Law of the Republic of China

Law of the Republic of China is mainly based on the civil law system. The legal structure is codified into the Six Codes:

In the area of constitutional law, the Republic of China uses the 1947 Constitution which was promulgated for the whole of China (including Taiwan), although numerous changes have been made to take into account the fact that the Republic of China only controls Taiwan and surrounding islands since the 1950s.

Following the overthrow of the Qing dynasty in 1911, China came under the control of rival warlords and had no government strong enough to establish a legal code to replace the Qing code.

Finally, in 1927, Chiang Kai-shek's Kuomintang forces were able to suppress the warlords and gain control of most of the country. Established in Nanjing, the KMT government attempted to develop Western-style legal and penal systems. Few of the KMT codes, however, were implemented nationwide.

Although government leaders were striving for a Western-inspired system of codified law, the traditional Chinese preference for collective social sanctions over impersonal legalism hindered constitutional and legal development. A new system of laws was promulgated based on the German legal system.The spirit of the new laws never penetrated to the grass-roots level or provided hoped-for stability. Ideally, individuals were to be equal before the law, but this premise proved to be more rhetorical than substantive. In the end, most of the new laws were discarded as the Kuomintang became preoccupied with fighting the Chinese Communists and the invading Japanese.

The ROC legal system took effect in Taiwan on October 25, 1945, after most Japanese laws were repealed on October 25, 1946.

The KMT-headed ROC central government moved to Taiwan in December 1949 followed by a large number of Mainlanders who eventually accounted for about 13 percent of Taiwan’s entire population. From then on, Taiwan and mainland China have had its own distinct legal systems. The “Statute for Agriculture, Mining, Industry and Commerce During the Extraordinary Period” (1938) and the "Temporary Provisions Effective During the Period of General National Mobilization for the Suppression of Communist Rebellion" (1942) gave authorities the power to control resources, as well as establish political control over freedom of news, speech, press, communication, assembly and association during wartime.

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