What is the law engraved in the hearts of citizens?

The 18th-century French thinker Rousseau gave the answer: "The most important law of all laws is engraved neither on marble nor on a bronze watch, but in the hearts of citizens." When watching "Article 20", as soon as the words of prosecutor Han Ming, played by Lei Jiayin, fell out at the hearing, the audience in the cinema burst into applause, which seemed to answer this question from the side: When the judicial conclusion is responded to and the public's simple sense of justice is realized, the law will naturally be remembered.

The main case in the film is extremely challenging and controversial - the party Wang Yongqiang rushed out of the courtyard and stabbed the village bully to death after the village tyrant's rape, is the illegal infringement "ongoing"? Of course, the final fact found in the film is that although the village tyrant's rape has ended, the bullying of Wang Yongqiang is escalating, and he is counterattacked to death when he tries to continue to hurt Wang Yongqiang with a knife. After watching the film, what has been circling in my mind for a long time is that if I don't find the plot of the village tyrant preparing to hold a knife, how should Wang Yongqiang choose in the face of the constant threat of the village tyrant who bullies men and women and dominates one side?

If you look at the rape of the village tyrant in the film in isolation, it seems that it has ended, and there is no "ongoing" illegal violation. But if we use the concept of "as I am suing", Wang Yongqiang's perspective shows that his fear of the threat of violence persists. Every time a village tyrant rapes, picking quarrels and provoking trouble, etc., is just a "point in time", and the long-term notoriety, continuous violence, and threats to be ready to rape often make the "dots" strung together as a thread. Each specific violation of the law and crime became part of the continuous and complete violence of the village tyrant, leaving Wang Yongqiang's family in a highly dangerous state at all times. Personality humiliation permeates the entire process, the threat of violence is ever-present, and the danger of infringement cannot be eliminated, and the unlawful violation can be considered "ongoing".

If we change the perspective to the perspective of the village tyrant, we can see that the village tyrant's family meddled in economic activities, and the many illegal and criminal acts carried out by the village tyrant formed psychological pressure, deterrence, and coercion on unspecified actors, so that in the process of committing illegal and criminal acts, not only Wang Yongqiang did not dare to resist, but even all the witnesses did not dare to testify. It can be seen from this that the village tyrant family belongs to the criminal activities of underworld forces that form illegal control in a certain area and seriously undermine the order of economic and social life. For such criminal activities of underworld forces that have a major impact or are illegally controlled, persistent threats against specific persons in the area under their control, especially threats of being ready to rape at any time, may be found to be ongoing unlawful violations. Of course, if there is no circumstance in which the village tyrant tries to continue to injure Wang Yongqiang with a knife, whether Wang Yongqiang's defensive behavior caused the death of the other party exceeded the necessary limit is another issue of controversy.

A case very similar to "post-defense" and a criminal suspect Wang Yongqiang, who makes all the audience sympathize, form a strong value conflict. In the end, when Prosecutor Han Ming's speech at the hearing responded to the audience's most simple emotional expectations, it naturally won a warm response from the public and made Article 20 of the Criminal Law be remembered.

What needs to be further questioned is, what is the most important law engraved in the hearts of citizens, is it a specific article? Although the title of the film is "Article 20", it is obviously impossible and unnecessary for most citizens to memorize too many specific legal provisions.

Taking criminal law as an example, although the freedom of life and death is related to people, most ordinary people who are not familiar with the provisions will not be imprisoned. This is mainly because "law is nothing more than human feelings" - on the one hand, law is nothing more than the summary and sublimation of social reason, and it is also the reason for forming the greatest common divisor through legal means, and on the other hand, social reason is the basis for the existence of law. As the basic and bottom-line moral standard, the law cannot be divorced from human and social conditions, let alone go to extremes without ordinary reason. Under normal circumstances, only by seriously breaking the socially recognized moral bottom line can one step into the field of criminal law. Therefore, as long as the masses abide by the public order and good customs that the society has reached a consensus on, they will not embark on the road of crime.

Therefore, the law engraved in the hearts of citizens is the common saying that the common people "have a rod and scale in their hearts", that is, "what is the law?" in the movie, "It is the law of heaven, the law of the country, and the favor of the people." I don't believe in the law of the land without heavenly principles, nor do I believe in heavenly principles without human feelings." Heavenly principles, national law, and human feelings are not three judgment elements that are distinctly separated and distinct, let alone a simple puzzle piece, each accounting for one-third, but the unity of micro individual cases and macro overall situation, and the unity of mutual penetration and blending. Human affection and natural reason themselves are part of the facts of the case, and they are all factors to be considered in judging the essential facts and sentencing circumstances of the crime, and they are all the objects of criminal law evaluation. When judicial personnel handle a case to ascertain facts and apply the law, they should consider it comprehensively, especially considering common sense, common sense, common sense, and other empirical rules. "This is the successful experience and judicial wisdom accumulated by traditional Chinese justice for a long time, and it is also the pluralistic values pursued by traditional Chinese justice for a long time, and it can even be said to be an important achievement of Chinese judicial civilization." In China's social construction, the relationship between heaven and man, emotion and reason, and virtue and law is mutually inclusive and gradually extended. Therefore, human affection is greater than the national law, and the national law cannot suppress the heavenly principle, and the heavenly principle is nothing more than human affection, and the three are the relationship between the internal logic and the same line. Only by establishing such values can the case-handling personnel achieve the organic unity of the "three effects" of case handling.

In recent years, many so-called hot cases, such as the negative cases presented in the movie "Article 20", have become hot spots because of conclusions that have surprised the public. The reason for this is nothing more than the fact that the case is handled on a case-by-case basis, mechanically handled the case, deviated from human feelings and heavenly principles and went to the extreme, and deviated from the inner law of the masses.

The cause is easy to find, but the solution is hard to find. "Striving to achieve the best legal, political, and social effects" has always been the goal of judicial case-handling. The new party group of the Supreme People's Procuratorate also stressed that procurators should be "good at coordinating the organic unity of law, reason, and feelings, and prevent the handling of cases on a case-by-case basis and through mechanical handling." The above-mentioned goals and requirements are familiar to almost all judicial personnel, and have even been cited many times in their own summaries and other materials.

It's just that when encountering specific cases, some people, like Prosecutor Han Ming in the movie, will forget the words they have said, written, and even told to young people. The daughter of the bus driver Zhang Guisheng questioned Han Ming: "If you were on the bus, what would you do?" This is the most speechless sentence that made Han Ming speechless, and it is also the simplest and most simple way to handle the case - "If I am suing".

Specifically, in the face of most criminal cases, front-line judicial personnel should have two judgment steps: the first step is to use the concept of "as I am suing" to substitute themselves into different parties, and judge according to common sense and common sense, what choices most people usually make? How will they choose? Whether the choice is in line with the principle of public order and good customs? The second step is to use specific legal rules to verify and revise their conclusions. If the conclusions of the two are consistent, the case will generally not deviate from the normal feelings of people and deviate from the "scale in the hearts" of the people. If the conclusions of the two are inconsistent, we must be highly vigilant: we must not only adhere to professional judgment and put an end to "legal nihilism" that ignores legal rules, but also insist on the integration of reason, reason, and law, and comprehensively consider individual cases in the context of natural reason, national law, and human feelings.

The reason why many cases deviate from the "scale in the hearts of ordinary people" is that judicial personnel omit the first step and directly apply specific legal rules to find a conclusion. After a long time and lack of guidance, it is easy to ignore reasonable judgments, and only consider the existing rules, specific procedures and professional skills to solve cases, and it is easy to handle cases mechanically and on the case, so that the soul of "the law is right, so who is at fault?" in the film.

Prosecutor Han Ming can use mobile phone videos to play them one by one afterwards to analyze the bus driver Zhang Guisheng's analysis of when they acted bravely, when they beat each other, and when they were injured. However, he was unable to answer Zhang Guisheng's daughter's question: "Is my father guilty, is his verdict fair?" The video can be played back, and life cannot be repeated. If Prosecutor Han Ming can put himself in the role of Zhang Guisheng at the scene, he will find that when facing the gangsters who have a superior number of people to harass women, Zhang Guisheng can be safe and sound by pretending to be deaf and dumb, timid and afraid of things, and it will be difficult to escape imprisonment in the face of righteousness and courage - in the case of continuous time and integrated space, as long as Zhang Guisheng chooses to stand up, unless the other party completely leaves the scene, he will not be able to give up the attack; in a conflict where the enemy is outnumbered, it is impossible to strike with precision like minimally invasive surgery, so that the other party happens to lose the ability to attack and is not seriously injured.

The law is the most basic morality, but judicial conclusions will affect the public order and good customs of society, and may even reshape the value orientation of society, as Zhang Guisheng's case fully demonstrates. In the film, the scene where Prosecutor Han Ming was forced to interrogate by Zhang Guisheng's daughter in the hospital was silenced. At the hearing, prosecutor Han Ming's speech was thunderous applause from the audience. People's hearts are turned against their backs and leap onto the screen.

General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that core values carry the spiritual pursuit of a nation and a country, and embody a value standard for judging right and wrong in society. The moral standard of the whole society comes from the greatest common divisor of each member's sense of justice and right and wrong. However, the sense of justice and the concept of right and wrong are not innate, but the work of social and cultural education, and even more so, the work of judicial conclusions and guidance. If most of the judicial organs' case handling conclusions are in line with the people's "scales in their hearts", they can shape and create good public order and good customs, and make them more in line with the inner vision of the public. Therefore, using judicial case handling to lead social justice and embody core values is the greater value of case handling.

Article 20 reminds us that judicial personnel should not forget that they are also members of citizens, that the law engraved in their hearts and the law on paper should be used as a guide for their work, and that cases should follow reason, abide by the law, and conform to people's feelings. Article 20 also reminds us that the more important value of legal people is to respond to and realize the sense of justice of the majority of citizens through the skill of interpreting and applying the law, so that judicial conclusions can resonate with the law engraved in the hearts of citizens, so as to guide the value orientation of society.

Judicial personnel should bear in mind that "where does the authority of the law come from?

(The author is Wang Yong, Deputy Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Deputy Procurator General of the Suzhou Municipal People's Procuratorate, Jiangsu Province)