Legislative Law of the People's Republic of China
Legislative Law of the People's Republic of China
Legislative Law of the People's Republic of China
Order of the President [2000] No.31
March 15, 2000
The Legislative Law of the People's Republic of China that has been adopted at the Third Session of the Ninth National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China on March 15, 2000 is hereby promulgated, and shall take effect as of July 1, 2000.
Jiang Zemin, President of the People's Republic of China
Appendix: Legislative Law of the People's Republic of China
Chapter I General Provisions
Article 1 The Legislative Law of the People's Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as the "Law") is enacted in accordance with the Constitution in order to standardize lawmaking activities, improve state legislative institutions, establish and perfect the socialist legal system with Chinese characteristics, safeguard and develop socialist democracy, promote the governance of the country in accordance with the law, and build a socialist country under the rule of law.
Article 2 The enactment, amendment and repeal of any law, administrative regulation, local regulation, autonomous regulation or special rule shall be governed by the Law.
The enactment, amendment and repeal of administrative rules promulgated by departments of the State Council and local rules promulgated by local governments shall be carried out in accordance with the relevant provisions of the Law.
Article 3 Lawmaking shall follow the basic principles of the Constitution, center around economic development, follow the socialist path, adhere to people's democratic dictatorship, adhere to the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party, adhere to Marxism, Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought and Deng Xiaoping Theory, and insist on the reform and opening up.
Article 4 Lawmaking shall be conducted in conformity with legally prescribed scope of authority and procedure, and shall serve the overall interests of the State and preserve the uniformity and dignity of the socialist legal system.
Article 5 Lawmaking shall reflect the will of the people, promote socialist democracy, and ensure the participation of the people in lawmaking in a variety of ways.
Article 6 Lawmaking shall be based on actual circumstances, and shall, in a scientific and reasonable way, prescribe the rights and obligations of citizens, legal persons and other organizations, and the powers and duties of the state organs.
Chapter II Laws
Section 1 Scope of Lawmaking Authority
Article 7 The legislative power of the State shall be exercised by the National People's Congress and its Standing Committee.
The National People's Congress enacts and amends criminal laws, civil laws, laws of state organs and other basic laws.
The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress enacts and amends the laws other than those that shall be enacted by the National People's Congress; during the period of prorogation of the National People's Congress, the Standing Committee thereof may make partial amendments and supplements to the laws enacted by the National People's Congress, but such amendments or supplements shall not contravene the basic principles of the corresponding laws.
Article 8 Laws may be enacted only in respect to matters relating to:
1. the state sovereignty;
2. the establishment, organization and authority of the people's congresses, people's governments, people's courts and people's procuratorates at all levels;
3. the system of regional ethnic autonomy, governance of special administrative regions, and autonomy system at the grass-root level;
4. crimes and criminal punishment;
5. the deprivation of political rights of citizens, or compulsory measures and penalties that restrict personal freedom;
6. the expropriation of non-state-owned assets;
7. basic civil systems;
8. the basic economic system and basic fiscal, taxation, customs, finance and foreign trade systems;
9. litigation and arbitration systems; and
10. other matters for which the laws must be enacted by the National People's Congress or its Standing Committee.
Article 9 In the event that no law has been enacted with respect to any matter mentioned in Article 8 hereof, the National People's Congress and its Standing Committee may be entitled to make the decision on authorizing the State Council to enact administrative regulations in advance concerning the partial matters as needed actually, except for matters relating to crime and criminal punishment, deprivation of citizens' political rights, compulsory measures and penalties restricting a citizen's personal freedom and judicial system.
Article 10 The authorization decision shall specify the objective and scope of the authorization.
The organ so authorized shall exercise its power in strict compliance with the objective and scope of the authorization.
The organ so authorized shall not re-delegate its authority to any other body.
Article 11 For legislative matters covered by an authorization, once circumstances are ripe for the enactment of a law after the practice examination, the National People's Congress and the Standing Committee thereof shall enact a law in a timely fashion. Upon the enactment of the law, the relevant authorization of lawmaking authority with respect to the matters accordingly shall be terminated.
Section 2 Legislative Process of the National People's Congress
Article 12 The Presidium of the National People's Congress may propose a bill to the National People's Congress for deliberation in the current session.
The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, the State Council, the Central Military Commission, the Supreme People's Court, the Supreme People's Procuratorate, and all special committees of the National People's Congress may propose a bill to the National People's Congress, and such bill shall be placed onto the agenda of the current session by the decision of the Presidium.
Article 13 A delegation may propose, or a group of not less than 30 delegates may jointly propose, a bill to the National People's Congress, and the Presidium shall decide whether to place such bill on the agenda of the current session, or whether to refer such bill to the special committee on deliberation, and such special committee shall suggest whether such bill shall be placed on the agenda of the current session, whereupon the Presidium shall decide whether or not to place the bill on the agenda of the current session.
In the course of deliberation on the bill, the special committee may invite the bill sponsor to attend the session and offer comments and suggestions.
Article 14 During the period of prorogation of the National People's Congress, a motion that shall be made to the National People's Congress may be first made to the Standing Committee, which shall, after the deliberation according to the procedure stipulated in Section 3 of Chapter II of the Law, forward the motion to the National People's Congress for deliberation, whereupon the Standing Committee or the bill sponsor shall make statements to the plenary session.
Article 15 In case where the Standing Committee has decided to submit a bill to the upcoming session of the National People's Congress for deliberation, the bill in draft law form shall be distributed to the delegates one month prior to the commencement of the session.
Article 16 In case where a bill has been placed on the agenda of the current session of the National People's Congress, the plenary session shall, after hearing the statements of the bill sponsor, forward the bill to the delegations responsible for deliberation.
In the course of deliberation of the bill by the delegations, the bill sponsor shall send representatives to hear the comments and answer the questions.
In the course of deliberation of the bill by the delegations, relevant institutions or organizations shall send representatives to make statements to the delegations upon the request of the delegations.
Article 17 A bill that has been placed on the agenda of the current session of the National People's Congress shall be deliberated upon by the relevant special committee, which shall then submit its opinions to the Presidium for distribution to the session's delegates.
Article 18 For a bill that has been placed on the agenda of the current session of the National People's Congress, the Law Committee shall, on the basis of the deliberation opinions of the delegations and the relevant special committee, conduct a general deliberation on the bill, and afterwards shall submit to the Presidium a deliberation report and an amended draft law. The deliberation report shall include statements of important differences in opinions and, and after being deliberated and approved by the Presidium, shall be distributed to the session's delegates.
Article 19 For a bill that has been placed on the agenda of the current session of the National People's Congress, the executive chairman of the Presidium may, where necessary, convene a meeting of delegation leaders to hear the deliberation opinions of all delegations on key issues of the bill, hold discussions, and report the discussions and suggestions concerning key issues to the Presidium.
The executive chairman of the Presidium may also call a session of the relevant delegates selected by the delegations to discuss important special issues contained in the bill, and shall report its discussions and suggestions to the Presidium.
Article 20 If a bill sponsor requests the withdrawal of a bill that has been placed on the agenda of the current session of the National People's Congress but has not yet been brought to a vote, the bill sponsor shall explain his request; once the Presidium has given consent to the request and reported its decision to the plenary session, then the deliberation over the bill shall be terminated accordingly.
Article 21 If, during the deliberation of a bill, there are key issues that need to be studied further, the Standing Committee may, upon the suggestion of the Presidium and the consent of the plenary session, be authorized to conduct further deliberations based on the opinions of the delegates, make a decision and report its decision to the next session of the National People's Congress.
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