On The Ming And Qing Dynasties Of Customary Law And State Statutes Of Interaction And Means - The Huizhou Area Of ​​civil And Commercial Activities For The Case

Unlike many previous researches focused on layer of statute law which overlooking layer of its concern for common people, many a scholar, now, are beginning to make researches on customary law. But there are still two defects: on one hand, they have studied more on its integrity but less on diverse cases. On the other hand, they have studied more on the nation-wide layer but less on regional ones. This dissertation aims at making up these deficiencies, and more important, to figure out some historical values, helpful for the present legislation, especially for the civil and commercial laws.In preface, a brief introduction is made, about the present findings and the methods of doing this research. The author chooses the civil and commercial activities as a specific sample occurred in the Huizhou,a region located on the south of Yangtze River in Anhui province, during the "long period" between Ming and Qing Dynasties. In order to make a further description of customary law, the interaction of both the legislative bodies and citizens, and the law making procedures, we go further into society to comprehend the deeper connotation concealed in the contracts. The main body of this paper consists of four chapters.Chapter One mainly examines on the civil and commercial conventions prevailed in Huizhou District in Ming and Qing Dynasties. It touches up the following questions one by one: the resources and classification of the contracts, the power and principles, the fulfillment, guarantor's function, and so on.Chapter Two makes a careful analysis, from the perspective of statute law, of the rules and agreements in Ming and Qing Dynasties on civil and commercial laws. To begin with the statutes related to agreement, the author analyzes the ending parts and taxation vouchers of Huizhou District, to find out that the management of the civil and commercial activities were rather strict at that time, and that the revenue of the contract tax and its implementation were all smoothly conducted.Conclusion serves as Chapter There. Both the governmental regulations and the non-governmental ones worked side by side to maintain the stability of the society and to secure individual's rights to the greatest extent at that time inHuizhou District. Fairness is their perfect combination. During the making of a law, not only should certain conventions be taken into account; but also folk conventions should be put into practice to secure the loophole left in the statute law.The denouement turns to the reflection on current legislation, especially on the legislation of civil and commercial conventions. In the author's opinion, legislation today should make fully consideration about the civil and commercial conventions, borrowing the pith and discarding the dregs.