Source: Democracy and the Rule of Law Weekly, No. 36, 2021
Editor's Note
Red resources are the spiritual imprint left by the party in the process of leading the people's revolution, construction and reform, and are extremely precious spiritual wealth, highlighting the nature and purpose of the party, witnessing the original intention and mission of communists, condensing the party's fine traditions and work style, and containing a rich revolutionary spirit and a thick cultural heritage.
Since the founding of the Communist Party of China, such a large number of revolutionary pioneers have emerged. With full patriotic enthusiasm, they looked around for ways to save the country; they abandoned their homes and businesses and resolutely threw themselves into the torrent of revolution; they participated in the building of political power in the Central Soviet And Border Regions, established rules and regulations, and made outstanding contributions to the cause of China's legal system and the establishment and development of the people's judicial system, leaving us many stories of the Red Revolution, retaining a rich red rule of law gene, and converging into the red rule of law bloodline of our party.
They are important "practitioners" of the party's great cause and the early legal system, the founders of the people's legal system, and the pioneers of the people's judicial system; they are leaders and pioneers with outstanding achievements on the judicial front; and many of their practices in handling cases have become the most precious fine traditions and spiritual wealth of the people's judicial cause; the systems of open trials, circuit courts, people's mediation, and criminal settlement that they advocate are full of historical and contemporary values and provide important practical experience for the establishment of the new Chinese legal system They are important drafters and witnesses of a series of laws, such as the Common Program of the Chinese-China Political Consultative Conference, the Constitution, the Marriage Law, and the Draft Civil Law; they are pioneers in new Chinese legal education and legal theory research, and have made outstanding contributions to the political and legal education and legal research of New China; they are "red legal experts" and "first-class jurists in the country" in the eyes of Chairman Mao Zedong...
On March 7, 2021, General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out in his speech when participating in the deliberations of the Qinghai delegation to the Fourth Session of the 13th National People's Congress: "In the study and education of party history, we must make full use of red resources, educate and guide the majority of party members and cadres to strengthen their ideals and beliefs, build a solid mission, continuously enhance the spirit of struggle, improve the ability to struggle, and ensure that they do not get lost in the face of complex situations and do not shrink back in the face of arduous struggles." ”
In order to carry out in-depth study and education in party history, with the theme of "red legal experts", the 28th issue of this magazine introduces the revolutionary heroic deeds of five "red legal experts" (in order of birth date) such as He Shuheng, Xie Jueya, Chen Jinkun, Li Liuru, and Lei Jingtian, and the 29th issue continues to introduce the red classic stories of five "red legal experts" (in order of birth date) such as Li Mu'an, He Sijing, Ma Xiwu, Liang Baitai, and Chen Shouyi, and continues to introduce five "red legal experts" (in order of birth date) in this issue. The rule of law stories of "Red Legal Experts" (in order of birth date) are to remember the revolutionary pioneers, relive the glorious history, carry forward the glorious traditions, continue the red blood, and take the new long march of the rule of law cause in the new era.
Thirteenth in the Red Legal Expert series
Yang Xiufeng: Pioneer of the people's mediation system
Text/Reporter Liu Yu
In 1897, qing guangxu twenty-three years. In the last years of the Qing Dynasty, external forces invaded, internal strife arose, internal and external troubles, and the people did not have a good life. The Qing Dynasty was crumbling. In this era of stormy times, Yang Xiufeng was born in a "generation of scholars" home in Qian'an, Hebei Province. Influenced by his family, Yang Xiufeng entered a private school at the age of 5, and in 1916, at the age of 19, Yang Xiufeng was admitted to the Beijing Higher Normal School (the predecessor of Beijing Normal University). In his youth, he resolutely threw himself into the revolution and fought bravely for the cause of the liberation of the Chinese; he took self-denial and served the people, cared about the well-being of the masses, and did a great deal of work in the building of political power; he engaged in the construction of the legal system and the study of legal science, participated in the formulation of many laws, presided over the restoration and reconstruction of the Chinese Law Society, and contributed all his efforts to building a socialist legal system and legal system with Chinese characteristics.
Seek the way to save the country
"Red Professor" casts pen from Rong
Although Yang Xiufeng was born in Shuxiang Mendi, at that time, this feudal family was already declining. His grandparents and fathers were all readers, and the influence of the family environment made him have a strong interest in education since he was a child, and the dilemma of his family's gradual decline prompted him to make up his mind to apply for a normal school.
In 1911, after graduating from the county high school, he was admitted to the Third Normal School directly under Hebei (Luanzhou). During his studies at the Third Normal School (Luanzhou), Yang Xiufeng was diligent and studious, and his grades ranked among the best. He witnessed the corruption of warlord rule, the national crisis, and the people's livelihood after the defeat of the Xinhai Revolution. Influenced by the Xinhai Revolution, he believed that braids were shackles, and despite his family's opposition, he resolutely cut them off, full of sorrow and indignation, turned his eyes to the rise and fall of the country and the nation, and actively sought the truth and ways to transform society and save the country and the people.
He preached the truth of national salvation and opposed the traitorous "Twenty-One Articles." On May 4, 1919, Yang Xiufeng, who was still studying at the Beijing Higher Normal School, was elected as a student representative to organize the student demonstrations, and he gave an impassioned speech denouncing the traitorous acts of the reactionary authorities. During the movement, many classmates were arrested, and he personally went to the reactionary military and police authorities, sat in a sit-in, and actively tried to rescue them. In 1925, Yang Xiufeng led the female teachers and students of Tongzhou to participate in the "May Thirtieth Movement", and published two articles in the Morning Post, calling on the faculty and staff to actively participate in the revolutionary torrent, and in the struggle against imperialism and feudalism, he gradually grew into a staunch democrat.
In October 1929, Yang Xiufeng studied in France, and the following year he was introduced to join the Communist Party of China in France, rising from a democrat to a communist. During his studies in France, he risked being arrested, joined the anti-imperialist alliance organization that led students studying in France and overseas Chinese, founded revolutionary secret publications such as "Workers", reprinted the organ newspaper "Chiguang" of the General Branch in Europe, and actively carried out anti-imperialist and patriotic propaganda activities. After the September 18 Incident, he participated in and led the demonstrations and rallies of students studying in France and overseas Chinese to protest against the crimes of Japanese imperialism against China, and was deported by the French authorities in 1932. But this did not shake Yang Xiufeng's revolutionary will in the slightest. He also went to Germany, Britain, and Japan to join the Communist Party, and was still constantly seeking the way to save the country.
In 1934, after returning to China, Yang Xiufeng, as a university professor and under the leadership of the Northern Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, engaged in the work of the anti-Japanese national united front of the upper echelons of the cultural and educational circles in the Pingjin area. He took the classroom as a front, analyzed the situation at home and abroad and the growing national crisis at that time, and pointed out the correct direction of the youth movement. His classes were popular with patriotic students, often with classrooms filled with students and audiences standing outside the windows. Yang Xiufeng taught "Social Science Methodology" and "Review of Historical Dynamics Theory" at Hebei Law Business School, Beijing Higher Normal School, China University, Northeastern University and many other universities, which was a very high level of materialist historical view at that time. Among the vast number of young students, he spread Marxism-Leninism and propagated the party's anti-Japanese and national salvation ideas, won the respect of young students, and was praised as "Red Professor" by people.
He spread progressive ideas to teachers and students: "Law must not only reflect reality, but also create reality, and law must not only maintain order but also transform order." Most students should go to the battlefield of the Anti-Japanese War and shoulder the heavy responsibility of rejuvenating the nation. He led the students to participate in the "12.9" movement, and jointly called Song Qingling to support the "Seven Gentlemen" of Shanghai. He initiated and organized the establishment of the "Beiping Cultural Circles Salvation Congress", and later, under the leadership of Liu Shaoqi and Peng Zhen, organized and led the Salvation Congress from all walks of life in North China to do the work of "supporting the 29th Army to resist Japan"...
In 1937, the July 7 Incident broke out, and Ping, Tianjin, Baoding, and Shijiazhuang were lost one after another, and the country was shattered overnight. The sacred duty of saving the nation from danger and saving the people from the depths of the sea can only fall on the shoulders of the Communists. In accordance with the instructions of the central authorities, Yang Xiufeng reported to the Northern Bureau of the CPC in Taiyuan via Tianjin and met Liu Shaoqi, Peng Zhen, Yang Shangkun, and Zhou Enlai and Peng Dehuai of the Central Military Commission. According to the instructions of the Northern Bureau, as a professor, he accompanied Zhou Enlai to the headquarters of the commander of the Kuomintang First Theater in Yuanshi County, obtained the name of "Special Commissioner for The Jixi Civil Training office of the Baoding Xing Camp, chairman of the Military Commission of the National Government", and rushed to jixi with his wife Sun Wenshu to establish the jixi civil training office. Since then, Yang Xiufeng has thrown himself into the fiery battle of opening up revolutionary base areas and carrying out guerrilla warfare.
Open up anti-Japanese base areas
Founded the War of Resistance College
Yang Xiufeng led exiled students and rural youth in Ping, Tianjin and other places to create the Western Hebei Guerrilla Group, serving as the commander-in-chief and member of the Party Committee of Jinyu District, and launched an anti-Japanese guerrilla war in Western Hebei. The guerrillas successively established 11 detachments, totaling more than 10,000 people. In May 1938, in order to absorb the vast number of intellectuals to participate in the War of Resistance, he also founded the Hebei Anti-Japanese War College and served as its president.
At that time, more than twenty counties and towns in the Jizhong Plain were retaken by the Eighth Route Army, and with the strong support of the local party committee, the site of the Anti-Japanese War College was selected as two schools in Shenxian County. Due to the destruction of the Kuomintang troops, all the teaching equipment in the school was looted. Yang Xiufeng worked with everyone to rebuild the school building, clean up the broken bricks and tiles, and repair the playground. A large makeshift mat shed was used as a classroom, and a grassy floor was used as a bed for the dormitory. Each person has 5 cents per day, 1 and a half pounds of millet, due to the enemy's strict blockade and lack of material conditions, Yang Xiufeng, as an ordinary member, shares weal and woe with teachers and students, and under his leadership, the preparatory work is carried out in an orderly manner.
After the establishment of the Anti-Japanese War College, a large number of young intellectuals in Jizhong and southern Hebei and exiled students in Pingjin admired Yang Xiufeng's name and rushed to register for the examination. In order to ensure the quality of admissions, all students must pass the examination to be admitted. Most of the education these young people received during the Kuomintang rule was the idealistic theory. At the Academy of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Marxism-Leninism and the revolutionary principle of resisting Japan and saving the dead were taught. Yang Xiufeng personally teaches materialistic dialectics, and he emphasizes teaching according to his talents in his lectures, and goes deep among the students to understand their ideas.
When Yang Xiufeng learned that some of his classmates lacked a correct understanding of the policy of resisting the Japanese national united front, he taught that because the Japanese and the Kosovars had penetrated deep into the national territory, ethnic contradictions had risen to the main contradiction. The class contradictions in the country have since been transformed into a second place, so that it is not only necessary but also possible for the Kuomintang and the Communist Party to unite against Japanese imperialism. This teaching method deeply inspired the students, who eagerly studied and understood the enlightenment course of Marxism-Leninism at the Anti-Japanese War College.
The Anti-Japanese War College was a vibrant scene, and loud salvation songs rose and fell on the campus. The lives of the trainees are both serious and intense and colorful. At the "9/18" commemorative meeting, the students organized a war troupe and performed dramas such as "Put Down Your Whip", which was quite popular with the local people.
Most of the administrators and teachers of the Anti-Japanese War College were selected by Jizhong, Jinan, and Jixi, and some came from the kuomintang-ruled areas. Among them were Communists, members of the Kuomintang, and non-partisan patriots. Yang Xiufeng carried out the party Central Committee's policy of the anti-Japanese national united front to the end, treated them equally, and made the best use of them.
There was a non-party person who had served in the Feng Yuxiang Office of the Northwest Army and had also run education in Beiping, and Yang Xiufeng saw that he had a sense of justice, so he invited him to serve as the chief education officer of the Anti-Japanese War College, and then Yang Xiufeng returned to Ji'nan to serve as the director of the administrative director's office, and the college was presided over by him and the teaching director Hao Yannong. At the beginning of the second period, a group of progressive intellectuals from the Kuomintang-ruled areas passed through Ji'nan, and Yang Xiufeng introduced them to the Anti-Japanese War College to work, some of them teaching, some of them serving as cadres in the brigade, and treated them sincerely. However, due to the cruel "sweeping" of the Japanese Kou and the difficulties of large-scale centralized training, the Anti-Japanese War Academy only ran two phases before it ended, training more than 3,000 cadres successively, and creating a large number of backbone anti-Japanese backbones.
As the situation in the base areas continues to unfold, new difficulties have emerged: There is little arable land in the mountainous areas, and most of the peasants eat jujube noodles, leaves, and chaff nests, and the troops are constantly expanding, which has increased a lot of burdens on the masses. Yang Xiufeng keenly felt this situation, and he educated the troops on abiding by the discipline of the masses and working hard. "Only by sharing weal and woe with the masses can we win the support and support of the people!" Yang Xiufeng repeatedly stressed. He said this and did the same, he ate chaff with everyone, and like the cadres and soldiers, he received only one yuan a monthly allowance. To this day, the mountainous areas of Jixi still recite many moving stories of his strict observance of mass discipline and arduous struggle.
Once, on the way out of Xiyang, Yang Xiufeng personally found his comrades and asked, "Have you given rice, oil, vegetables, and firewood money?" When he learned that the firewood money had not been given, he immediately ordered his comrades to return to the station and send firewood money to the landlord. The landlord said excitedly: "For a few copper plates, let you run dozens of miles, Mr. Yang's team is really autumn without committing any crimes!" Another time, when the breeder was walking his livestock, the black mule he was riding was frightened and ran into the farmer's valley. Yang Xiufeng insisted that the guards count the grain seedlings that had been trampled and compensate the peasants.
Yang Xiufeng is wholeheartedly supported and loved by the vast number of cadres, fighters, and the people in the base areas, not only because he is a good leader, but also because his strong party spirit infects the people around him. Deng Xiaoping once praised him: "Civilian officials do not want money, and military officials are not afraid of death -- Yang has both." He was also called "a banner of the War of Resistance in Southern Hebei."
Attach importance to the building of the legal system
Develop a people's mediation system
Yang Xiufeng is not only a well-known jurist with profound theoretical cultivation, but also a government leader with rich practical experience. During his lifetime, he devoted himself to the building of revolutionary power and the building of the legal system.
"Since ancient times, the laws of the reactionary forces have been the chains that oppress the common people. The laws of today's democratic government are powerful weapons used by the people to suppress reactionary forces, maintain social order, and protect people's production. Yang Xiufeng's words expressed his thinking of attaching importance to the building of the legal system. He attached great importance to the building of the legal system in the base areas, and he held that only by formulating and conscientiously implementing a series of laws and regulations in the base areas and completing the legal system can we realize the rule of law, calm the people's minds, and ensure the existence, consolidation, and development of the base areas. Under his presidency, the anti-Japanese democratic government in the base areas formulated a series of laws and regulations, such as the "Administrative Program for border areas," the "Marriage Law," the "Land Use Law," the "Interim Regulations on Labor Protection," the "Regulations on Giving Preferential Treatment to the Families of Soldiers Fighting the War," the "Regulations on Uniform Progressive Taxes," the "Regulations on Rent Reduction and Interest Reduction," and the "Regulations on Military Expenditures," and adopted effective measures to implement them.
During his tenure as commander of the guerrilla forces in western Hebei, director of the Ji'nan Bureau, director of the Ji'nan, Taihang, and Taiyue Administrative Joint Offices, chairman of the Jinji-Hebei Luyu Border Region Government, and vice chairman of the North China People's Government, he did a great deal of pioneering work for the building of China's people's democratic power and revolutionary legal system.
While presiding over the work of the Ji'nan Bureau, a judicial department was set up to "specialize in second-instance litigation cases" so that "the legal interests of the people can be correctly guaranteed." He also pointed out: "The mission of the Judicial Office in today's anti-war environment is not only to protect the legal interests of the people of southern Hebei and maintain social order in southern Hebei, but also its more important task should be to educate the public about his due duties and rights he should enjoy in law."
Determining the work center and working method of the government according to the objective situation and environment is Yang Xiufeng's consistent style. When he presided over the work of the Jinji-Hebei Luyu Border Region Government, in light of the situation of the War of Resistance Against Japan, he vigorously promoted the streamlining of the army and the streamlining of administration, reducing personnel by 48 percent and saving 46 percent of the funds. The "Liberation Daily" praised it as "enough for all base areas to learn from and emulate." When the two border regions of Jin-Cha-Ji and Jin-Ji-Lu-Yu were merged, Comrade Nie Rongzhen praised Yang Xiufeng as an "expert in political power work." In August 1948, the North China People's Government was established, and he was elected as the vice chairman, and served as the secretary of the party leading group, concurrently serving as the president of the People's Control Yuan, assisting Chairman Dong Biwu in presiding over the daily administrative affairs of the North China People's Government.
Yang Xiufeng has always attached importance to judicial work. Less than a month after the establishment of the North China People's Government, under his impetus, it promulgated the "General Decree on the Provisions on restoring the original judicial organizations and trial levels in each county in order to unify the names of the judicial organs of each administrative department", which clearly stipulates: "The original judicial organs of each administrative department shall be renamed 'the people's court of so-and-so (regional name)'." "The various administrative departments have ordered the county governments to quickly restore the original judicial organization." The circular decree also pointed out: "In the past, the judicial organs were merged with the civil, religious or public security bureaus, and the prisons under the jurisdiction of the judicial section (or the judicial section or the people's court) were merged with the detention centers of the public security bureaus, which was extremely inconvenient for work and needed to be separated. In the past, judicial cadres who were transferred to other jobs should be adjusted back to the judicial department as much as possible. "The circular decree stipulates the trial level, the criminal review system, and the powers and responsibilities of county and municipal judicial organs and the North China People's Court in handling criminal cases.
In the thirteen months of existence of the North China People's Government, Yang Xiufeng worked diligently day and night, not only fulfilling the task of organizing a large number of manpower and material resources in North China to support the national liberation war, but also formulating and promulgating more than 200 decrees, directives, regulations, rules, general principles, and detailed rules. Even if the staff of administrative organs at all levels can administer according to law, they have also made active explorations in the formulation of laws, regulations, and systems for the upcoming Central People's Government, and have made full preparations for the establishment of the Central People's Government.
After the founding of New China, Yang Xiufeng engaged in education work for a long time, and he attached great importance to teaching by law; on the basis of summing up the positive and negative experiences, he formulated a series of rules, systems, regulations, and other legal documents related to education, so as to institutionalize and regulate education work.
In Yang Xiufeng's decades of revolutionary career, he has spent most of his time engaged in the work of building people's power and the legal system, and his ideas and experiences formed through rich practice in people's mediation are of great practical significance to guiding the mediation work of the people of our country.
During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the War of Liberation, Comrade Yang Xiufeng attached great importance to mass mediation. He is good at guiding the masses and relies on the masses to use their own strength to mediate disputes. As early as 1939, when opening up the anti-Japanese base area in southern Hebei, he clearly pointed out: "It is necessary to establish county, district, and township mediation committees, with county, district, and township mass organizations and gentry as members, responsible for mediating civil disputes." He also emphatically pointed out: "Its significance is not simply to reduce the people's litigation burden, the main thing is to listen to the people's self-determination as much as possible in case of trouble." When summing up the work in the base areas, he also repeatedly stressed: Everything should be done from the convenience of the people, and we should "focus on reconciliation" of civil disputes. In the governments and courts of the base areas, a series of laws and regulations on mediation work have been formulated and implemented, such as the "Organizational Outline of the District Mediation Committee" and the "Detailed Rules for Handling Affairs" promulgated by the Jiluyu District of the Jin-Hebei Luyu Border Region, and the "Regulations on Civil Mediation" promulgated by the Ji'nan District. After the founding of New China, the experience of mass mediation in the base areas was affirmed, and the state promulgated laws and regulations on people's mediation, established a people's mediation system nationwide, and promoted the development of mediation work.
In January 1965, Yang Xiufeng was appointed President of the Supreme People's Court and Secretary of the Party Group. At this time, the local mediation committees have not yet been perfected, and a large number of civil disputes and minor criminal cases have flocked to the courts, and the courts are facing a passive situation of fewer personnel and a large backlog of cases. Yang Xiufeng began to conduct in-depth research, and he personally led a team to investigate and study in various places. He went deep into the people's courtrooms, into Yujia Lane in Nanjing City, in Hongye Village in Bengbu City, in The South District of Tangshan City, in the Workers' Dormitory Neighborhood Committee of the Locomotive and Rolling Stock Factory, and to visit the mediation committees, to comfort the grass-roots cadres and masses, and to understand the situation, difficulties, and experiences of the grass-roots mediation work.
Through his research, he learned that the Tangshan Lunan Mediation Committee mediated 26 disputes in more than a year and a half from 1964 to July 1965. In mediation, in addition to resolving ideological problems, it also helped resolve difficulties in a timely manner and fundamentally resolved contradictions. In addition, it has taken the initiative to extend its functions and has done work to prevent disputes and crime. Xiao Zheng, an 18-year-old young man, did not love to study since he was a child, and also stole things from his classmates, and loved to fight and scold the street, after being expelled from school, he mixed with some young people with the habit of stealing, often stealing the broken copper and rotten iron in the factory, and his parents could not take him. The conciliation committee took the initiative to approach him, care for him, educate him with the hardships of his parents' past lives, and asked the active youth of the street to help him learn culture, take him to participate in recreational activities, and help him correct his shortcomings and mistakes. Under the patient work, he not only changed his bad habits, but also took the initiative to do good deeds, helped the families of the martyrs to work, participated in the river control project, and was recruited by the railway to work as a road maintenance worker.
The in-depth investigation made Yang Xiufeng realize that in addition to the street residents, the contradictions and disputes between the employees and their families of industrial and mining enterprises are also increasing, affecting the unity and production of workers and workers, and these are some new situations and new problems that have emerged with the development of socialist economic construction. Some factories and enterprises have begun to set up mass mediation organizations within themselves, and some good practices have been formed in mediating disputes between workers and their families, which have also produced good results.
In order to promote the development of this work, on September 23, 1965, he personally wrote a letter to the relevant responsible comrades of the State Council, proposing to establish a mass mediation organization within industrial and mining enterprises, which is specifically responsible for mediating disputes between employees and their families. This proposal has played a positive role in further improving the organizational system of mediation among the people of our country, adapting it to the needs of economic construction, serving the development of production, and enhancing the unity among the people. Today, the people's mediation work has been comprehensively developed, which is inseparable from the pioneering work made by Yang Xiufeng for the cause of people's mediation in our country.
A career in law
Preparation for the establishment of the Chinese Law Society
The Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China re-established the Marxist ideological, political, and organizational lines, made the strategic decision to shift the focus of work to socialist modernization, and put forward the historical task of developing socialist democracy and perfecting the socialist legal system. In order to meet the needs of strengthening the building of socialist democracy and the legal system, under the care of the Party Central Committee and at the initiative of Comrades Deng Xiaoping, Peng Zhen, and other comrades, at the end of 1979, the China Political science and Law Society was restored.
On June 28, 1980, the Preparatory Group of the China Law Society was established, chaired by Comrade Yang Xiufeng and composed of the former leading members of the China Political Law Society. In January 1981, it was renamed the Preparatory Committee of the China Law Society, and the Party Central Committee decided that Yang Xiufeng would be the director and Zhang Youyu, Wang Yifu, Xie Bangzhi, Liang Wenying, Gan Chongdou and Chen Shou would be the deputy directors.
In 1980, Yang Xiufeng was entrusted by the central government to preside over the restoration and reconstruction of the China Political law Society, which was later renamed the Preparatory Committee of the China Law Society. The picture shows Yang Xiufeng in front of the office building of the Preparatory Committee of the China Law Society.
The tasks and central work of the China Law Society after its establishment have always been important issues for Yang Xiufeng to ponder. Liang Wenying once recalled in a commemorative article: Elder Yang repeatedly stressed that legal research must adhere to the party's four basic principles and be politically consistent with the party Central Committee; Proceeding from reality, seeking truth from facts, and integrating theory with practice; We must serve socialist economic construction. Elder Yang said: From the current point of view, our greater task is to study legislative issues, especially economic legislation issues. Economic legislation is being carried out in all aspects, and there are more than 400 legislative documents sent to the Legislative Affairs Committee of the NPC Standing Committee, including the State Council system. We must participate in the study of legal studies to study the theoretical and practical problems that need to be solved in economic legislation. In this way, the content of research work will be enriched and the field of research will be broadened.
Yang Xiufeng clearly pointed out that the task of the China Law Society is to unite legal and legal workers throughout the country under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, adhere to the four cardinal principles, follow the party's principles and policies, actively carry out legal research activities and exchange activities between domestic and international legal circles, develop Marxist theory of Chinese socialist legal science, develop socialist democracy, improve the socialist legal system, and make contributions to building a socialist material and spiritual civilization.
Comrade Sun Wanzhong, executive vice president of the China Law Society and who has worked with Yang Xiufeng for many years, issued a commemorative document on the 30th anniversary of the restoration and reconstruction of the China Law Society. According to the article, while stepping up the restoration and reconstruction work, Elder Yang also actively carried out research activities. He held several forums for the heads of the Preparatory Committee to discuss how to carry out the work of the Law Society. On May 20, 1981, Yang Xiufeng, as a member of the Constitution Revision Committee of the People's Republic of China, presided over a forum of jurists of the Preparatory Committee of the China Law Society to discuss the draft amendment to the Constitution in order to solicit opinions extensively.
After two years of preparation, the Society was officially inaugurated on July 22, 1982. After completing the preparatory work for the establishment of the China Law Society, when he learned that the Central Committee was preparing to decide yang Xiufeng to be the president of the China Law Society, he made a request to the Central Committee to give up his position to a capable young comrade, and he assisted in doing what he could, and later he was elected honorary president of the China Law Society. On September 3, 1982, at the age of 85, Yang Xiufeng sent a letter to the Central Committee, proposing that his physical strength and energy were deteriorating, that he should not be included in the list of candidates for the Central Advisory Committee, and that he repeatedly request to resign as vice chairman of the CPPCC National Committee. His letter was approved by the central authorities.
On July 22, 1982, he presided over the first member congress of the China Law Society, with the rostrum from left: Yang Xiufeng, Peng Zhen, Peng Chong.
After that, Yang Xiufeng's body was weaker than before, but he still often came to the Fa Society. Sun Wanzhong recorded such a fragment in his article remembering Elder Yang: In August 1983, shortly after Yang Xiufeng was seriously ill and discharged from the hospital, he went to the Law Society to visit the staff and told everyone that because he was sick, he had not seen everyone for a long time. He said: In carrying out the work of the Law Society, it is first necessary to maintain political unity with the central authorities and have a strong party spirit. Then, in carrying out all work, we must pay attention to seeking truth from facts, proceed from reality, and proceed from the masses. In November 1983, Wang Zhongfang (then secretary of the party leading group of the China Law Society) and Comrade Liang Wenying visited Elder Yang, who was critically ill, in the hospital.
In his later years, Yang Xiufeng also presided over and organized the drafting and revision of some important laws, such as the Marriage Law, the Civil Law, and the Provisional Regulations on Lawyers, and made important contributions to the restoration and construction of China's socialist legal system.
From the patriotic youth who threw himself into the revolution to the "red professor" who spread progressive ideas; from the chairman of the border area who abstained from self-denial and public service, to the president of the Supreme People's Court who adhered to lofty convictions, to the restorer and rebuilder of the Law Society, Yang Xiufeng's life was bright and upright, and he struggled unceasingly; for decades, he devoted his life's energy to the cause of the liberation of the Chinese people, the socialist revolution, and the construction of the rule of law, and established great historical merits.
【Reference】
Hebei Provincial Society for the Study of Figures in the History of the Communist Party of China edited "Remembering Yang Xiufeng"; "Yang Xiufeng Wencun"; Zhou Xianqi, "Strengthening the Construction of Political Power and the Legal System, Building a Socialist Country Ruled by Law -- Commemorating the 100th Anniversary of Comrade Yang Xiufeng's Birth"; Sun Wanzhong, "Pioneer of People's Mediation Work"
Editor: Qu Hehe Kang Qixian