A Study On Engels’ Thoughts Of Law In His Old Age

Marxist legal thought is the theoretical results explored and established by Marx and Engels. In the process of the establishment, Engels played a significant role, making a outstanding contributions. After Marx’s death, Engels pointed out the relative independence of law under the new historical conditions, which made Marxist Legal Thought more meaningful. Hence, we can say that Engels’ legal thought in his late years occupies a very important position in the whole Marxist legal system.After Marx, the proletarian revolutionary leader, was passed away, Engels made all his effort on compiling and publishing the posthumous works of Marx for making up the blank.Meanwhile, he also fought some thoughts that distorted, denied and misunderstood Marxist legal thought, writing a lot of related works and letters such as “Family, Private Property and the State of origin”, "jurist socialism", " five letters of historical materialism ". In the book of “Family, Private Property and the State of origin”, Engels systematically discusses the country’s origin thought and the development thought of the law, and also discusses what the e adjustment mechanism of the primitive social relations, how the law developed,whether the law can vanishes and how the law vanishes. In the book of “jurist socialism”,Engels explains his attitude of the proletariat. With the reguard of the wanton attack and distortion of historical materialism from Bourgeois scholars headed by Paul Bart and "youth camp" of Germany Social Democratic Party, Engels explains the law, the economic basis and their relation, stresses the decisive role of the economic basis, points out the famous relative independence of the law, he also deduces the fact that the law reflects the economic basis does not mean that the law is the economic basis, it is an independent social phenomenon. The independence is conditional, determined by economic basis. The level of the impact on economic basis is determined by the need of the economic basis. The relative independency of the law can be reflected by the imbalance between the development of the law and the development of the economic basis, the historical inheritance of the law, the consistence of the law system, and the dynamic reaction of the law to the economic basis.Moreover, Engels discusses the interaction between the law and the economic basis. The above contents enrich the Marxist legal thoughts.Currently, China is constructing the socialist legal system and building the legal society. Based on the background, rediscovering Engels in his later years legal thought is the important position in Marxist legal thought,it is also helpful to promote ruling the country according the law.