Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-5g6vh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-28T12:06:15.387Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

China's Changing Constitution

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

Extract

An organization must have rules, and so must a state. A constitution is a set of general rules, it is the fundamental law.… Constitution-making is a matter of science.Mao Tse-tung On 5 March 1978 the People's Republic of China promulgated its second constitution in little more than three years and the third since its establishment in 1949. What functions does a constitution serve in the Chinese political-legal system? Is it a sham not worth the paper on which it is printed? Is it an artifice of propaganda designed to impress and mislead foreigners? Does it have legal as well as political significance? The 1954 Constitution was not revised for two decades – why then was its 1975 successor so quickly overtaken by events? What are the differences among these basic documents?

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 1978

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Mao Tse-tung, , “On the draft constitution of the People's Republic of China,” 14 June 1954 in Selected Works (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1977), Vol. V, pp. 141, 14546.Google Scholar

2. An English translation of the new constitution can be found in Documents of the First Session of the Fifth National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1978), pp. 125–72.Google ScholarAn English translation of the 1975 version can be found in The Constitution of the People's Republic of China (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1975).Google ScholarAn English translation of the 1954 document can be found in Documents of the First National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1955), pp. 131–63. All quotations from these constitutions are from those translations unless otherwise indicated, but the term “procuracy” has been substituted for the more awkward and less familiar “procuratorate.”Google Scholar

3. Wang Chung-hui, “Law reform in China,” The Chinese Social and Political Science Review, Vol. II, No. 2 (June 1917), p. 13.Google Scholar

4. Bevan, L. R. O., “China's constitutions,” The Chinese Social and Political Science Review, Vol. II, No. 4 (December 1917), pp. 89, 92.Google Scholar

5. Wang, , “Law reform in China,” p. 14. For English translations of the two principal documents promulgated by the Manchu government, the “Principles of constitution” of 1908 and “The nineteen articles” of 1911,Google Scholarsee Tung, William L., The Political Institutions of Modern China (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1964), pp. 318–19, 320–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6. For an English translation of that document, see Tung, , The Political Institutions of Modern China, pp. 322–25. Literature on the Manchu flirtation with constitutionalism and its Republican sequel is extensive.Google ScholarIn addition to the other sources cited in this article, Ch'ien, Tuan-sheng, The Government and Politics of China (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1950) is an informative analysis on which I have generally relied.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

7. Bevan, , “China's constitutions,” p. 90.Google Scholar

8. For a valuable, in-depth study of the political currents that shaped this document, see Nathan, Andrew J., Peking Politics 1918–23, Factionalism and the Failure of Constitutionalism (Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California Press, 1976).Google ScholarFor an English translation of the 1923 Constitution, see Ch'ien, , The Government and Politics of China, p. 436.Google Scholar

9. For an English translation of the 1931 Provisional Constitution, see Tung, , The Political Institutions of Modern China, pp. 344–49.Google Scholar

10. Ch'ien, , The Government and Politics of China, p. 308.Google ScholarFor an intelligent analysis of some of the Kuomintang's early post-1931 dilemmas concerning constitutionalism, see Eastman, Lloyd E., The Abortive Revolution, China under Nationalist Rule, 1927–1937 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1974), especially pp. 159–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

11. Scott Quigley, Harold, “The constitution of China,” The American Political Science Review, Vol. 18, No. 2 (1924), pp. 346, 350.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

12. For an English translation of the 1946 Constitution, see Ch'ien, , The Government and Politics of China, p. 447.Google ScholarFor an interesting discussion of this document by Dean Roscoe Pound, who served as adviser to the Chinese Ministry of Justice, see “The Chinese constitution,” New York University Law Quarterly Review, Vol. 23, No. 3 (1948), pp. 194232.Google ScholarSee also Tsao, W. Y., The Constitutional Structure of Modern China (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1947).Google Scholar

13. See Ming-min, Peng, “Political offences in Taiwan: laws and problems,” The China Quarterly (CQ), No. 47 (July–September 1971), p. 471, for a detailed discussion of the consequences of the “state of siege” proclaimed throughout the island on 19 May 1949 that is still in effect. To be sure, only some aspects of everyday life in Taiwan are affected by martial law. Although political activists, intellectuals and the press are acutely aware of dictatorial restraints, the impact on most ordinary people is usually rather modest.Google Scholar

14. Liu Shao-ch'i, , “Report on the draft constitution of the People's Republic of China,” 15 September 1954, in Documents of the First NPC, pp. 9, 20, 28.Google Scholar

15. Mao, , “On the draft constitution,” p. 142.Google Scholar

16. The first plenary session of the Chinese People's Consultative Conference adopted on 27 September 1949 “The organic law of the Central People's Government of the People's Republic of China.” Two days later the same body adopted “The common programme of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference.” For English translations of these documents, see Blaustein, Albert P. (ed.), Fundamental Legal Documents of Communist China (South Hackensack, N.J.: Rothman & Co., 1962), pp. 104114 and 34–53, respectively.Google Scholar

17. Mao, , “On the draft constitution,” p. 145.Google Scholar

18. For translations of and commentary on selected excerpts from this literature, see generally Cohen, J. A., The Criminal Process in the People's Republic of China: 1949–1963: An Introduction (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1968).Google ScholarFor an English language bibliography of relevant materials, see Fu-shun, Lin (ed.), Chinese Law, Past and Present (New York: Columbia University, 1966), especially pp. 4955; for a list of relevant Chinese language periodical literature,Google Scholarsee Tao-tai Hsia, , Guide to Selected Legal Sources of Mainland China (Washington: Library of Congress, 1967), esp. pp. 261–65.Google ScholarFor western analysis of the 1954 Constitution, see Arthur Steiner, H., “Constitutionalism in Communist China,” The American Political Science Review, Vol. XLIV, No. 1 (March 1955), pp. 121;andCrossRefGoogle ScholarHoun, Franklin W., “Communist China's new constitution,” The Western Political Quarterly (1955), pp. 199233.Google Scholar

19. For analysis of this provision and the struggle over its application, see Cohen, J. A., “The Party and the courts: 1949–1959,” CQ, No. 38 (April–June 1969), p. 120.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

20. Quoted in Miscellany of Mao Tse-tung Thought (1949–1968) (Mao Tse-tung ssu-hsiang wan-sui) (1967, 1969), Joint Publications Research Service (JPRS), No. 61269–1 (20 February 1974), p. 138.Google Scholar

21. See “Ten years of the Chinese people's constitution,” Bulletin of the International Commission of Jurists, Vol. 1, No. 20 (1964), pp. 22, 28.Google Scholar

22. See, e.g., Cohen, , The Criminal Process in the People's Republic of China, pp. 1118, 25–35, 354–64.Google Scholar

23. Quoted in “Ten years of the Chinese people's constitution,” p. 28.Google Scholar

24. For an English translation of the “Revised draft of the constitution of the PRC,” approved by the Party Central Committee 6 September 1970,Google Scholarsee Michael, Lindsay (ed.), The New Constitution of Communist China: Comparative Analyses (Taipei: Institute of International Relations, 1976), pp. 312–20.Google Scholar

25. Some observers have stated that there was also a second revised draft adopted by the Party Central Committee in 1973. See, e.g., Gudoshnikov, Leonid, “Two constitutions of the People's Republic of China,” Far Eastern Affairs, No. 3 (Moscow, 1975), p. 72.Google ScholarIndeed, the Republic of China on Taiwan published an English translation of what purported to be such a document; see Background on China, B.74–13 (New York: Chinese Information Service, 26 September 1974) and also Lindsay, The New Constitution of Communist China, pp. 321–27. Yet two knowledgeable commentators have questioned the authenticity of this document, which will not be discussed here.Google ScholarSee Hsia, Tao-tai and Haun, Kathryn A., The 1975 Revised Constitution of the People's Republic of China (Washington: Library of Congress, 1975), p. 2.Google Scholar

26. Article 2, p. 314, Lindsay, , The New Constitution of Communist China.Google Scholar

27. Article 15 (1975 Constitution).Google Scholar

28. For an example of more scholarly Soviet analysis of the 1975 Constitution, see Gudoshnikov, , “Two constitutions of the People's Republic of China.” And for an interesting commentary on a similar Soviet work, by an American expert on Soviet law,Google Scholarsee Hazard, John N., “A Soviet model for Marxian socialist constitutions,” Cornell Law Quarterly, Vol. 60, No. 6 (1975), pp. 9851004.Google ScholarFor the range of western analyses of the 1975 Constitution, in addition to works cited elsewhere in this article, see e.g., Rowe, David N., “PRC's constitutions and the philosophy of constitutionalism” Issues and Studies (Taipei), July 1975, pp. 223;Google ScholarHsüeh, Chün-tu, “The new constitution,” Problems of Communism, Vol. XXIV (May–June 1975), pp. 1119;Google ScholarTche-hao, Tsien, “Les traits particuliers de la nouvelle constitution chinoise,” Revue internationale de droit comparé, April–June 1975, pp. 349–73; andGoogle ScholarMunzel, Frank, “Eine Verfassung der Proletarischen Diktatur,” WGO-Monatshefte für Osteuropäisches Recht, Vol. 4 (1974), pp. 243–53.Google Scholar

29. Ch'un-ch'iao, Chang, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” in Documents of the First Session of the Fourth National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1975), p. 36.Google Scholar

30. Kenneth Lieberthal, “The internal political scene,” Problems of Communism, Vol. XXIV (May–June 1975), pp. 1, 56. It is not clear to me whether Lieberthal's third group, the military, really constituted a coherent category regarding the questions discussed here.Google Scholar

31. See Article 17.Google Scholar

32. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” 1 March 1978, in Documents of the First Session of the Fifth NPC, pp. 173, 176–77.Google Scholar

33. See “Socialist legal system,” China News Analysis, No. 1123 (16 June 1978), p. 7.Google Scholar

34. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” p. 212.Google Scholar

35. Ibid. p. 202.

36. Article 5.Google Scholar

37. Ibid.

38. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” p. 204.Google Scholar

39. Ibid. p. 205. These maxims appeared in Article 12 of the 1936 U.S.S.R. Constitution, and Article 14 of the 1977 U.S.S.R. Constitution reiterates: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his work.” Similarly, the concession securing the peasant's garden plot and related activities appeared in the 1936 U.S.S.R. Constitution, Article 7, and is retained in Article 13 of the 1977 version.

40. Article 11.Google Scholar

41. Article 9.Google Scholar

42. Article 54 of the new constitution specifically guarantees the just rights and interests not only of “overseas Chinese,” as in previous constitutions, but also of “their relatives,” that is, those actually residing in China. The Soviet Union has long struggled to define the boundary between earned and unearned income, and Article 13 of the 1977 Soviet Constitution maintains the distinction.Google Scholar

43. See the discussion in the text infra, after note 107.Google Scholar

44. See, e.g., Vogel, Ezra, Canton under Communism (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1969), p. 279, which reports efforts in 1960–61 to make at least partial restitution or compensation to peasants for property seized from them during the Great Leap Forward.Google Scholar

45. See, e.g., “Kirin purges gang follower, compensates victims,” Peking NCNA Domestic (28 April 1978), in FBIS-CHI-78–84 (1 May 1978), L1, L4, which states that property taken from victimized persons was returned to them and that they were repaid wages that had been withheld. Chinese media have shown increasing concern about property deprivations such as failure to restore to their owners houses that have been requisitioned for a long time by the military.Google ScholarSee “Liberation Army Daily on observance of law, discipline,Peking Domestic Service (12 April 1978), in FBIS-CHI-78-74 (17 April 1978), E6, E8.Google ScholarSee also “Shantung provincial Party committee's united front department sends a letter to the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office of the State Council,” Jen-min jih-pao, (Jen-min) (People's Daily), 19 July 1978, p. 4, which recounts the two-year efforts of government agencies to oust a resistant cadre from a house of an overseas Chinese that he occupied long beyond his authorized tenancy.Google Scholar

46. Article 12.Google Scholar

47. Chiang Hua, , “To implement the new constitution is the glorious task of the people's courts,” Jen-min, 23 May 1978, p. 3.Google Scholar

48. See Takayanagi, Kenzo, “A century of innovation: the development of Japanese law, 1868–1961,” in von Mehren, A. T. (ed.), Law in Japan (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1963), pp. 512.Google Scholar

49. See Berman, Harold J., Justice in the U.S.S.R. (New York: Vintage, 1963), rev. edit., pp. 238et seq., 375, 299 et seq.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

50. Article 27.Google Scholar

51. Article 35. Article 34 also established various permanent committees.Google Scholar

52. Article 36.Google Scholar

53. Article 37.Google Scholar

54. Article 17.Google Scholar

56. Article 18.Google Scholar

57. See Hsia, and Haun, , The 1975 Revised Constitution, p. 82, for a similar conclusion.Google Scholar

58. Article 17.Google Scholar

59. Article 22. The new provision makes no reference to a power to declare a general amnesty, and there are other minor differences.Google Scholar

60. Article 28. Article 27 also authorizes the NPC or its Standing Committee to establish special committees “as deemed necessary,” and this provision could become the basis for investigating committees.Google Scholar

61. Article 25 (3). One should also note that the power to annul illegal decisions of local government that Article 60 of the 1954 Constitution conferred upon local people's congresses has not been revived by Article 36 of the 1978 Constitution.Google Scholar

62. Article 81.Google Scholar

63. Law of the People's Republic of China for the Organization of People's Procuracies, promulgated 28 September 1954, Articles 8 and 9; an English translation can be found in Documents of the First Session, pp. 201, 206207.Google Scholar

64. Article 25. There is some evidence that, even after promulgation of the 1975 Constitution, certain procutorial organs continued to function as separate departments within public security bureaus. See Seikichi, Haryu, “The judicial system under the new Chinese constitution,” Juristo (Jurist), No. 602 (Tokyo, 1975), p. 124.Google Scholar

65. Ibid.

66. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” p. 197. The restoration of the procuracy is but one of a number of measures taken by the regime to increase the likelihood of discovering violations of law and discipline. Others include: revival of the Party disciplinary commissions; renewed emphasis on letters to newspapers and visits to government offices as important means of airing grievances; and re-establishment of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference as a forum for discussion and protests by intellectuals.Google Scholar

67. Ibid. pp. 197–98.

68. Ibid. p. 198.

69. Article 43.Google Scholar

70. Ibid.

71. Article 36. This power of local congresses to address inquiries to the procuracy, court and revolutionary committee of the same level is an innovation of the 1978 Constitution. The NPC Standing Committee recently adopted a decision authorizing provincial revolutionary committees to select the chief procurator of the province when the provincial people's congress is in recess. “NPC Standing Committee holds second session 23–24 May,” NCNA Domestic (24 May 1978), in FBIS-CHI-78-101 (24 May 1978), E12, E13.Google Scholar

72. See Hazard, John N., Settling Disputes in Soviet Society (New York: Columbia University Press, 1960), pp. 157–58.Google ScholarFor recent commentary on the Chinese procuracy, see Tao-tai, Hsia and Kathryn, Haun, The Re-emergence of the Procuratorial System in the People's Republic of China (Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, 1978), especially pp. 910. The failure of the new constitution to restore to local people's congresses their earlier power to annul decisions of local governments (see supra, note 61) suggests that the draftsmen were not unduly concerned with establishing grass-roots control over local executive agencies.Google Scholar

73. Article 25 (1975 Constitution).Google Scholar

74. Article 2.Google Scholar

75. See Article 7 of the Arrest and Detention Act of the People's Republic of China, promulgated 20 December 1954. For an English translation of the Act, see Cohen, , The Criminal Process in The People's Republic of China, pp. 360–62, 386, 584–85.Google ScholarFor analysis of the Soviet model for this scheme, see Berman, Harold J., Soviet Criminal Law and Procedure (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1972), 2nd ed., pp. 10, 52–53.Google Scholar

76. Article 28.Google Scholar

77. See Cohen, , The Criminal Process in the People's Republic of China, p. 15.Google Scholar

78. Ch'eng-wen, T'an, “Absorb experience and teaching, impel a great leap forward in procuratorial work,” Cheng-fa yen-chiu (hereafter Political-Legal Research), No. 3 (1958), pp. 34, 38.Google Scholar

79. Article 47.Google Scholar

80. See supra, note 75.Google Scholar

81. Chang, Wu-yün, “Smash permanent rules, go 1,000 li in one day,” Political-Legal Research, No. 5 (1958), p. 60.Google Scholar

82. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” p. 197.Google Scholar

83. Article 47.Google Scholar

84. Article 75.Google Scholar

85. Article 76.Google Scholar

86. Ibid.

87. See Cohen, , The Criminal Process in the PRC, p. 13.Google Scholar

88. Article 78.Google Scholar

89. See Cohen, , “The Party and the courts: 1949–1959,” pp. 141–47.Google Scholar

90. Article 25.Google Scholar

91. See Article 22.Google Scholar

92. Article 25.Google Scholar

93. See, e.g., Chang Hui, et al., “These are not the basic principles of our country's criminal litigation,” Political-Legal Research, No. 4 (1958), pp. 7778;Google Scholar Liu Tse-chün, “Realizations from my adjudication work,” Ibid. No. 1 (1959), pp. 48–51.

94. Article 2.Google Scholar

95. Article 15.Google Scholar

96. Article 16.Google Scholar

97. Article 3.Google Scholar

98. Article 25 (4) (1978 Constitution).Google Scholar

99. Article 28 (1978 Constitution).Google Scholar

100. Articles 22 (6), 25 (7), 42 (1978 Constitution).Google Scholar

101. See Articles 36, 42 (1978 Constitution).Google Scholar

102. See Berman, , Soviet Criminal Law and Procedure, p. 14 and sources cited therein, andGoogle ScholarSharlet, Robert, “The new Soviet constitution,” Problems of Communism (September-October 1977), pp. 1, 11–12, which treats the Soviet claim cautiously.Google Scholar

103. Reportage on national judicial conference held in Peking,” Peking NCNA Domestic (27 May 1978), in FBIS-CHI-78-105 (31 May 1978), E1, E2.Google Scholar

104. Ibid. E3.

105. Supra, note 47.Google Scholar

106. People's Daily editorial hails judicial work conference,” Peking NCNA Domestic (28 May 1978), in FBIS-CHI 78–106 (1 June 1978), E1, E2.Google Scholar

107. See “Cases of infringing on rights noted in Heilungkiang,” Harbin Heilungkiang Provincial Service (22 May 1978), in FBIS-CHI 78–106 (1 June 1978), L1.Google ScholarSee also, e.g., “District in Shensi improves public security work-style,” Sian Shensi Provincial Service (26 May 1978), in FBIS-CHI 78–106 (31 May 1978), M1, M2.Google ScholarSuch accounts are to be contrasted with the efforts of Peking media to emphasize the renewed role of the courts and formal judicial trials. See, e.g., “Shanghai resumes open-court hearings after 10 years,” Peking NCNA (25 July 1978), FBIS-CHI 78–143 (25 July 1978), G5G6.Google ScholarSydney Rittenberg, an American who has long worked for Peking propaganoa organs, has suggested that their recent reporting concerning the judiciary “was all pretty far from the truth.” Linda Mathews, “American reflects on his rise and fall in China,” Los Angeles Times, 24 July 1978, pp. 1, 8.Google Scholar

108. Fukushima, Masao, “Chinese legal affairs (second discussion),” in Chūgoku no hō to shakai (Chinese Law and Society) (Tokyo, 1960), p. 47, transl. in Cohen, , The Criminal Process in the People's Republic of China, p. 583.Google Scholar For typical compensation cases, see Cohen, Ibid. pp. 574, 584.

109. Ibid. p. 583.

110. See, e.g., Tung, Pi-wu, “Adjudication work of the people's courts in the preceding year,” Hsin-hua pan-yüeh k'an (New China Semi-monthly), No. 15 (1956), p. 10. There are, of course, many current reports of the large number of erroneous judgments handed down during the decade preceding the overthrow of the “gang of four.”Google ScholarSee, e.g., “Nanking court re-examines appeals,” Peking NCNA Domestic (13 July 1978), FBIS-CHI 78–137 (17 July 1978), E12, E13.Google Scholar

111. See the English translation reprinted in Communist China 1955–1959, Policy Documents with Analysis (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1962), pp. 273, 290.Google Scholar

112. Quoted in MacFarquhar, Roderick (ed.), The Hundred Flowers Campaign and the Chinese Intellectuals (London: Stevens and Sons, 1960), p. 48.Google Scholar

113. Article 27.Google Scholar

114. Ibid.

115. The quotation is from the People's Daily of 15 May 1978, as transl. in “Socialist legal system,” China News Analysis, No. 1123 (16 June 1978), p. 4.Google Scholar

116. See supra, note 45 and “Party justice,” China News Analysis, No. 1121 (2 June 1978), pp. 45.Google Scholar

117. Shenyang, Fushun committees reverse wrong decisions,” Shenyang Liaoning Provincial Service (28 May 1978), FBIS-CHI 78–107 (2 June 1978), L4, L5.Google Scholar

118. Kyodo: former jurist, first secretaries reinstated,” Tokyo Kyodo (28 February 1978), FBIS-CHI 78–40 (28 February 1978), D3. Yang was reinstated as an NPC delegate. There is no indication of his return to the judiciary.Google Scholar

119. Chiang, Hua, “To implement the new constitution,”Google Scholar

120. Liaoning Daily on need to reverse incorrect verdicts,” Shenyang Liaoning Provincial Service (28 May 1978), FBIS-CHI 78–106 (1 June 1978), L4, L5.Google Scholar

121. Article 3 (1978 Constitution).Google Scholar

122. Articles 21 and 35 (1978 Constitution).Google Scholar

123. Article 3. In his commentary on the 1975 Constitution, Gudoshnikov pointed out that the phrase “democratic consultation” was used to describe the process of selecting delegates not only to the government congresses but also to the ninth and 10th Party congresses. Under this arrangement, he stated, “the will of the electorate was not brought out, the deputies or delegates being appointed by the corresponding local agencies (‘revolutionary committees’ or Party committees) following consultations with the centre.” See Gudoshnikov, “Two constitutions of the People's Republic of China,” p. 73. See also Article 9 of the 1977 Party Constitution, infra, note 172, p. 20.Google Scholar

124. Supra, note 122.Google Scholar

125. Article 16 (1975 Constitution).Google Scholar

126. Article 19.Google Scholar

127. Article 14 (1975 Constitution).Google Scholar

128. Article 85.Google Scholar

129. Article 18 (1978 Constitution).Google Scholar

130. Preamble (1978 Constitution).Google Scholar

131. See Hazard, , “A soviet model for Marxian socialist constitutions,” p. 991, andGoogle ScholarBerman, , supra, note 49, p. 90.Google Scholar

132. Ibid.; see also Gudoshnikov, “Two constitutions of the People's Republic of China,” p. 73.

133. Ch'un-ch'iao, Chang, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” p. 38.Google Scholar

134. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” pp. 200201.Google Scholar

135. Ibid. p. 199, referring to Article 18 of the 1978 Constitution.

136. Ibid. p. 199.

137. See, e.g. Kuang, I, “Overcome subjectivist ideology, raise the quality of investigation of cases,” Kuang-ming Daily, 15 April 1957.Google Scholar

138. Compare Article 18 of the 1978 Constitution with Article 14 of the 1975 version and Article 19 of the 1954 version (the English translations of the same Chinese phrase in the two latter documents vary slightly – the quotation is from 1954).Google Scholar

139. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” pp. 200201. China's English translation of this passage of Yeh's text omits reference to “reactionary capitalists.” The Chinese text simply refers to fan, which could symbolize either reactionary capitalists or counter-revolutionaries, and the translator chose the latter.Google Scholar

140. See “Party to drop charges against 100,000 right-wingers,” Tokyo Kyodo (17 May 1978), in FBIS-CHI-78-96 (17 May 1978), E1819. One of those who benefited from this measure is Lo Lung-chi, quoted in the text supra at note 112.Google Scholar

141. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” p. 201.Google Scholar

142. Compare Article 4 of the 1978 Constitution and Article 3 of the 1954 Constitution with Article 3 of the 1975 document, which lacks the two quoted passages.Google Scholar

143. Article 53.Google Scholar

144. Ibid.

145. See Articles 1 and 3 of the Marriage Law of the People's Republic, promulgated 1 May 1950. An English translation can be found in Blaustein, Fundamental Legal Documents of Communist China, pp. 266, 267.Google Scholar

146. Article 90 (1954 Constitution).Google Scholar

147. See, e.g., “Instructions of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and the State Council of the PRC relating to checking the blind outflow of people from rural villages (18 December 1957),” partially transl. in Cohen, The Criminal Process in the PRC, p. 287.Google Scholar

148. See Bernstein, Thomas P., “Urban youth in the countryside: problems of adaptation and remedies,” CQ, No. 69 (March 1977), p. 75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

149. Recall text discussion beginning at note 113.Google Scholar

150. Compare Article 90 of the 1954 Constitution with Article 28 of the 1975 version and Article 45 of 1978.Google Scholar

151. Compare Article 88 of the 1954 version with Article 28 of 1975 and Article 46 of 1978. The latter version is similar to Article 52 of the 1977 U.S.S.R. Constitution and its 1936 predecessor.Google Scholar

152. Article 87 (1954 Constitution); Article 28 (1975 Constitution); Article 45 (1978 Constitution).Google Scholar

153. Article 28 of the 1975 Constitution established the right to strike.Google Scholar

154. Ch'un-ch'iao, Chang, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” pp. 3940.Google Scholar

155. Quoted in Mao Tse-tung ssu-hsiang wan-sui (Long Live Mao Tse-tung's Thought) (Taiwan: reprint, n.p., preface dated August 1969), p. 93.Google Scholar

156. Article 100 of the 1954 Constitution had required citizens not only to uphold labour discipline but also to abide by the constitution and the law, keep public order and respect social ethics.Google Scholar

157. Article 45 (1978 Constitution).Google Scholar

158. Article 57 (1978 Constitution). Article 101 of the 1954 Constitution had established the duty of every citizen to protect public property.Google Scholar

159. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” p. 191.Google Scholar

160. See Article 45 (1978 Constitution).Google Scholar

161. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” p. 216.Google Scholar

162. Communist China 1955–1959, p. 279.Google Scholar

163. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” p. 198.Google Scholar

164. Article 52.Google Scholar

165. Article 95.Google Scholar

166. Article 12.Google Scholar

167. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” p. 211.Google Scholar

168. For translation of the relevant passage of Mao's speech, see Communist China 1955–1959, p. 290.Google Scholar

169. Chien-ying, Yeh, “Report on the revision of the constitution,” pp. 211–12.Google Scholar

170. Ibid. p. 179.

171. See Loewenstein, Karl, “Reflections on the value of constitutions in our revolutionary age,”Google Scholarin Zurcher, Arnold J. (ed.), Constitutions and Constitutional Trends since World War II (New York: New York University Press, 1951), pp. 191, 193, 204.Google Scholar

172. See especially Chs. 2 and 3 of the “Constitution of the Communist Party of China,” adopted by the 11th National Party Congress, 18 August 1977, English translation in Peking Review, No. 36 (2 September 1977), pp. 1622.Google ScholarFor a fascinating, ground-breaking study of Politburo processes, see Lieberthal, Kenneth, Central Documents and Politburo Politics in China (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Center for Chinese Studies, 1978).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

173. See, e.g., “Peking wall posters appeal cases to authorities,” Paris AFP (21 April 1978), FBIS-CHI 78–79 (24 April 1978), F19.Google Scholar

174. See Cohen, J. A., “Will China have a formal legal system?”, American Bar Association Journal, Vol. 64 (October 1978).Google Scholar

175. See Cohen, J. A., “Due process in China?” in Terrill, Ross (ed.), The China Difference [New York: Harper & Row, (forthcoming)]; and Cohen, “ Human rights in China,” Washington Post (23 April 1978), p. D2.Google Scholar