Добри, поштени и праведни у српским законим 19. века - језичка и културолошка анализа

Abstract

One of the greatest challenges of mankind is the comprehension of the meaning and role of moral norms and rules and their application in human conduct. The aim of this paper revolves around a linguistic and cultural analysis of the Constitution and Laws from the 19th century with the goal to observe, highlight and analyze grammatical and lexical constructions which denote just, fair and, in general terms, good officers of the law. The second part of the analysis is concerned with the cultural framework that influenced the making and execution of these laws. The corpus is limited to examples of legal and administrative registers from the 1830s and 1840s. We employed analytical and descriptive methods. One can note that despite the constant insistence on bringing competent people to do the appropriate governmental functions, the reality is quite different. Political opportunities, the age of absolutism and human nature as such have established people with lower moral values in positions of power whose demeanor had to be sanctioned by law.