>>Emergence of the people's democratic state in Vietnam
Lawyer Tran Thi Tuyet
State and Law Research Institute
Right after its emergence following the August 1945 Revolution, the young State of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam had to confront almost unsurmontable difficulties and obstacles brought about by long colonial and feudalist rule: The economy was in recession; a terrible famine in early 1945 killed more than two million people; 95 percent of the population were illiterate. Besides, on September 23, 1945, the French colonialists returned to southern Vietnam behind the shield of the British troops and Chiang Kaishek army of China, who came as part of the allied forces to disarm the Japanese troops after World War Two. Yet, in fact the British troops rendered active support to the French colonialists in their second attempt to impose their rule on Vietnam while the Chiang Kaishek army acted as a mainstay for the Vietnamese reactionaries in their efforts to overthrow the revolutionary administration.
In face of the situation where the destiny of the nation hung by a thread, the main task of the Vietnamese revolution then was to wage a life and death struggle against the imperialists and their lackeys, against the famine and illiteracy in order to defend the revolutionary gains. To these ends, the revolutionary administration had to be strengthened.
Right in the first meeting of the Government Council on September 3, 1945, President Ho Chi Minh proposed the organization of a general election as soon as possible and the elaboration of the country’s first Constitution. And only 6 days after the Independence Proclamation, the provisional government of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam issued on September 8, 1945 Decree No.14, having decided to hold a general election to elect deputies to the National Congress, and later on October 17, the same year, promulgated Decree No.51 on the election rules, clearly stating that every citizen aged from 18 upward, irrespective of sex, would be entitled to be elected to organs of State power and would be entitled to free electioneering provided that it would not be contrary to the democratic republic.
By then a number of people had believed that it would have been unable to hold such an election. They thought such difficulties as the low intellectual level of the people (95% of the population were illiterate), the then lingering famine, the opposition by the reactionary forces could not be easily overcome by the revolutionary administration.
Despite all these, the Indochinese Communist Party (now the Communist Party of Vietnam) and President Ho Chi Minh firmly believed in the undaunted spirit and high political consciousness of the people who would certainly be wise enough to elect worthy people to be their representatives.
And on January 6, 1946, the general election was successfully organized with high voter turnouts of from 65 to 95% in various localities and 333 deputies from all walks of life and social classes elected to the first National Assembly. This was the first victory of great political and legal significance for the Vietnamese people and State after the August revolution. The people’s confidence in the Party and the new regime was confirmed once again.
At its first session, the National Assembly of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam on March 2, 1946 elected an official government headed by President Ho Chi Minh who was also appointed by the meeting as head of the Constitution Drafting Committee. At his proposal, the deputies agreed to let 70 representatives of “Quoc Dan Dang” (The Nationalist Party) and “Cach Mang Dong Minh Hoi” (Revolutionary Alliance Society), the two reactionary organizations then, to join the National Assembly without having to go through the election. This was a tactical move to isolate and disintegrate the enemies.
The consolidation and strengthening of the local revolutionary administration had great immediate and long-term effects. On November 22, 1945 President Ho Chi Minh signed Decree No.63 on the organization of the People’s Council and the Administrative Committee at all levels in the country-side; and on December 21, 1945, Decree No.77 on the organization of the people’s administration in cities and provincial towns. The People’s Councils elected the Administrative Committees in replacement of the provisional People’s Committees which had existed during the “pre-uprising” period before the August Revolution.
At this time, the local administration was organized at four levels: regional, provincial, district and communal, with the administrative councils being only at two levels, provincial and communal. The regional and district administrative committees were placed under the direction of the immediate higher-level administration.
Alongside the consolidation of the system of people’s administration, the revolutionary courts were quickly set up, having contributed to the maintainance of national independence, the consolidation and enhancement of the worker-peasant dictatorship. Court martials were established in key provinces and cities to suppress the reactionaries who undermined the national independence, which were subject to the joint direction of the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of the Interior.
The provisional court martial in Hanoi was empowered to try armymen and military workers who committed offences, causing harms to the army.
The court system was comprised of the supreme court at the regional level, the appellate court at the provincial level and the first-instance court at the district level. There existed in communes justice boards whose tasks were undertaken on part time basis by the Executive Boards of the Administrative Committees.
This court system was placed under the direction of the Ministry of Justice and tasked to try common criminal and civil cases.
So, within only few months after regaining power, the Vietnamese people, under the leadership of the Indochinese Communist Party and President Ho Chi Minh, quickly built a new-type State of their own with the National Assembly, the elected government, the elected bodies, administrative and professional agencies of different levels, which all represented the nation’s independence and sovereignty and the people’s iron will to maintain their revolutionary gains. The system of people’s administration played its role in taking urgent measures to stabilize the people’s life, foiling all rebellious attempts of reactionary forces and organizing the resistance war against the French colonialists in Southern Vietnam.
On behalf of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam government, President Ho Chi Minh signed with French government a preliminary agreement (on March 6, 1946), compelling the French government to recognize Vietnam as a free country having its own parliament, government, army and finance, and at the same time ousting from the country the Chiang Kaishek army so that the Vietnamese revolution could concentrate on the then key and most dangerous enemy, namely the French colonialists.
In order to have more time preparing for the anti-French resistance war, President Ho Chi Minh signed with France the September 14, 1946 Modus Vivendi.
Thanks to the correct strategic and tactical political direction by the Communist Party of Indochina and President Ho Chi Minh, the Vietnamese revolution went through numerous complicated and extremely dangerous political situations during its first days.
Together with the building and consolidation of the system of people’s democratic administration, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam State quickly set to building a revolutionary legal system. On October 10, 1945, the Government promulgated a decree on the temporary application of a number of laws passed by the colonial and feudal regime. They were laws that governed economic and social affairs, civil laws, laws on marriage and family, which were all selected to ensure that they would not contravene the principle of independence and the democratic republic regime of Vietnam.
At the same time, the revolutionary State also quickly issued laws, focusing on the tasks of defending the national independence and the new regime, and solving immediate difficulties in the economic, cultural and social domains. First of all, the revolutionary legislation abolished all privileges and special interests enjoyed by the colonialists and feudalists. After the August Revolution, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam became an independent and sovereign country and a subject of international laws and international relations. Therefore, all unequal treaties signed with the French colonialists by the Nguyen feudal regime were annulled. Following the “Independence Proclamation”, the revolutionary State issued various decrees abrogating all unequal treaties, all privileges and special interests of the colonialist and feudalists as well as their ownership of land, mines and natural resources...
Those decrees that prohibited joining, supplying or working for the French army or prohibited taking advantage of democratic freedoms to undermine the revolution... greatly contributed to thwarting the French colonialists’ moves of “feeding the war by wars and using Vietnamese to fight the Vietnamese”. To maintain the political security and the social law and order, the government issued numerous legal documents dealing with such social evils as kidnapping, blackmailing, assassination, illegal torturing, destruction of public property, making counterfeit banknotes...
In order to clear the consequences of the famine left behind by the former regime, to restore production and step by step stabilize the people’s life, the State also promulgated legal documents on the establishment of famine relief committees at central and local levels, prohibiting food speculation and waste; permitting free transport of food from region to region; setting up relief funds and relief rice warehouses... The most important measures to do away with the famine was to restore and develop production. As result, legislation was made to abolish all obstacles to the development of production and the circulation of goods, to forbid plantation owners leave their land uncultivated, to temporarily give ownerless or uncultivated land to peasants, to move people to new land for reclamation, to encourage the development of trade.
The abolition of illiteracy was defined in the September 8, 1945 decree by opening anti-illiteracy classes where teaching and learning were conducted compulsorily in Vietnamese. Many ABC classes were opened exclusively for workers and peasants; general education schools, teachers’ training institutions, colleges and universities were newly built or reopened. The basic principles of the new educational regime was clearly stated in the August 10, 1946 decree that the educational system of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam was based on the principles of popularization, nationalization and modernization for the benifits of the country and the people.
Under the colonial and feudal regime, the Vietnamese people had no democratic freedoms. Yet, right after its founding the young State did its best to bring them to the people, considering this not only its task but also an issue vital for the existence and development of the people’s democratic administration. In early 1946, many decrees were issued, reaffirming the people’s rights to the freedom of press, association, and meeting, demonstration, as well as their inalienable rights with respect to the body, residential houses, mails, the right to religious freedoms, etc.
In a nutshell, despite numerous difficulties and obstacles, the young Democratic Republic of Vietnam State, within a short length of time before the elaboration and promulgation of the 1946 Constitution, promulgated a great number of legal documents that governed various aspects of the social life. The form of decree was widely used, which could ensure the legal effects on the one hand and be quickly made on the other so as to promptly meet the specific and urgent requirements of the revolution. All those documents greatly contributed to solving immediate difficulties in the social life, consoli-dating and defending the revolutionary administration, maintaining the revolutionary gains. They laid the first foundation for the emergence of important law disciplines and new-type legal system in Vietnam.-