page_title: History of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (1648–1764)
section_title: Magnate oligarchies, decline of central government
hierarchical_section_title: History of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (1648–1764) / Wars fought to protect territorial integrity, decline of government / Magnate oligarchies, decline of central government
caption_attribution_description: English: Election of Michał Korybut Wiśniowiecki on Wola fields in 1669. A-Horse shed, B-Election place, C-Parsonage of nuncio Marescolti, D-Gate, E-Guards (polskie gwardie przyboczne), F-Carts 1-Nuncio, 2-Primate, 3-Bishop of Kraków, 4 and 5 Benchs for Senators and Bishops.
context_page_description: The history of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (1648–1764) covers a period in the history of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, from the time their joint state became the theater of wars and invasions fought on a great scale in the middle of the 17th century, to the time just before the election of Stanisław August Poniatowski, the last king of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.
  From the 17th century, the nobles' democracy, experienced devastating wars and fell into internal disorder and then anarchy, and as a result declined. The once powerful Commonwealth had become vulnerable to internal warfare and foreign intervention. In 1648 the Cossack Khmelnytsky Uprising engulfed the south and east of the vast Polish–Lithuanian state, and was soon followed by a Swedish invasion, which raged through core Polish lands. Warfare with the Cossacks and Russia left Ukraine divided; the eastern part, lost by the Commonwealth, became a dependency of the Tsardom of Russia. John III Sobieski, who fought protracted wars against the Ottoman Empire, revived the Commonwealth's military might once more. In one decisive engagement he helped in 1683 to deliver Vienna from a Turkish onslaught.
context_section_description: The reigns of John II Casimir Vasa, Michael Korybut Wiśniowiecki and John III Sobieski brought further downgrading and loss of effectiveness of governmental authority, both in the domain of royal control and in the areas of legislative (central and local) ability to function and power. With the diminished fortunes of regular szlachta, the struggle for power and the rather feeble, but still present attempts to reform the system took place within the changing alliances of powerful magnates and royal courts. From the time of John Casimir and his wife Marie Louise, who cared about the well-being of the Commonwealth, but were obsessively preoccupied with the issue of royal succession, the Polish–Lithuanian state was informally divided into a number of territorial domains, practically controlled by regional top feudal lords, inclined to pursue their private and familial interests in the first place.
  Janusz Radziwiłł, the most powerful magnate of Lithuania, is credited with being responsible for the first instance of the liberum veto act, which was used to break the deliberations of the sejm of 1652. This widely abused practice eventually led to a paralysis of most of significant legislative activity, and through their szlachta surrogates was used by foreign powers to prevent internal reform in the Commonwealth.
  John Casimir's poor relations with the magnates contributed to his initial alienation from the Commonwealth's nobility and armed forces in 1655 at the time of the Swedish Deluge. In 1658 the King, supported by the more patriotic faction of the szlachta, postulated a reform program, which included the introduction of majority voting rules in parliamentary assemblies. The proposal was supported by the Senate in 1658 and considered by the Sejm, which in 1659 established a committee for implementing new procedures, but the reforms soon became a victim of disagreements over the vivente rege and royal succession issues. Although during the sejm of 1661 John Casimir predicted and warned of partition of the Commonwealth by Russia, Brandenburg and Austria if unsettled successions cause significant interregnum periods, by that time the reform program had been defeated and the army remained unpaid.
  Hetman Jerzy Sebastian Lubomirski was the central figure among the opposition responsible for the defeat of the royal couple's undertakings and attempted reforms. With his inspiration confederations of unpaid soldiers were established in 1661 in the Crown and in Lithuania. The army confederations lasted for two years, forced the parliament to come up with large sums of money, devastated estates and put an end to what was left of the reform processes.
  Marie Louise tried to force Lubomirski to leave the country. In 1664 he was accused of high treason and sentenced by the sejm court to banishment, confiscation of property, infamy and removal from state offices held. Lubomirski sought imperial protection in Silesia, where he gathered an army and conducted diplomatic activities aimed at forming an international coalition against the Polish King.
  In 1665 Lubomirski entered the Commonwealth in an act of open rebellion known as Lubomirski's Rokosz. The main military confrontation took place in July 1666 near Inowrocław (Battle of Mątwy), where rebel forces slaughtered thousands of the King's best troops. The victory brought no great advantage to Lubomirski, who left the country again and soon died, but John Casimir was obliged to formally abandon his and the Queen's vivente rege election attempts. After the contentious and broken sejm of 1668, the King abdicated and rejected numerous appeals for reconsideration. He still took steps to influence his succession, apologized for his errors (the balance of the reign was clearly negative) and predicted again the ultimate demise of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.
  With the disintegration of the system, and of the functionality of central and local parliamentary assemblies in particular, confederations had assumed an important role, as a substitute but necessary mode of governance. Confederations, w
caption: Election of King Michał Korybut Wiśniowiecki on Wola fields in 1669
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