Professor Andor Csizmadia (1910–1985) is renowned as one of the most outstanding figures of Hungarian legal history in the second part of the 20th century. There are two well-established reasons for dealing with his scientific career rich in achievements at the conference on “The Constitutional system of the Habsburg monarchy in the last decades before its fall. The search for the elements of Rechtsstaat” held in Krakow within the framework of the co-operation between the Departments of Legal History of the Universities of Pécs and Krakow on 22–26 October 2007. On the one hand, Andor Csizmadia was doctor honoris causa of the Jagiellonian University. On the other hand, his studies presenting the findings in his main fields of research are always intertwined with the analysis of the constitutional and legal history of dualism. It follows that the many-sided evaluation of his research into the dualistic era would be impossible without first gaining some insight into his life achievement.

It should be noted that Hungarian law applied the principle of legal continuity in 1919–1944, consequently the late dualistic law formed a substantial part of the law in effect in the first part of the 20th century – thus Csizmadia, the future legal historian, as a civil servant applied the effective law which he later studied as public administration and law of the past and described in its historical context. Andor Csizmadia filled in positions in central social administration after 1945.