What criminal law was generally applied to official crimes during the Qing Dynasty? Isn't it more legally privileged than ordinary people? These two questions were left by a reader, and I didn't have time to reply because of the recent mundane things, so this issue expands on this topic.
According to the Qing Dynasty Punishment Law, if an official commits a crime and uses administrative sanctions, such as dismissal or dismissal, and still cannot make up for his fault, he must enter the judicial process and be handed over to the Criminal Department for conviction, and according to his severity, he or she is divided into the following types.
Chapter 1, Death Penalty
There are two types of death sentences in the "Laws of the Qing Dynasty": beheading and hanging. The beheading of the criminal officer is in a different place; Hanging means strangling or hanging of criminal officers. However, because the hanging is a whole corpse, it is lighter than beheading. But whether it is beheaded or hanged, it is specifically divided into legislative decision and prison.
In addition to the statutory formal punishment, there are also some types of death penalty. Such as Ling Chi, the head of the owl, the corpse and so on. Ling Chi is commonly known as "chopping", that is, the criminal law that cuts the criminal to death with a knife, so Ling Chi is also called the "capital punishment" in the death penalty, which is extremely cruel.
Bow head, that is, after beheading, hang the head high on the wooden pole to show the public; Killing corpses, that is, opening coffins and killing corpses, during the Yongzheng period, Lu Liuliang was punished by this because of the punishment of the literary prison. In addition, there are various ways to make criminal officials "commit suicide", such as giving poisoned wine or hanging themselves.
After the judicial reform at the end of the Qing Dynasty, there were some changes in the provisions of the death penalty, mainly the abolition of torture such as Ling Chi and corpse killing. In the "Great New Criminal Law", the death penalty is generally hanged, except for those who commit the most heinous crimes, which are still beheaded, and the hanging is not like before, but only in prison.
Second, corporal punishment
Physical punishment is the physical torture of criminal officials for punishment, this kind of criminal law is the same as ordinary people, the mainstream is flogging, rod two kinds.
Flogging is the lightest punishment in the criminal law, that is, hitting the criminal with a small bamboo board weighing 1.5 catties. According to the magnitude of the sins committed, the flogging is divided into five classes, i.e., 10 boards, 20 boards, 30 boards, 40 boards, and 50 boards.
There are 31 types of flogging prescribed in the "Laws of the Great Qing Dynasty", which are related to officials, such as those who go to work without reason for exceeding the limit of one day, those who have four days of official documents, and so on.
The rod is an upgraded version of the flogging, aimed at the more sinful. At first, the Ming system was followed, and the staff was made of large wattle strips, and during the Kangxi period, it was changed to a large bamboo board weighing 2 catties for punishment.
The cane punishment is also divided into five classes, namely 60 canes, 70 canes, 80 canes, 90 canes, and 100 canes. In the provisions of the "Great Qing Regulations", each of the five degrees of cane punishment has a relevant provision that points the sharp edge at the official. For example, there are 16 rods of 90, including:
Those who have lost the document and a colleague has signed the case on their behalf to make up the file;
The bosses and envoys passed through the yamen, and the officials went out to greet and send off the people, and allowed the greeting and sending without asking;
监守自盗仓库钱粮等物一Two以上至二Two五钱者;
Official gamblers, and so on.
However, it should be noted that officials who have committed flogging or cane punishment can be offset by fines or demotions, and the Criminal Department has detailed standards for this: if the flogging is 10, a fine of one month will be imposed; Twenty flogs shall be fined for two months...... Whoever has sixty rods shall be fined one year; the rod of seventy shall be lowered to one level; If the rod is eighty, it will be lowered to two levels; Those who have a hundred rods shall be dismissed from their posts and retained.
There are also flail numbers and stabbing characters used together with floggings and canes, but after the middle of the Qing Dynasty, civil and military officials are generally exempt from shackles and stabs except for those who are serious.
Third, restricting the punishment of liberty
Restriction of liberty is well understood, in today's terms, it is indefinite and indefinite, and it is specifically divided into imprisonment and exile.
Imprisonment is a criminal law that deprives a criminal officer of his freedom for a certain period of time and compels him to serve hard labor. ”
The statutory sentence of imprisonment is also divided into five classes, each of which is accompanied by a cane, specifically: 60 canes for one year, 70 canes for one year and a half, 80 canes for two years, 90 canes for two and a half years, and 100 canes for three years.
There are about 341 articles of imprisonment in the statute, many of which are aimed at officials, such as the following provisions for one-year imprisonment:
Those who steal money, grain, and other goods from the warehouse to seven taels or five cents;
Officials and others received a hundred and two;
military and civilian officials and adulterous officials who have husband and wife;
Officials who took bribes and perverted the law and took 20 taels of bribes, and 50 taels who did not take bribes of the law; Wait a minute.
Exile is a kind of punishment in which criminals are escorted to remote areas to serve labor or garrisoned, and are not allowed to leave, that is, the so-called "unbearable torture and killing, exile to distant places".
Officials are sentenced to exile, usually in more serious cases. After entering the customs, the Qing Dynasty followed the Ming system and included exile in the statutory punishment, specifically 100 canes for 2,000 miles, 100 canes for 2,500 miles, and 100 canes for 3,000 miles.
According to the provisions of the "Great Qing Statute" in the 33rd year of Qianlong, 41 of them were for officials, such as the article on 2,000 li of exile:
Guarding the theft of money and grain from the warehouse to twenty taels;
Officials who take bribes and pervert the law to take 45 taels, and do not pervert the law to 100 taels;
Whenever the judge encounters all the cases of theft, there are those who are tortured to death by beating the cane, and so on.
In addition to exile, there are also three kinds of punishments: migration, conscription, and repatriation. Migration is a punishment for sending the offender to a place 1,000 miles away for resettlement, which is slightly lighter than the exile sentence.
The punishment for confiscation is divided into five classes, the first class is 2,000 li, the second class is near the border, that is, 2,500 li, the third class is remote, that is, 3,000 li, and the fourth class is 4,000 li.
Dispatch, that is, sending the convicts to Jilin, Heilongjiang, Ili and other border areas as slaves, or sending them to Xinjiang as errands. In many historical materials, there is "a man in armor who is a slave", which specifically refers to dispatch.
As for whether officials commit crimes less severely than ordinary people, or whether they enjoy privileges. This is a fact, and as mentioned earlier, some of the lighter penalties can be offset by fines and demotions.
However, in some respects, officials are punished more severely for crimes than ordinary people, for example, the punishment for corruption and bribery of officials is quite severe, that is, the so-called "state-designed, punishment for corruption, the strictest regulations". For another example, the moral requirements of officials are higher than those of ordinary people, and the punishment of officials with bad conduct and moral turpitude is also heavier than that of ordinary people.
However, in the final analysis, the basis of the rule of the feudal dynasty is all kinds of officials, large and small, although many punitive measures have been formulated in the law, but in the actual implementation process, there are still the characteristics of officials protecting each other, protecting officials but not protecting the people.