The History of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (1764–1795) is concerned with the final decades of existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The period, during which the declining state pursued wide-ranging reforms and was subjected to three partitions by the neighboring powers, coincides with the election and reign of the federation's last king, Stanisław August Poniatowski.
During the later part of the 18th century, the Commonwealth attempted fundamental internal reforms. The reform activity provoked hostile reaction and eventually military response on the part of the surrounding states. The second half of the century brought improved economy and significant growth of the population. The most populous capital city of Warsaw replaced Danzig (Gdańsk) as the leading trade center, and the role of the more prosperous urban strata was increasing. The last decades of the independent Commonwealth existence were characterized by intense reform movements and far-reaching progress in the areas of education, intellectual life, arts and sciences, and especially toward the end of the period, evolution of the social and political system.
The royal election of 1764 resulted in the elevation of Stanisław August Poniatowski, a refined and worldly aristocrat connected to a major magnate faction, but hand-picked and imposed by Empress Catherine II of Russia, who expected Poniatowski to be her obedient follower. The King accordingly spent his reign torn between his desire to implement reforms necessary to save the state, and his perceived necessity of remaining in subordinate relationship with his Russian sponsors. The Bar Confederation of 1768 was a szlachta rebellion directed against Russia and the Polish king, fought to preserve Poland's independence and in support of szlachta'''s traditional causes. It was brought under control and followed in 1772 by the First Partition of the Commonwealth, a permanent encroachment on the outer Commonwealth provinces by the Russian Empire, the Kingdom of Prussia and Habsburg Austria. The "Partition Sejm" under duress "ratified" the partition fait accompli. In 1773 the Sejm established the Commission of National Education, a pioneering in Europe government education authority.
The long-lasting sejm convened by Stanisław August in 1788 is known as the Great, or Four-Year Sejm. The Sejm's landmark achievement was the passing of the May 3 Constitution, the first in modern Europe singular pronouncement of a supreme law of the state. The reformist but moderate document, accused by detractors of French Revolution sympathies, soon generated strong opposition coming from the Commonwealth's upper nobility conservative circles and Catherine II, determined to prevent a rebirth of a strong Commonwealth. The nobility's Targowica Confederation appealed to the Empress for help and in May 1792 the Russian army entered the territory of the Commonwealth. The defensive war fought by the forces of the Commonwealth ended when the King, convinced of the futility of resistance, capitulated by joining the Targowica Confederation. The Confederation took over the government, but Russia and Prussia in 1793 arranged for and executed the Second Partition of the Commonwealth, which left the country with critically reduced territory, practically incapable of independent existence.
The radicalized by the recent events reformers, in the still nominally Commonwealth area and in exile, were soon working on national insurrection preparations. Tadeusz Kościuszko was chosen as its leader; the popular general came from abroad and on March 24, 1794 in Cracow (Kraków) declared a national uprising under his command. Kościuszko emancipated and enrolled in his army many peasants, but the hard-fought insurrection, strongly supported also by urban plebeian masses, proved incapable of generating the necessary foreign collaboration and aid. It ended suppressed by the forces of Russia and Prussia, with Warsaw captured in November. The third and final partition of the Commonwealth was undertaken again by all three partitioning powers, and in 1795 the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth effectively ceased to exist.
Economic transformations and beginnings of capitalist development
Revitalized economy, serfdom, agricultural rent and hired labor Commencing primarily in the second half of the 18th century, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth experienced economic transformations, which culminated in the formation of a capitalist system a century later. The more advanced West European countries were a source of examples of economic progress and formulated the ideology of Enlightenment, which provided theoretical foundations for the Polish undertakings. Industrial development, population growth and frequent warfare in the West increased the demand for agricultural products, which resulted in improved, for the agriculture-dominated Commonwealth, market situation: from the 1760s prices kept growing for farm and forest products imported from the East. The Commonwealth's grain exports reached again the high levels of the early 17th century. The internal market for produce was making gradual progress as well, because of increasing population of towns and because of urban people abandoning the agricultural labor market, which many of them had joined in times of high economic stress. Agricultural producers were able again to invest in their trade.
Despite these favorable conditions, the degree of the economic change and whether it had reached a turning point is a matter of dispute. The Commonwealth started from a very low level of economic activity early in the 18th century and its rate of growth remained less than half of that of highly developed countries, such as Great Britain or France. The relative economic backwardness had therefore remained and was one of the underlying reasons for the political and military weakness of the state.
Because of conservative resistance to changes, despite a multitude of self-help books available, agricultural economy and agrarian social relations were changing slowly. Potato cultivation was becoming more common first in Silesia and Pomerania. More typically agricultural improvements were being introduced in the western provinces of the Commonwealth, Greater Poland and Pomerelia (Gdańsk Pomerania), but overall grain yields had not yet reached the productivity of the Renaissance economy.
Enlightenment political and economic publicists had become preoccupied with promoting fundamental alteration of social aspects of agricultural production, in particular with serfdom and the necessity of its reform. Insufficient productivity and quality of output of folwark enterprises was increasingly forcing their szlachta operators to supplant or supplement the overburdened serf labor with agricultural hired work force and rent of farmland.
A pool of agricultural laborers, the "loose" people, often subjected to restrictions, were in demand and enticed by published wage tariffs in times of labor shortages. Feudal rent offered enterprising peasants more independence and ability to get ahead, if fees were reasonable. Such alternative arrangements were practiced in a minority of landed estates, most often in the western provinces of the Commonwealth. Oppressive serfdom had remained the dominant form of agricultural production throughout the vast ranges of Poland and Lithuania.
Manufacturing industry and trade
The level of economic prosperity in the Commonwealth was largely determined by its agricultural production, but for the fundamental transformation that the country experienced in the second half of the 18th century, the changes taking place in the cities and within the industrial sphere were of crucial importance. At the outset manufacturing and crafts were underdeveloped in comparison with Prussia, Austria and Russia. The hurried efforts to close the half-century delay and industrialization gap that took place especially during the last three decades of the Commonwealth's existence, were only partially successful.
The industrialization process, initiated by landed magnates in the first half of the 18th century, intensified during its second half, when burgher entrepreneurship also became a significant component. Important for the development of manufacturing, mining and industrial financing was the leadership of King Stanisław August Poniatowski, from the early years of his reign. Production workshops were most highly developed in the cities of Greater Poland, in Danzig and Pomerelia, Warsaw, Cracow area and some magnate estates in the east. Of the heavy industries, iron production and processing had become most significant, especially in the Old-Polish Industrial Region. The second half of the 18th century brought also heavy industry (metallurgy and mining) to the border region of Upper Silesia.
The stronger position of urban entrepreneurs was also a result of the revitalized trade. Under the King's leadership, steps were taken that led to the abolishment of nobility's monopoly on various trade activities, which made capital concentration in the hands of burgher merchants feasible. The Commonwealth was, however, being subjected to discriminatory trade practices (such as high custom duties, tariffs and fees) imposed by Prussia, Austria and Russia, the Commonwealth's stronger neighbors. Paved roads and inland waterways were constructed or improved by state authorities to facilitate the increased trade. Burgher dominated investment financing and general lending, previously concentrated in Danzig, was now done mainly in Warsaw and also in Poznań. The huge fortune accumulated by the banker Piotr Tepper, who came from a non-noble family, was an indication of changing times.
The Commonwealth's balance of trade was negative until the 1780s. The decreased role of Danzig was in part due to the Prussian harassment of the city. Prussian policies also weakened the previously vital exchanges between Silesia and the Commonwealth. Warsaw, the new great commercial center, was crucial for the considerably intensified internal trade. There were also regional trade centers such as Cracow, which served western Lesser Poland and eastern Upper Silesia. The First Partition lessened trade contacts with southern Lesser Poland and Pomerania, incorporated into Austria and Prussia.
Social evolution and early formation of a modern nation
Changing population patterns during the partitions period; peasantry
Early social transformations of the multinational, nobility-dominated Commonwealth population were taking place during the period of the three partitions. To varying degrees they affected all the main strata of the society: peasants, burghers and nobility. The ethnic composition of the Commonwealth was changing with the reduced territory.
The population, estimated at no more than seven million at the end of the Great Northern War, acquired a few additional millions by the time of the First Partition. Western Poland (Kraków and Poznań regions) was much more densely populated than the vast areas in the east. After the Second Partition, the much reduced territory (from 730,000;km2 in 1772 to 200,000;km2 in 1793) contained only 4 million inhabitants. Peasants constituted three-fourths of the pre-partitions population, the growing urban strata 17-20%, and the nobility with clergy 8-10%. The population before the First Partition was two-thirds ethnically Polish or Polonized, with the minorities distributed primarily among the non-noble classes.