New China's First Marriage Law A Number Of Issues Discussed

On April 13, 1950, in the seventh session of Central People's Government Committee presided over by Mao Zedong, Marriage Law of the People's Republic of China was decided, which is the first basic law issued after the foundation of the new China. It was not only a summary in law of the long struggle of Chinese people against the feudal marriage and family system, but also stipulated to satisfy the practical needs of reforming the marriage and family system after the liberation. Either in the liberation history of Chinese women, or in the legal system building history in new China, it is of great significance and plays an important role.The first marriage law in new China was consisted of eight chapters, namely, the principles, marriage, rights and obligations of husband and wife, relationships between parents and children, divorce, custody and education of children after divorce, property and existence after divorce and supplementary articles, being totally 27 articles. The feature was to emphasize on adjusting the marriage relationships and stipulates specifically on the children and property after divorce while the stipulations on the family relationships are relatively brief. The basic spirit of this marriage law was specified in the first article of this law:"to abolish the feudal marriage and family system that arranged the forced marriage, treated females as inferior to males and disregarded the interests of the children. To enforce the new-democratic marriage system that advocates the free marriage, monogamy, equal men's and women's rights and protects the female and children's legal interests."This stipulation explained the major tenet of this law and displayed the principles of this law.This paper elaborates the background, constitution process, basic principles, main contents, propaganda and implementation and the corresponding social influence of the first marriage law in new China, so as to attempt to conduct fairly thorough and deep discussion on the first marriage law in new China. With the description of the historical facts, the first part of this paper introduces the background of the first marriage law in new China; moreover, the constitution process, the issuance process and the corresponding social influences are described briefly.The second part of this paper addressed the basic principles of the first marriage law in new China including: abolish the arranged and forced marriage and advocate free marriage; forbid any bigamy and concubinage and practice monogamy; oppose...