Legislative Law of the People's Republic of China (Amended in 2015)
Legislative Law of the People's Republic of China (Amended in 2015)
Legislative Law of the People's Republic of China (Amended in 2015)
Order of the President of the People's Republic of China No.20
March 15, 2015
(Adopted at the Third Session of the Ninth National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China on March 15, 2000 and amended in accordance with the Decision on Revising the Legislative Law of the People's Republic of China made at the Third Session of the 12th National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China on March 15, 2015)
Contents
Chapter I General Provisions
Chapter II Laws
Section 1 Scope of Legislative Powers
Section 2 Legislative Process of the National People's Congress
Section 3 Legislative Process of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress
Section 4 Interpretation of the Law
Section 5 Other Provisions
Chapter III Administrative Regulations
Chapter IV Local Regulations, Autonomous Regulations and Special Regulations and Rules
Section 1 Local Regulations, Autonomous Regulations and Special Regulations
Section 2 Rules
Chapter V Application of Law and Filing Review
Chapter VI Supplementary Provisions
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 legislative activities, improve state legislative institutions, improve the legislative quality, perfect the socialist legal system with Chinese characteristics, give play to the leading and promotion role of lawmaking, safeguard and develop socialist democracy, fully 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 Laws shall be made in compliance with the basic principles laid down in the Constitution, center around economic development, follow the socialist path, adhere to the 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 Laws shall be made in accordance with the statutory limits of power and procedures, on the basis of the overall interests of the State and for the puprose of safeguarding the uniformity and dignity of the socialist legal system.
Article 5 Laws shall be made in order to embody the will of the people, promote socialist democracy, insist on the openness of legislative work, and ensure the participation of the people in legislative activities in a variety of ways.
Article 6 Law shall be made by proceeding from reality and adapting to economic and social development and the requirements of comprehensively deepening of reforms, 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 state organs.
Legal norms shall be clearly articulated, specific, targeted and enforceable.
Chapter II Laws
Section 1 Scope of Legislative Powers
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 establishment of tax categories, determination of tax rates, tax collection management and other basic taxation systems;
7. the expropriation and requisition of non-state-owned assets;
8. basic civil systems;
9. the basic economic system and basic fiscal, customs, finance and foreign trading systems;
10. litigation and arbitration systems; and
11. other matters for which the laws must be enacted by the National People's Congress or its Standing Committee.
(Relevant articles: Legal news 1)
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, matter, scope and term of the authorization as well as governing principles for the organ so authorized to execute the authorization decision and others.
The authorization term shall not exceed five years, unless otherwise prescribed in the authorization decision.
The organ so authorized shall, six months before the expiry of the authorization term, report the implementation of the authorization decision to the enabling organ, and shall give its opinions on whether to formulate relevant laws; may give relevant opinions on the continuance of the authorization as it considers necessary, which shall be decided by the National People's Congress and its Standing Committee.
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.
Article 12 The organ so authorized shall exercise its power in strict compliance with the authorization decision.
The organ so authorized shall not re-delegate its authority to any other body.
Article 13 The National People's Congress and its Standing Committee may decide to temporarily adjust or suspend the application of certain legal provisions in certain places within a certain period with regard to the authorization on certain matters in the fields of administrative management and others based on the requirements of reform and development.
Section 2 Legislative Process of the National People's Congress
Article 14 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 15 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 16 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 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.
When deliberating the bill pursuant to the preceding paragraph, the Standing Committee shall solicit opinions from the representatives of the National People's Congress through various ways and provide the feedback on the relevant situations. The relevant representatives of the National People's Congress may be invited to participate in legislation investigations and researches carried out by the special committees and the working bodies of the Standing Committee.
Article 17 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 18 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 19 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 20 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 21 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 22 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 23 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. The Standing Committee may also be authorized to hold further deliberations according to the opinions of the delegates, and put forward an amendment plan for deliberation and decision by the next session of the National People's Congress.
Article 24 After the deliberation by the delegations, the amended draft law shall be further amended by the Law Committee based on the deliberation opinions of the delegations; the Law Committee then shall present a version of the draft law so that the Presidium may make a case to the plenary session for adoption based on simple majority vote of all delegates.
Article 25 A law enacted by the National People's Congress shall be promulgated by the presidential order signed by the President of the State.
Section 3 Legislative Process of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress
Article 26 The Chairmen's Council may propose a bill to the Standing Committee for deliberation.
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 Standing Committee and such bill shall be placed on the agenda of the current session of the Standing Committee upon the decision of the Chairmen's Council, or the bill may be proposed to the relevant special committees for deliberations and a report shall be submitted by the special committee to the Chairmen's Council, which then decides whether to place it on the agenda of the upcoming session of the Standing Committee.
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