Posted on 07/26/2023 3:27:03 PM PDT by Faith Presses On
Before the overthrow of the Qing Dynasty in 1911, China’s legal system differed from that of liberal Western states in three major aspects: First, the apex of the entire legal system was the absolute monarch; it was the emperor who issued and abolished laws, and the most serious crimes of the legal code were those which endangered imperial dynastic rule and desecrated the emperor and his property. Second, Chinese law incorporated major principles of Confucian ideology, most notably its emphasis on the family, on filial piety and on strict social roles and hierarchies. Third, the imperial legal system was designed to impose social norms – mostly of Confucian origin – with the aim of creating a self-regulating society. These three aspects of imperial China’s legal system are reflected in what imperial legal codes called “the ten abominations” or “the ten evils” (十惡), which were classified as the most heinous of all crimes. Even the emperor himself could not pardon subjects who had been found guilty of committing them.
The term “ten abominations” was invented by the Legalist school in order to identify those crimes which the state considered most threatening to political and social order (see: Charles Benn: Daily Life in Traditional China: The Tang Dynasty, 2002, p. 197). The first nucleus of the “ten abominations” can be found in the law codes of the Northern Qi kingdom (550-577 AD), which divided crimes into ten categories (see Xin Ren: Tradition of the Law and Law of the Tradition: Law, State, and Social Control in China, 1997, p. 37)...
1. Plotting a rebellion (謀反), i.e. endangering the state (which was tantamount to endangering the ruling dynasty, as no distinction existed between emperor and state).
2. Planning “great betrayal” (謀大逆), i.e. damaging or destroying imperial temples, tombs and palaces.
3. Plotting treason (謀叛), i.e. “turning one’s back on one’s own country and conspiring with another country” (謀背本國潛從他國)]
4. Evil disobedience (惡逆), i.e. beating or intentionally killing one’s grandparents or parents, one’s husband’s grandparents or parents, killing one’s father’s or husband’s brother, one’s parents, one’s father’s or husband’s aunts or sisters, elder brothers, elder sisters, one’s paternal grandparents or husband.
5. Immoral behaviour (不道), i.e. killing three or more people of the same family who are not guilty of a capital crime, dismembering a body, killing a person with ‘gu’ poison or performing sorcery. Gu poison (蠱毒) “was made by placing venomous creatures such as snakes, toads, scorpions, spiders, and centipedes in a pot. According to tradition, the animal that survived combat with the others and devoured them was the most noxious, by virtue of having absorbed the others’ toxins. When the sorcerer or sorcerers decided to kill someone, he or she secretly injected the feces of the creature in the intended victim’s food or drink. The poison then destroyed the victim’s organs and caused him to vomit blood” (Benn 2002, p. 197).
6. Great irreverence (大不敬), i.e.stealing sacrificial objects, stealing imperial property, forging imperial artifacts and seals, endangering the emperor’s life by administering him contaminated food or wrong medicine.
7. Lack of filial piety (不孝), i.e. cursing one’s grandparents or parents or one’s husbands grandparents or parents, stealing from them, failing to support them, not mourning for them properly.
8. Improper behaviour (不睦), i.e. killing or accusing of a crime one’s relatives within the five degrees of mourning.
9. Unrighteous behaviour (不義), i.e. when the people killed their own prefectural magistrates, senior provincial government officials and county head magistrates; when soldiers killed their commanders; when officials killed their own department superiors of the fifth rank or above; when people killed their own teachers; if, upon hearing of their husband’s death, wives hid the news or failed to mourn properly, or if they played music, took off their mourning clothes or married another man during the mourning period.
10. Incest (內亂, lit. ‘internal disorder’), i.e. fornicating with a relative of the 4th degree of mourning or above, fornicating with one’s grandfathers’ or father’s concubines.
Also of interest was a system of self-policing and surveillance by citizens themselves:
"The baojia comprised the pai (牌, 10 households), the jia (甲, 100 households) and the bao (保1,000 households) (Kung-Chuan Hsiao: Rural China: Imperial Control in the Nineteenth Century, 1960, p. 44)."
And how has this changed with Communist rule?
The conclusion discusses the similarities.
I’ve also just started watching this video, which is on the same topic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LkLBDiNGfo
“Confucianism and Chinese Law, Past and Present”
The Bao-Jia system is not unlike present communist China’s “neighborhood committees” with them reporting on people in on their street/area and registration needed with the public security
Interesting stuff.
China’s “legal system” is whatever the CCP says it is. And it’s coming to America.
Rape didn’t make the top ten?
America's legal system is fractured to say the least. We have a few constructionist judges and AGs and many activist judges and AGs. For the unlearned, a constructionist judge or AG attempts to apply the Constitution and laws specifically based on the exact wording of the law. An activist judge or AG applies the Constitution and laws based on interpretation that's not restricted to the exact wording of the law. I.e., activist judges and AGs can interpret the law from whole cloth, which they do on a regular basis.
China pretty much operates as a capitalist system.
The determining factor is a vote. (Yet they locally do.)
If American votes are disregarded . . .
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