on a modern basis.

In 1912, on the overthrow of the Manchu monarchy, China became a
republic, with an elected President, and a Parliament consisting
of a Senate and House of Representatives. The various government
departments were reorganized on Western lines, and a large number
of new offices instituted. Up to the present year the Law of the
Constitution, owing to political dissension between the North and
the South, has not been put into force.


Laws

Chinese law, like primitive law generally, was not instituted
in order to ensure justice between man and man; its object was
to enforce subordination of the ruled to the ruler. The laws were
punitive and vindictive rather than reformatory or remedial, criminal
rather than civil. Punishments were cruel: branding, cutting off the
nose, the legs at the knees, castration, and death, the latter not
necessarily, or indeed ordinarily, for taking life. They included in
some cases punishment of the family, the clan, and the neighbours of
the offender. The _lex talionis_ was in full force.

Nevertheless, in spite of the harsh nature of the punishments, possibly
adapted, more or less, to a harsh state of society, though the "proper
end of punishments"--to "make an end of punishing"--was missed, the
Chinese evolved a series of excellent legal codes. This series began
with the revision of King Mu's _Punishments_ in 950 B.C., the first
regular code being issued in 650 B.C., and ended with the well-known
_Ta Ch'ing lü li_ (_Laws and Statutes of the Great Ch'ing Dynasty_),