[citation needed] In 1792 he negotiated in vain with a Saxon delegation on the introduction of the hereditary transmission of the Polish crown to the King of Saxony.

In 1799, he was nevertheless arrested in Warsaw and imprisoned for a year in Kraków as a state prisoner, being accused of responsibility for a meeting of the Polish Sejm in Milan.

[3] From his youth Małachowski laboured zealously for the good of his country, and as president of the royal court of justice won the honourable title of the "Polish Aristides".

Accurately gauging the situation, Małachowski speedily gathered round him all those who were striving to uphold the falling Commonwealth and warmly supported every promising project of reform.

Disappointed in his hopes by the overthrow of the constitution, he resigned office and left the country in 1792, going first to Italy and subsequently to his estates in Galicia, where he was imprisoned for a time on a false suspicion of conspiracy.

In the negotiations with the Austrian government concerning the Galician salt-mines, Małachowski came to the assistance of the depleted treasury by hypothesising all his estates as an additional guarantee.