In his youth, he was a revolutionary, and pro-independence, politician associated with the Polish Socialist Party (PPS). He was the defense attorney in political trials in 1905-1907 and a co-organizer of the judiciary during the First World War and in the reborn Poland. He was also the professor of criminal law at the University of Warsaw, and designer of the Polish Penal Code of 1932 and of the draft of the Constitution of 1935. In the interwar period, he pursued a political career, serving as the Minister of Justice as many as seven times; he was also a Sejm deputy, Marshal of the Sejm, senator, and Deputy Marshal of the Senate. His works include Zbrodnie, kary i sądy wyjątkowe (1911), Przyczynek do psychologii kryminalnej (1914), Prawo karne. Część ogólna (1920), and Państwo społeczne (1936).