ABSTRACT
The patriarchalism of the social, and the paternalism of the political, institutions, the inadequate conception of law, the inefficiency of judicial administration, the easy access to non-legal means of satisfactory settlement of disputes, together with perfect isolation, and, hence, lack of contact with other nations having legal systems worthy of study, combined to make Chinese laws what they were up to the beginning of this century. The judicial ladder was no less hierarchic or multi-graded than the civil service. Geographically speaking, the lowest court in a province was the magistrate or sub-prefectural court. Every member of the Censorate had judicial duties of some kind. The Censor-General, besides being one of the highest judicial triumvirate, received individually cases to which a trial has been denied or unjustly concluded by the provincial authorities.
