The word "veto" itself means "I forbid" in Latin. This capricious expression, however, firmly entered the vocabulary of lawyers and politicians. It is believed that for the first time the veto was applied in ancient Rome, during the time of the Republic; it was also called the "law of the stands." The stands - the citizens of Rome, chosen from the plebs to represent the interests of the townspeople - could veto, namely, impose a ban, recall decisions adopted by the Senate or the magistrate. Such a ban was also called intercession. The only person whose decrees were not subject to such restrictions was the dictator of the Republic.
Thus, the veto is a refusal to adopt any bill or policy decision adopted by the authorized body, another legal entity (person or body), and this refusal has legal force. In the political sphere, this means the power to revoke, suspend or prohibit decrees and decisions adopted by the relevant authority. Such power may be partial or absolute.
After Ancient Rome, the practice of veto was not applied until the 17th century, until the formation of the Commonwealth, the union of the states of Lithuania and Poland. In a vote of the supreme state body of the Sejm (parliament) , a law was adopted on the “Libero Veto” (on a free veto, translated from Latin). The Commonwealth's speech was guided by the law of Nihil novi (that is, the Radom Constitution), according to which the king could not legislate without the consent of the entire gentry. Shlyahtichi of the Diet were elected by the local Diet in order to represent the interests of their locality in it. Since the state was federal in nature, where all regions had equal rights, a tradition arose to give the possibility of prohibitions to each parliamentarian. The decision was considered adopted when all members of the Seimas voted for it. It is believed that for the first time in Poland, the veto was used in 1669 by the representative of Kiev, Adam Olizar.
The enemies of Poland - Prussia and Russia - took advantage of this procedural moment existing in the legislation of the Commonwealth. They bribed the gentry, who used their veto power to block certain decisions, and thereby weakened the rival state. In the first half of the eighteenth century, this practice became common for sessions of the Sejm, and meetings were disrupted, barely having time to begin. This continued until May 3, 1791, when the Confederate Four-year Seimas adopted the new Constitution, which established the principle of decision-making by majority vote.
However, the very principle of recalling decrees or blocking decisions continues to live in the policies of many countries and in decision-making procedures of interstate organizations. Some presidential-parliamentary republics have a veto power.
It can be absolute (resolutive): in this case, the president has the right to finally reject the law adopted by parliament. In case of a relative (suspensive or suspensive) veto, the president only stops the entry into force of the bill, and the parliament has the right to adopt it by repeated vote by a qualified majority of votes (in the United States and the Russian Federation, this is two-thirds of the parliamentarians of each house). With a partial or selective veto, the head of state has the right to reject articles or parts of laws and acts.
Although the United Nations Charter does not say a word about vetoing, this right is actively used there. Five permanent members of the Security Council have the right to veto the UN - Russia, Great Britain, the USA, France and China. From the very beginning, the application of the practice of freezing a UN decision by a country with this right has led to human rights violations. Thus, the UN Security Council can not adopt a resolution condemning Israel’s policy of seizing territories, and other important decisions, since the representative of the countries using the right of veto uses it to fail this issue. This, of course, causes serious criticism from many UN member states.