The development of party rule in the judiciary: personnel changes and political transformation of the Nanjing government’s judicial center, 1927–1937

Abstract

After the establishment of the Nanjing Nationalist government in 1927, the Guomindang (GMD) gradually founded a national regime and started to implement the principle of “governing the nation by the party.” But the party-rule was not implemented immediately and effectively. In the early years of the Nationalist government, its judicial branch mostly hired former Beiyang judicial officials, who generally pursued the ideals of judicial independence and politics transcending party lines, ideals established in the Beiyang period. In 1932, when Ju Zheng became the president of the Judicial Yuan, founding members of the GMD began to replace the Beiyang officials in the judicial center. This personnel change was completed around 1935. Meanwhile, due to national crisis and the GMD’s concern that the judicial status quo did not meet its political needs, the GMD began to emphasize the political nature of the judiciary and to advocate the party-ization of the judiciary. Consequently, eight years after the founding of the Nanjing Nationalist government, GMD party members began to obtain de facto control of the judicial center, symbolizing the completion of the shift from Beiyang judicial practices to GMD party-rule in the judiciary. Nevertheless, during the following years, the GMD failed to penetrate, dominate, and integrate the middle and lower levels of the judicial system, where the judicial ideals and personnel structures still strongly retained their Beiyang legacy.