Chapter 1864 - The New Judge

Around noon that day, Element Shen Ruiming of the Ministry of Justice arrived in Guangzhou from Lingao.

As a member of the Law Society, he had come to strengthen judicial work in Guangzhou. Originally, the only Element in the city's judicial system was Liang Xinhu, who was run off his feet; moreover, his work was merely passable—after all, the justice department itself had few trained naturalized citizens, and no matter how talented Element Liang was, he couldn't work miracles.

Legal work in the city was already substantial. After the sorcery case was solved, Liu Xiang's plan called for a public trial and sentencing, making it a key case for "legal education." Additionally, there were the "New Life Movement," the "Vice Industry Rectification," the "Public Order Strengthening Campaign," the "Industrial and Commercial New Order," and the "Land Tax Rectification"—a whole series of social and economic reform campaigns, all requiring extensive judicial support. This proved too much for Liang Xinhu. After complaining to Ma Jia via telegram, Shen Ruiming was transferred in.

Before D-Day, Shen Ruiming had been merely a junior lawyer who had recently graduated. His life was unremarkable until he stumbled upon news of the wormhole. His crude ambitions for building a harem were immediately ignited; he quit his job and headed south to join the cause. After D-Day, almost everyone in the Law Society found themselves in difficult circumstances. Element Shen could only muddle along at the Law Society—his law degree came from a maritime university, which in the pedigree-conscious Law Society was practically a side door. Had he not at least passed the bar exam and actually obtained a lawyer's license, he might have ended up rubbing shoulders with An Xi.

Like most of his colleagues in the legal field, Element Shen served as "borrowed labor" shuffled around to various departments while also working at the Law Society, participating in the drafting of various laws. As the governed territory expanded and legal practice increased, demand for legal talent grew. After the Arbitration Court was established, members of the Law Society finally shed their "part-time" work and were assigned to various circuit courts.

The Executive Council advocated "rule of law," but those with modern legal knowledge were few. When territory was small, the shortage wasn't obvious; once the governed area expanded, it became critical.

According to the principle of separating justice from administration, local executives did not oversee judicial practice. But though territory grew daily, the number of Elements in the legal field did not increase—and because the justice department was at the lowest priority for personnel allocation, few naturalized cadres had been trained.

Thus, the Elements in the legal field, long considered "useless," suddenly became sought after. To meet the demands of various localities, the Law Society established a circuit court system, dividing the Executive Council's administrative regions by population into multiple circuit court jurisdictions, with judges rotating through to hear cases on a regular schedule.

Apart from Ma Jia, who was anchored in Lingao, the other members rotated on assignment. Two-thirds of the year, they were scattered across Taiwan, Jeju, Vietnam, and recently Guangdong. Jiangnan and Shandong, where complete governments had not yet been established, didn't require their presence—under existing local authorities, encroaching on another's jurisdiction would not be wise.

Shen Ruiming received his transfer notice to Guangzhou just as he disembarked from the return ferry from Jeju Island—he had just completed a three-month circuit of the Gaoxiong-Jeju route.

Though the notice was somewhat sudden, it wasn't entirely unexpected. Once the Mainland Strategy commenced, the Ministry of Justice's focus would naturally shift to the mainland.

Having received the notice, Shen Ruiming went straight to the Ministry of Justice without even going home and found Ma Jia.

"You've worked hard. But the next assignment will be even harder." Ma Jia got straight to the point. "You received the notice?"

"Yes." Shen Ruiming nodded. "If you have no specific instructions, I'll leave tomorrow."

"No hurry." Ma Jia said. "Guangzhou has a mountain of work piled up. Whether you go a day earlier or later doesn't matter. We need to sort things out first."

Shen Ruiming understood what Ma Jia meant by "sorting things out." Strictly speaking, the Executive Council's legal institutions had always been a "responsive agency," operating on the principle of "treat the head when the head hurts, treat the feet when the feet hurt." The legal system in use was not only incomplete but—frankly—quite chaotic. Of course, this wasn't the Law Society's fault; reality demanded it.

Shen Ruiming said, "The Arbitration Court framework is too small and lacks proper legitimacy. Before, when conditions were limited, we made do. Now that Guangdong is in hand and our territory has more than doubled, with human resources to match, maintaining the old stopgap system seems unjustifiable." He added, "That's what everyone in the Society has been saying."

"Because everyone shares this view, the Law Society is preparing to convene an expanded meeting to formally establish a charter and discuss our future system and direction." Ma Jia saw the gleam in Shen Ruiming's eyes and thought "these young people just can't hide their excitement." "Secretary Ma's opinion is that we should create a complete legal system. Of course, whether it follows the TG model, the German model, the British model, or the American model—that will require us to submit proposals and go through proper procedures." He was pleased to see Shen Ruiming's eyes widen. "Go and study up. We meet the day after tomorrow."

The Law Society's expanded meeting was extraordinarily lively. Not only were all Arbitration Court members present, but every Law Society member attended without exception. In fact, anyone with even a hint of legal background—gods, demons, and everything in between—showed up, all hoping to secure a place in the future system.

"Ahem, everyone share your thoughts." Ma Jia saw that the turnout exceeded his estimates, and a smile crept to the corner of his mouth. The Elements clearly took this top-level legal design seriously. There was a great future in the law!

Seeing everyone still hesitant, Ma Jia continued: "Though the system has been reformed and the Arbitration Court is equivalent to a combined Supreme Court and Supreme Procuratorate, how exactly to implement this hasn't been sorted out. The Executive—er, the Cabinet members also want to hear everyone's views."

As Ma Jia's confidant, An Xi spoke first: "Law embodies the interests of the ruling class. In this timeline, it should embody the interests of the Executive Council and the broad masses of Elements." The assembled Elements wore expressions of "tell us something we don't know." Seeing no one taking the bait, An Xi continued: "Speaking of protecting the regime, nothing beats the Anglo-American legal system."

"The advantages of Anglo-American law are obvious. Flexible application, combining common law and equity, not rigidly bound by form. The American model is even better than the British, with more statutory law, which suits our legal habits better. Most importantly, the chief justices hold the power to interpret law..."

"Ahem, the American system certainly has its merits... Does anyone else have thoughts?" Ma Jia cut him off before he could finish. An Xi might be good at flattery, but he was somewhat lacking in grasping leadership intentions.

As a member of the Law Society, Ma Jia naturally preferred the American system and had expressed this multiple times. The problem was that the Executive Council didn't like it. The framework wasn't even built yet, and they already wanted to extend their hands toward interpretive power—weren't they afraid of overreaching? Besides, non-Society Elements were present; word getting out wouldn't do the Society's image any good.

The second to speak was Xu Ke: "To be sure, a major advantage of the Anglo-American system is its high barrier to entry—it requires extensive practice and knowledge. Future monopoly of this profession would naturally fall to Element descendants. Those descendants who don't inherit Council seats could enter the profession in large numbers, providing them a kind of security. However—" he paused, "—a high entry barrier is even more likely to lead to big capital influencing and controlling the judiciary. The wealthy hire good lawyers and easily escape conviction. Our future nation will surely be a multi-ethnic empire with great economic disparities. If people perceive the judiciary as favoring the rich, that's one thing. But if other tensions are sparked, the harm would be incalculable."

Shen Ruiming spoke next: "Element descendants entering the judicial field one after another, plus family members holding Element seats—wouldn't that create new-age legal aristocracies? When everyone is vying for power, will we still have rule of law?" He grew more animated, leaving An Xi no opening to interject "then just legislate to bar Element descendants from the judiciary."

Finally, Ma Jia made the decision: "The elitism and aristocratization of the Anglo-American system is indeed a major problem. We can't simply copy it wholesale. Besides, in this timeline, where would we even find so many experienced judges? Comrades, within ten years we plan to secure all of China. With such a large platter, how many courses can we actually serve?"

Ma Jia's remarks fully buried the Anglo-American faction. If they were limited to civil law systems, continuing the old-timeline framework became the more realistic choice. Currently, the Executive Council's legal structure was relatively chaotic. The Chief Arbitrator was appointed by the Council Chairman; the Arbitration Court was both Supreme Court and Supreme Procuratorate—at this point, the Council's Procuratorate was still just an office under the Arbitration Court. When the Council's rule was limited to Lingao alone, there naturally weren't enough cases to warrant a separate procuratorate; a prosecutor's office sufficed. During the successive occupations of various territories, military tribunals predominated, and the Council naturally had no mind to attend to the judicial rights of "*** enemies"—a few naturalized cadres pronounced sentences according to the superiors' designated charges, and that was that. But now, with Guangdong and its population of several million becoming Song territory, case numbers grew exponentially. The prosecutor's office's handful of people obviously couldn't cope, not to mention the need to handle the various prefectures and counties of Hainan beyond Lingao. Thus, case prosecution, as in the early days of the founding, was primarily carried out by the National Police under Mu Min's administration.

(End of Chapter)