Chapter 2632: Legal Popularization Style Lawsuit (Part 1)

One of the Clan Elders spoke up angrily. "Zongbao, those are not words befitting a junior. I'll overlook your rudeness this once, given your youth and inexperience."

"Guan Youde," Guan Boyi said, turning to face him, "what do you propose we do about this matter?"

Guan Youde stepped forward and thrust an accusing finger at Huang Shi. "I've suffered endlessly for this family. I fought tooth and nail just to survive to this day. And her? She betrayed her womanly duties! She cuckolded me, and drove me to this state—"

"You dare blame her?" Guan Zongbao roared. "Aren't you afraid of Heaven's Condemnation?"

Guan Boyi's face contorted with rage. "Silence! You've brought shame upon our ancestors! This matter will not be spoken of again!"

Another Clan Elder stepped forward to mediate. "What's past is past. Speaking of it changes nothing. Let us set aside old grievances. Today, we discuss only the future."

Guan Youde puffed up with arrogance. "From this day forward, as long as she treats me well, I'll let bygones be bygones. Guan Zongbao, if you're willing to call me 'Father,' I'll still acknowledge you as my son."

Huang Shi bowed her head. "Then I will treat him well. As long as he's willing to live peacefully, I can forgive him this once."

Guan Zongbao was so furious he laughed bitterly, unable to utter a single word.

Seeing that the moment was ripe, Guan Boyi addressed Huang Shi. "I understand your family's difficulties. From now on, the clan will provide you with one hundred jin of grain each month. Since the Official Family has taken an interest in this matter, we mustn't lose face before them. The Official Family plans to establish an Agricultural Technology School in this township. When it opens, the clan will fund Guan Zongbao's enrollment. Does this arrangement satisfy you?"

Huang Shi thanked him profusely. Guan Zongbao, however, deflated like a punctured ball, unable to muster even a shred of joy.

The next day, Guan Zongbao slipped away to the Jiujiang Great Market to find Zhao Hening. After hearing the whole story, she was livid with confusion and fury. She grabbed Zhang Jiayu and they rode without pause to question Huang Shi directly.

Huang Shi wore the weary expression of someone who had given up the fight. "I'm doing this for Bao'er's sake," she said resentfully. "Even if I divorced that man, Bao'er would still be obligated to support him. If anything happened, Bao'er would bear the burden. Better that I shield him from it."

"If you want to escape him, it couldn't be easier!" Zhao Hening exclaimed. "Under Senate rule, peace reigns everywhere. You and your son could fly far away—even if you went to Nanyang to make a living, you wouldn't starve."

"Sister, you don't understand." Huang Shi sighed heavily. "Every family has its own troubles." As she spoke, tears began streaming down her face again.

"This is just—I can't even—" Zhao Hening sputtered with incoherent rage. "Today I finally understand what it means to 'mourn someone's misfortune while raging at their refusal to fight!'"

Zhang Jiayu, as a local, could better appreciate Huang Shi's predicament. Still, in his heart, he hoped she would leave Guan Youde and start fresh. "Aunt, I understand your situation," he said gently. "But this choice is truly unwise. Guan Youde's nature was set decades ago. He won't change."

"Exactly! Can a dog stop eating shit? Have you ever seen that happen?" Zhao Hening's fury had nowhere to go. She grabbed Zhang Jiayu and pummeled his back with her fists, making him wince and grimace.

Guan Zongbao looked at Zhao Hening hopefully. "Can my mother's divorce still go forward?"

Zhao Hening shook her head. "Divorce? How can we proceed with a divorce? It's a civil lawsuit—there has to be a plaintiff. The plaintiff doesn't want to sue anymore. What are we supposed to do, ask the Judge to forcibly separate them?"

Guan Zongbao let out a long sigh and shook his head repeatedly.

Zhao Hening's voice softened with pity. "Mark my words. Her bitter days are still ahead."

No matter how Zhang Jiayu and Zhao Hening pleaded, Huang Shi remained unmoved. If anything, her resolve only hardened. Finally, with no recourse left, the two departed in bitter disappointment.

Zhao Hening reported every detail to Zhang Xiao and Li Yao'er. Between sighs, she said, "I truly don't understand. What is she thinking? Is her head filled with nothing but excrement?"

Li Yao'er replied thoughtfully, "Experience is the mother of wisdom. Hening, you should take a lesson from this. Changing someone's mind is incredibly difficult—especially an adult's. To make someone who has lived for decades admit that everything they believed was wrong? That's nothing less than the collapse of their entire world. Rather than face that, they'd rather persist in their mistakes until death."

"Humans are like that," Zhang Xiao added, remembering Liu Dalin's earlier assessment of Chen Zizhuang. He shook his head. "No matter what wrong they've done, they can always find excuses for themselves—and even turn around to blame others. Truly, as the saying goes: 'One may despise a person as intensely as fire and water, yet she can still follow her husband in life and death, faithful to womanly virtue to a fault.'"

He continued, addressing Zhao Hening and Zhang Jiayu. "That said, drawing your sword to help when you see injustice—that's exactly what young people should do. Don't take this too much to heart. Injustice exists everywhere in this world. It cannot be changed overnight by passion alone. Transforming the world requires the sustained effort of many people over many years."

Zhang Jiayu bowed his head. "I have received your teaching!"

Zhao Hening muttered bitterly, "I made such a grand spectacle of this. Every village within ten li knew that I, the Women's Federation Special Commissioner, was going to stand up for women. And now she just quits on me. It's infuriating! A pitiful person always has something hateful about them!"

Zhang Xiao smiled. "Little Hening, don't be angry. Getting angry ages you. Your publicity efforts weren't wasted. If Huang Shi won't come forward, there's still Zeng Shi. If not her, then Song Shi or Ding Shi. The music plays on, and the dance continues!"

When it came down to it, Huang Shi's case was merely a "Typical Example." Without Huang as a representative case, there would be Li or someone else. There would always be people bold enough to fight for their destiny. Divorce cases were hardly unprecedented in Guangdong.

Zhang Xiao promptly dispatched notices to the surrounding countryside announcing the "Release of Accusations": A trial would be held by the County Circuit Court at Jiujiang Market on June 15th.

Following the Witchcraft Case, the Court System had strengthened judicial construction throughout Guangdong. The "Circuit Trial" system in particular had matured considerably over the past two years. The courts of Nanhai and Panyu counties had established multiple Circuit Tribunals, conducting trials at various markets within their jurisdictions according to a regular schedule.

At each location, the court would remain for approximately one week, primarily conducting summary trials for civil lawsuits and minor violations. Trials were open and transparent. The cases heard mostly concerned affairs directly related to the daily lives and livelihoods of common people. Combined with the extensive application of the Ma Xiwu Style Trial Method—which adhered closely to local conditions and people's welfare—the system quickly achieved excellent results once implemented. One could say the Senate's initial "Legal Popularization" campaign began with the Circuit Courts. After all, most commoners couldn't read the various "Legal Popularization Booklets," but through what they heard and witnessed firsthand, they gained profound impressions of the trial process and the judge's "Summary Statement" at its conclusion.

The significant results gave Liang Xinhu and his colleagues confidence to comprehensively perfect the legal system throughout the Two Guangs Region. Currently, the naturalized citizen judges serving in various courts mostly came from three-month accelerated training programs. Only a select few had completed two years of legal education at the Fangcaodi Judicial Training Class after graduating from primary school.

The Circuit Court primarily handled civil cases. Their defining characteristic was complex circumstances that resisted simple application of legal statutes—especially since the Civil Code revised by the Senate was a massive work. Setting aside the naturalized citizen judges from crash training courses, even the Senators of the Law Society wouldn't dare claim complete mastery over this adapted code.

After producing several embarrassing missteps of varying severity, the Circuit Trial system gradually found its footing. On one hand, they drew lessons from advanced practices of the old time-space. On the other, Liang Xinhu followed the method Zhu Yuanzhang had used when compiling the Grand Pronouncements, publishing a collection of Typical Precedents monthly. These cases included some accumulated from the Senate's judicial construction work in Hainan, along with cases from the Old Time-Space. Of course, the selection and compilation depended primarily on organizing and summarizing the cases tried by judges each month, ensuring the precedents remained grounded in reality.

Looking at the current trial situation, most local civil cases involved property disputes—particularly concerning land. This included family division and property distribution, tenancy disputes, and land ownership claims.

Cases involving land were generally the most complex, entangled with numerous "historical problems." The relevant deeds were often ancient, either incomplete, ambiguously worded, or of questionable authenticity. This gave judges considerable headaches. Because ordinary people knew little about official documentation, they relied entirely on retained personnel to identify and organize these materials.

To prevent such retained personnel from exploiting their positions for fraud, they were centrally assigned to a newly established Judicial Appraisal Center as technical specialists, responsible only for appraising materials without direct involvement in specific cases.

Despite having this Appraisal Center's assistance, cases involving real property remained the greatest headache for naturalized citizen judges. Even if Liang Xinhu himself presided, results wouldn't necessarily improve much. After all, "taking facts as the basis" required clear facts—but these facts were often murky and undocumented. As for "witnesses," frankly speaking, in this time-space where village factions and clan relationships dominated, they were not particularly reliable. Sometimes Liang Xinhu and the naturalized citizen judges could only resort to "Free Evaluation of Evidence."

By comparison, cases like divorce and property division appeared far more manageable. Divorce cases especially. Generally speaking, anyone willing to fight a lawsuit for divorce in this era had reached the end of their rope—one could say their determination was absolute. Such cases often possessed great dramatic quality. Every trial drew considerable public attention. Therefore, though the circumstances might be simple, for propaganda purposes the trials were conducted with particular care, in hopes of achieving the best possible "Legal Popularization" effect.

One week before the Circuit Court's arrival at Jiujiang, local naturalized citizen cadres posted relevant notices, advising those wishing to bring lawsuits to prepare their documentation in advance. At that moment, throughout the streets of Jiujiang Market, inside tea houses and inns, Litigation Masters could be seen everywhere holding cloth banners reading "Agent Writing Complaints," competing vigorously for business.

Because illiteracy rates in this era were extremely high, and filing a lawsuit required a written complaint, Litigation Masters had rapidly spread from the original Prefecture and County Cities to rural areas, following in the footsteps of the Circuit Court.

Although these Litigation Masters had never formally studied "Australian" law, they possessed a keen sensitivity to rules and regulations. Without any official training, after just a few years they had become remarkably adept at drafting various "Australian" legal documents. Even Liang Xinhu found himself surprised by their proficiency.

(End of Chapter)