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oyars, the clergy legal residents, neighboring boyars and peasants, who had not
accepted town rights.
Internal order in towns changed along with the laws regarding towns. The role
of the boyars was exceptional as the town municipalities were forming and as they
were being reorganized. Residents of towns and townships relied on the boyars for
their experience and sought their assistance in the struggles with elderships and
royal estate administrations. It could be said that the towns movement would not
have grown so widely without participation by the boyar social stratum. Central
governmental institutions in small and large towns also encouraged boyars to
become involved in the work of the municipalities.
Grand Duchy stratum of nobles did not accept townspeople’s rights as
actively and, not infrequently, this was also due to prompting by the ruler. Even
the initiators of the reforms did not expect such an active movement in the towns
and townships. It was inconceivable to the aristocrats of the Age of Enlightenment
that illiterate people (who were the absolute majority of the townships and small
townships) should be granted extended rights, freedom to elect a municipality,
the ability to independently decide their town’s matters, collect taxes and, once
acquiring such certain rights of citizenship, the possibility, albeit a theoretical
one, to influence national processes. Thusly eldership administrators of small
townships often classified residents along with peasants. Meanwhile the efforts
by townspeople to gain the rights of personal inviolability and property security,
which the new law guaranteed, would turn into open conflicts with the eldership
and estate administrators.
Town officials who had been protecting municipal traditions up to the Four-
Year Sejm changed along with the new order of municipal elections. The frequent
outbreaks of conflicts during the April 1792 elections indicate that new people
were breaking into town municipalities, which means that the model of oligarchic
rule was withdrawing from towns, and more democratic municipalities were
developing. Every owner had the chance at a position, therefore some unpopular
officials had to withdraw from office or take a more humble position in the
municipal hierarchy. In small townships, the priority was given to their most
active citizens, and boyars elected as vaitas (akin to prefects) especially frequently
stepped in to lead them.
During the time of the movement, the townspeople especially focused on
recovering the townspeople community’s property, which the old, professed
patents of rights guaranteed or which the lustration and inventory established. As
signs of unity with other towns were forming, matters of specific, local importance
comprised most of the requests directed to the ruler and to the Sejm. The attention
of the townspeople concentrated on the past. Despite the expansion of rights and
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