born into wealthy Polish aristocracy, Poniatowski arrived as a diplomat at the Russian imperial court in Saint Petersburg in 1755 at the age of 22 and became intimately involved with the future empress Catherine the Great. With her aid, he was elected King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania by the Sejm in September 1764 following the death of Augustus III. Contrary to expectations, Poniatowski attempted to reform and strengthen the large but ailing Commonwealth. His efforts were met with external opposition from neighbouring Prussia, Russia and Austria, all committed to keeping the Commonwealth weak. From within he was opposed by conservative interests, which saw the reforms as a threat to their traditional liberties and privileges granted centuries earlier.

Royal Prussia (Polish: Prusy Królewskie; German: Königlich-Preußen or Preußen Königlichen Anteils, Kashubian: Królewsczé Prësë) or Polish Prussia (Polish: Prusy Polskie; German: Polnisch-Preußen) became a province of the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland, which was annexed following the Second Peace of Thorn (1466) from territory in Pomerelia and western Prussia which had been part of the State of the Teutonic Order. Royal Prussia retained its autonomy, governing itself and maintaining its own laws, customs, and rights.

In 1569, Royal Prussia was fully integrated into the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland and its autonomy was largely abolished. As a result, the Royal Prussian parliament was incorporated into the Sejm of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. In 1772 and 1793, after the first and second partition of Poland, the former territory of Royal Prussia was annexed by the Kingdom of Prussia and subsequently re-organized into the province of West Prussia. This occurred at the time of the First Partition of Poland, with other parts of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth being annexed by the Russian Empire and Habsburg Austria.

Polish Americans (Polish: Polscy Amerykanie) are Americans who are of full or partial Polish origin. Polish settlement in the United States started in the mid-19th century. The flow of people has fluctuated over time depending upon conditions in Poland and the United States. The Polish American population is concentrated around the Great Lakes and the Mid-Atlantic. Illinois, New York, Michigan, and Pennsylvania are the states with the largest populations though none of them contain more than 15% of the Polish American population.

Poland has a long history of republicanism going back to the establishment of the first national legislature, the Sejm of the Kingdom of Poland, in 1386. This legislature became bicameral in 1493. Poland and Lithuania formed a federated state in 1569 with the establishment of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. In this commonwealth of two nations there was a joint legislature called the General Sejm. An elective monarchy was started in 1572. Influenced by the Constitution of the United States, the commonwealth enacted a written constitution called the Constitution of 3 May 1791.

The 1793 Second Partition of Poland was the second of three partitions (or partial annexations) that ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth by 1795. The second partition occurred in the aftermath of the Polish–Russian War of 1792 and the Targowica Confederation of 1792, and was approved by its territorial beneficiaries, the Russian Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia. The division was ratified by the coerced Polish parliament (Sejm) in 1793 (see the Grodno Sejm) in a short-lived attempt to prevent the inevitable complete annexation of Poland, the Third Partition.

The Great Sejm, also known as the Four-Year Sejm (Polish: Sejm Wielki or Sejm Czteroletni; Lithuanian: Didysis seimas or Ketverių metų seimas) was a Sejm (parliament) of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth that was held in Warsaw between 1788 and 1792. Its principal aim became to restore sovereignty to, and reform, the Commonwealth politically and economically.

The Sejm's great achievement was the adoption of the Constitution of 3 May 1791, often described as Europe's first modern written national constitution, and the world's second, after the United States Constitution. The Polish Constitution was designed to redress long-standing political defects of the federative Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and its system of Golden Liberties. The Constitution introduced political equality between townspeople and nobility and placed the peasants under the protection of the government, thus mitigating the worst abuses of serfdom. The Constitution abolished pernicious parliamentary institutions such as the liberum veto, which at one time had placed a sejm at the mercy of any deputy who might choose, or be bribed by an interest or foreign power, to undo all the legislation that had been passed by that sejm. The 3 May Constitution sought to supplant the existing anarchy engineered by some of the country's reactionary magnates, with a more egalitarian and democratic constitutional monarchy.

Rejtan, or the Fall of Poland (Polish: Rejtan. Upadek Polski) is an oil painting by the Polish artist Jan Matejko, finished in 1866, depicting the protest of Tadeusz Rejtan (lower right) against the First Partition of Poland during the Partition Sejm of 1773. Tadeusz Rejtan was a member of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth's Sejm, known for his opposition to the First Partition of Poland in 1773 by physically trying to prevent delegates from leaving the chamber to stop the ratification of the partition. The Sejm was heavily influenced by foreign powers, with delegates being bribed or threatened, while Russia, Prussia, and Austria justified their annexation of Polish territory as a response to the internal conflicts of the Bar Confederation.

Jan Matejko's composition depicts the scene in the manner of academic history painting, placing Rejtan in a central position with a dramatic gesture, surrounded by figures who appear complicit with the foreign demands, including members of the future Targowica Confederation and Russian ambassador Nicholas Repnin. Despite causing controversy and receiving mixed reviews at the time of its initial display to the public in 1866, Matejko's work was later recognized for its cultural significance in Poland, depicting themes of political resistance and critique. Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria subsequently acquired the painting, which was displayed in Vienna until 1920.