China has made support for Chinese Communist Party leadership an explicit legal qualification for lawyers, elevating a political requirement already imposed through Ministry of Justice regulations into the national law governing the profession.
The amendment to the Lawyers Law, adopted by the National People’s Congress Standing Committee on Aug. 28 and effective Sept. 1, requires lawyers to support China’s Constitution, “the leadership of the Communist Party of China,” and the country’s “socialist rule of law.”
The previous law required applicants to support the Constitution, pass the national legal qualification examination, complete a one-year internship, and have good character. It did not separately list support for CCP leadership as a statutory qualification.
The amendment also adds a new Article 3 stating that lawyers’ work must adhere to CCP leadership and implement party and state policies and decisions.
It requires CCP organizations to be established in law firms under party rules and says firms must provide the necessary conditions for party activities.
The amendment retains existing language stating that “lawyers’ lawful practice is protected” and adds a requirement for courts, prosecutors, police, state-security agencies and judicial-administration departments to “establish systems to protect lawyers’ professional rights.”
Political Requirements Predate Amendment
Tying lawyers’ work to the CCP did not begin with the new law.
Ministry of Justice rules governing law firms already made support for CCP leadership and China’s socialist legal system a basic requirement for legal practice.
The rules, issued in December 2018 and effective in January 2019, required firms with three or more CCP members to establish party organizations.
Firms with fewer members were to conduct party work through joint organizations or party-building instructors.
The ministry also required law firms to establish mechanisms for party organizations to participate in decision-making and management and to provide space, personnel, and funding for party work.
The Aug. 28 amendment moves those requirements into national legislation and, for the first time in the Lawyers Law itself, makes support for CCP leadership a separately stated qualification for becoming a lawyer.
Rights Lawyers Under Pressure
The change followed a yearslong tightening of controls over lawyers who take cases the regime deems politically sensitive.
Many legal professionals in China remain under severe restrictions after more than 300 lawyers, legal assistants, and rights advocates were detained, questioned, or otherwise swept up in the “709 Crackdown” that started on July 9, 2015.
Some lawyers were held incommunicado or later prosecuted on national-security charges. Others lost their law licenses. Their spouses and children also reported surveillance, restrictions on movement, pressure on landlords, and interference with schooling.
In December 2018, Li Wenzu and three other wives of lawyers and activists caught up in the crackdown appeared outside a Beijing court and shaved their heads.
“We can go hairless, but you cannot be lawless,” the women chanted—a play on the homophones for “hair” and “law” in Chinese.
Li’s husband, lawyer Wang Quanzhang, had by then been held incommunicado for more than three years.
The Epoch Times has sought comment on the amended Lawyers Law from several 709 lawyers and family members in China. None had responded by publication time.
The lack of response comes amid increasingly tight restrictions on public expression in China.
Rights lawyer Wang Yu, one of the lawyers detained during the 709 crackdown, described her view of the legal system in an earlier interview.
“Now I believe there is no law in China,” Wang told The Epoch Times in June 2018.
“The essence of rule of law is about limiting the power of the government,” she said. “But the Chinese Communist Party is using the rule of law to reinforce its own rule.”
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