The Exploration Of Lawyer System In The Early Republic Of China

Lawyer system is a democratic institution of jus, which is an important part ofnational institution of law today. However, there’s no lawyer system in ancient China, forthe reason that no conditions existed like developed handicraft industry and business,democratic politics,freedom and so on. It’s an agricultural society which was conservativein hundreds of years. By the mid-19th century, the imperialism made China asemi-colonial and semi-feudal country. In order to save the nation from subjugation andensure its survival, the government of the late Qing Dynasty began to reform, which reallycreated some conditions for the birth of China’s Lawyer System. After the Qing Dynastywas overturned, the bourgeois revolutionaries represented by Dr. Sun Yat-sen abolishedthe feudal despotism, shattered the foundations of the old state apparatus and at this basic,they chose democratic republic as their forms of the new government. The newgovernment set the new national institution of law according to the principle of rule of lawin Western countries. In the difficult process, they also tried to change judicial adjudicationsystem and built the lawyer system. In the period that the government was under theregime of the Northern warlord clique, a special regulation called <Lawyers InterimConstitution> was published, that indicated the birth of China’s lawyer system. Luckily,the Northern warlord clique government hadn’t dropped to build the institution. In thefuture five years, the government revised the regulation four times. In this article, theauthor would analyze the reasons, the process and the development of the lawyer system inthe early time Republic of China. Through the study of <Lawyers Interim Constitution>,try to explore the rationality of the system design at that time. At last, the author try to findthe problems of the lawyer system appeared in practice, and commentate the erasignificance.