Address by Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs: Necessary Sequel to Western Contacts "Chinese law, on the whole, Is progressive, modern, up-to-date, workable and supported by the people. There are imperfections, but they cannot eclipse the many years of painstaking work and effort," said Mr. Hsu Mo, Political Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs, and immediate Jpast president of the Nanking Rotary Club, in the course of a talk on the Chinese Judicial System before the Shanghai Rotary Club on Sept. 10.
Commencing on a somewhat light note, he briefly recounted the story of the trial in the "Merchant of Venice." Portia's two telling points, that no blood be spilt and that one ound of flesh, no more, no less, be cut, had always been regarded' by laymen as illustrative of the nicely and subtlety of the law. But neither the contract nor Portia's defence would be sustained in any modern court of low, he said, the fact that under the old law Sterility could be elted as grounds for divorce. A "husband " might divorce his wife on such grounds, but a wife could rarely do $0, This was a rather unfair state of affairs, fax in the ease of such a divorce the court never took the "trouble to ascertain if the trouble lay in the husband and not the wife; marriage made it a wife's duty to bear chile dren, The Present System Turning to the present day, Chinese law was now certainly different from what it was during the old Imperial regime. The changes were brought about not by artificial means, but of necessity, and as a result of changes in the customs of society and the philosophy of rife. Many believed that China had made her Judicial reforms merely in an attempt to abolish extraterritoriality; he was In the first place, any court would recognise that the shedding of blood was implied in the contract. With regard to Portia's second" point, "Shylock to-day would not be bound of the firm opinion these' changes would have come Into being even If extraterritoriality had not existed, being found necessary as a result of contact with the West, the mingling of Chinese and Western civilization, the acquisition of Western political thought, the adoption of modern methods of determining right and wrong, and in the administration of justice, Ethical rules of conduct were not sufficient for a more complicated society.
Code after code was enacted, taw after law passed, until today China had a legal system which was modern, answered to the needs of the time, could be favourably compared with any system in any part of the world, Many important laws had been parsed, including the Civil Code, Civil" Procedure Code, Criminal Procedure Code, and the Trade Mark Law, over which there had been so many—quarrels recently. In the inception and adoption of these, the laws of the major powers in Europe and America were studied, and those that were found to be beneficial and easy of application were incorporates Important Aspect (oe, Herald" Photo, There was one important aspect which was often the subject of comment from foreign quarters, Under the present Chinese system, judicial power was not allowed to interfere with executive power; questions of administration—for example, disputes between the executive and. into take his full pound of flesh; he could take less. Full recompense was the debtor's duty, but partial recompense the creditor's right. In any case, however, Shylock would have lost his suit," as the contract, being contrary to' the public good, would have been held invalid, Now Chinese law had developed on different lines to that of Occidental law. In olden days, it was based on general rules of conduct and not on the protection of individual rights. Tt rested on ethical grounds and moral standards. If Shylock's case had come before a Chinese Court of the Ming dynasty, which more or Tess corresponded to the period, not only would it have been dismissed, but both creditor and debtor would have been severely punished for having come to such an agreement in the first place, dividuals, or a claim for damages against ah official for an iMegal official act—eame not under judicial power but executive power. This adminis trative law did not exist in England for America, but did in the law China and certain countries Europe, In England or America, the judiciary was independent of ' the executive, 'Chinese law, he said in conclusion, was eminently up-to-date, workable and progressive. If China' had made any "progress in ler renaissance movement of the past three or four decades, he felt that the greatest had ben in the field of law and administrative Justice.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.