Petition for a Labor Law and a General
Outline for Labor Legislation*

*by the Secretariat of Chinese Labor Organizations*

(July 1922)¹

Petition

This is the substance of our petition. We venture to note that the labor problem
emerged long ago, following the Industrial Revolution in Europe, and during the
more than one hundred years since then countless politicians and students of
politics have racked their brains studying it day and night, yet no fundamental
solution has been found. Only the advanced nations of Europe and America,
after repeatedly accumulating experience, have drawn significant lessons from it.
They have accordingly promulgated explicit laws and regulations for the protection of labor, and as a result the poor and miserable laborers who used to have no
means to seek redress have gradually gained equal status with ordinary people,
and the fortunes of these nations have been improved by a certain measure of
peace and stability. Recently there has been the example of Soviet Russia, where
a worker-peasant government founded entirely by the toilers seized political
power, and the national constitution was also fashioned by the laborers. From
this we may know the truly important role of a country's workers in founding the
state. This is a natural law of evolution in the world; of that there can be no
doubt. Lately, the workers in our country have gained a considerable degree of
consciousness. In the areas of our country where industry is somewhat developed, all the workers are forming one organization after another in the hope of
pooling their wisdom and energies to improve their own status and alleviate their
sufferings. This is altogether reasonable and proper. Moreover, some have been
forced by the problems between labor and capital to unite in strike action. From

¹ This document was first published in the Changsha *Dagongbao* on September 6, 7, and 8,
1922. Our source is *Mao Zedong ji. Bujuan*, Vol. 2, pp. 97–102.

1. This text is dated September in *Bujuan*, Vol. 2, p. 97, but according to the index
volume of the *Bujuan* it was composed in July, though published in September. For a
discussion of the resolution on the labor movement adopted at the Second Congress of the
Chinese Communist Party in July 1922 and its relation to the position put forward here,
see above, the Introduction to Volume II.


the point of view of justifiable self-defense, uniting for strike action is indeed a
right to which workers are indisputably entitled. In our country, however, the
elite² has habitually adopted the ugly attitude of despising manual workers.
Because the workers' efforts to organize and all their legitimate actions are not
adequately protected by law, the generality of power-holders in our country
wantonly ride roughshod over the workers and treat with particular hostility their
efforts to organize and all of their legitimate actions. For this reason, in recent
years there have been frequent incidents everywhere arising from the problems
of inequality between labor and capital. As those who wield power today are
unaware of world trends and ignorant of the fundamentals of government, they
think that the workers are easy to deceive. Their stupidity is truly phenomenal. In
addition, lawmakers in the past have also been prisoners of such prejudices, thus
failing to perceive this reality. This is why the working class in our country
remains moaning in misery, with no place to turn for redress. How tragic! They
are really unaware that the workers in our country are an integral part of the
Republic of China, so according to the principle that all the people of the Republic of China are strictly equal, the workers in our country should also receive
protection under the law and may not be arbitrarily discriminated against. Workers also constitute in fact an absolute majority of the people of the country, and
according to the principle of the greatest happiness for the greatest number, how
can the workers possibly be rejected and ignored? Besides, the foundation of the
country rests entirely on the pillar of the domestic producers; the consumers have
no part in it. All those who know anything at all about modern political, social,
and economic history are in unanimous agreement with this principle. Moreover,
in society, the workers devote themselves entirely to production, and they exert
the greatest effort of all classes in the country, yet their lot is the cruelest, despite
the fact that their contribution to state and society is greatest. Lawmakers in the
past have devoted their attention to protecting the minority in our country those
special classes in society who consume but do not produce yet they have
mercilessly abandoned and excluded from the masses of the people the workers,
who constitute the absolute majority of the nation's people and who exert the
most effort and make the greatest contribution yet suffer the cruelest lot. How
can this be deemed just as regards the proper rights and duties of the citizenry?
Consequently, on the basis of the various arguments given above, and taking into
account all aspects of the question, there is a definite need today to enact labor
laws, and these laws must definitely be included in the fundamental basic law.
Thus in the future a group that has grasped political power will not lightly
venture to invent pretexts, or use special security laws and other tricks to oppress
the workers. In the current process of formulating a constitution, this is indeed
the most urgent task. But today there are those who argue that our country's laws

2. Shiren, literally the scholars, here stands for the strata of society linked to the
scholar-officials in general.

have never discriminated against workers, so why cry before you're hurt? Don't
you know, they say, that strikes and disturbances are clearly defined as crimes
under criminal law (interim new criminal code, article no. 224) and that Mr.
Yuan's³ security laws have not yet been repealed (the Beijing Government's
Directive on Security and Police, no. 28, March 1913). Thus to claim that our
country's laws have never discriminated against the workers is simply to deceive
oneself as well as others. The root cause of all this is that a fundamental basic
law has yet to be enacted on the national level, and the Provisional Constitution
does not offer explicit protection to labor, so that strikes and disturbances run
afoul of the security and police laws.

Although twice the national parliament decided, at special sessions in
Guangzhou, to abolish these laws, the question of the limitations on their authority to change the laws arose at the time, so [the abolition] has yet to be put into
effect nationwide. This is sufficient to prove that today's labor law should be
covered without delay by the fundamental basic law. Just recently the national
parliament has reconvened, and the people of the country hope that it will hasten
to formulate the constitution. Moreover, Mr. Li Qingfang, member of the Standing Committee of the Lower House,4 has already proposed a draft labor-protection
law, and Mr. Wu Ziyu has also proposed to attach labor-protection legislation to
the fundamental basic law. Although each has a different argument, and it would
not be easy to work out a compromise version, the fact that our country's elite5 is
gradually tending away from looking down upon labor and toward respecting
labor is nonetheless cause for some satisfaction. All of us have been involved in
the labor movement for a long time and, having witnessed year after year the
tragic and violent abuses suffered by the workers in our country, we understand
deeply the miseries that having no legal protection imposes on the workers in our
country. We have, moreover, experienced those power-holders' clever manipulation of words and laws, and therefore feel even more strongly the importance of
incorporating labor-protection legislation into the constitution. This appeal is
made on behalf of the workers of the entire country and for the sake of future
lawmaking in our country. We hereby present the nineteen articles of an Outline
of Labor Legislation, and in accordance with the law, we petition your honorable
assembly to adopt and enact it and incorporate it into the constitution. We furthermore request that, to alleviate the distress of the workers, an official resolution be passed to repeal article 224 of the interim new criminal code that makes
strikes and disturbances a crime, as well as the Beijing Government's Directive
on Security and Police, no. 28, of March 1913. What a blessing this would be
for the workers of the country! For this reason we hereby petition, in accordance

3. Yuan Shikai, who was president when the directive mentioned here was adopted.
4. Zhongyiyuan, literally the mass (or people's) deliberative assembly, frequently
translated House of Representatives.
5. Shifu, short for shidafu, the scholar-officials.

with the law, that your honorable assembly present this proposal to its entire
membership for resolution and implementation. Presented to the speaker of the
Lower House.
The nineteen articles of the Labor Legislation Outline are respectfully submitted below for your perusal.

Labor Legislation Outline

1. Recognize the workers' right of assembly and association.
2. Recognize the right of workers to form unions and to strike.
3. Recognize the right of labor groups to sign collective contracts.
4. Recognize the right of the workers to form an international alliance.
5. The workday is not to exceed eight hours for day workers and six hours
for night workers; there must be forty-two consecutive hours of rest each week.
6. Young workers under the age of eighteen, male and female, and those
performing strenuous tasks are not to work for more than six hours at a time.
7. Prohibit exceeding the legal limit on work hours. Under special circumstances, work hours may be increased with permission of the union.
8. The workday for agricultural workers may exceed eight hours, but wages
for excess work hours are to be calculated on the basis of the eight-hour system.
9. There must be legal guarantees on prices for agricultural products produced by ordinary peasants who do not exploit the labor of others. Such prices
are to be proposed by peasant representatives and regulated by law.
10. Work on strenuous jobs and on jobs that present health hazards, and work
by workers under the age of eighteen, male or female, may absolutely not exceed
the legal time limit. All female workers, and male workers under the age of
eighteen, are strictly forbidden from working the night shift.
11. Female manual workers are to have eight weeks of leave both before and
after childbirth. Female workers on other kinds of jobs are to have six weeks of
leave both before and after childbirth. In all cases they are to receive their normal
pay.
12. It is prohibited to hire child laborers, either male or female, under the age
of sixteen.
13. In order to guarantee workers a reasonable minimum wage, the state must
enact such protective laws. Representatives of the All-China General Labor
Union6 must be allowed to be present when such legislation is adopted. Wages in

6. The creation of such an organization had been proposed at the First All-China
Labor Congress, held in Guangzhou in May 1922. Though it was not actually established
until the Second Labor Congress of 1925, the authors of this draft may have assumed that
it would shortly come into being. They may also have postulated that the Secretariat of
Chinese Labor Organizations, set up in 1921 at the same time as the Chinese Communist
Party and on behalf of which they signed this petition, constituted the embryo of such a
national union.
both public and private enterprises and institutions must not fall below these
legally guaranteed minimum limits.
14. Workers in all fields protected by their industrial or professional organizations have the right to elect representatives to participate in government enterprises and institutions, and also to elect representatives to participate in private
enterprises or institutions managed by government enterprises and institutions.
15. The state has the right to set up labor inspection bureaus in all foreign
enterprises, public and private.
16. The state guarantees the workers full rights to participate in the labor
inspection bureaus set up by the state.
17. Workers must participate in the regulation of all insurance matters to
provide protection from loss or risk for all workers employed in government,
public, and private enterprises and institutions. Insurance premiums are to be
paid entirely by the employers or the state; the insured is to bear no part of the
cost.
18. All workers and employees have the right to one month of vacation
during every year of work and two weeks of vacation during every six months of
work, all with full pay.
19. The state is to guarantee by law that all workers, male and female, have
the opportunity to receive remedial education.

Petitioners:

Deng Zhongxia,7 Head Office of the Secretariat of Chinese Labor Organizations
Ruan Dashi, Shanghai Office of the Secretariat of Chinese Labor Organizations
Lin Xiangpu, Wuhan Office of the Secretariat of Chinese Labor Organizations
Mao Yunzi,8 Hunan Office of the Secretariat of Chinese Labor Organizations
Tan Pingshan,9 Guangdong Office of the Secretariat of Chinese Labor Organizations
Wang Jingmei, Shandong Office of the Secretariat of Chinese Labor Organizations

7. Deng Zhongxia (1894-1933), zi Zhongxie, original name Deng Kang, was a native
of Yizhang, Hunan. He enrolled in the Chinese Department of Beijing University in 1917
and was active in many student societies before and during the May Fourth movement. At
this time, he was a close friend of Mao Zedong; see, in particular, his introductory note to
the "Statutes of the Problem Study Society," in Volume I of this edition, p. 407. He joined
the Beijing Communist "small group" in 1920, and became head of the Secretariat of
Chinese Labor Organizations when it was set up in 1922. His Zhongguo zhigong yundong
jianshi (1919-1926) (Brief History of the Chinese Labor Movement, 1919-1926) remained the standard work on the subject until 1949. He was executed by the Guomindang
in 1933.
8. In signing this document, Mao used a variant of his zi, Runzhi, pronounced as
indicated.
9. On Tan Pingshan see below, the relevant note to the telegram of the All-China
Peasant Association dated April 9, 1927.