On Shen Jiaben's Thought Of Criminal Law

Mr. Sheng Jiaben, a famous scholar in Chinese Qing dynasty, created the new Chinese legal system. With his effort, a lot of western legislation has been transferred into China.The amendment of criminal law was the most difficult work for him, and it had led to a struggle between the legal system and Chinese traditional culture. The equality of personality is the base of Mr. Sheng Jiaben's criminal law system. It had been proved that his thinking went too far from the tradition. Therefore the Criminal Law of Qing Dynasty which adopted the idea of personality equality was strongly opposed because this law left no space for the privilege class including the royalties.The core of criminal legal system set up by Mr. Sheng is that every punishment caused by a crime must be stipulated in the crime law of the country. He devoted a great sum of effort to research Chinese culture trying to persuade people to accept this idea. With his effort, the concept that criminal punishment must be stipulated in the crime law has been carried forward and plays its fundamental role nowadays.Mr. Sheng Jiaben also argued that the criminal punishment should be humane. And he strongly hold this idea that excruciation should be totally revoked. After analyzing many Japanese samples, he entirely adopted the western modern criminal system, and helped China to adjust its criminal legal system to a more humanitarian way.The independence of jurisdiction is the institutional guarantee for the criminal legal system. The first step of separation of powers is the independence of jurisdiction. Mr. Sheng Jiaben tried his best to call for the establishment of the self-governed judicial system. He had played a great role in improving the influence and the status of the idea of jurisdiction independence.