(August 10, 1932)

The Provisional Supreme Court has requested approval of its decision of August
3-4, 1932, to sentence the counterrevolutionaries Ji Zhentong, Huang Zhongyue,
Xiao Shijun, Zhang Shaoyi, Zhu Guanfu, Gao Dafu, Li Pinqing, and Liu Zuohua
to death by firing squad; and [to sentence] Cai Peiyu to five years in prison and
deprivation of his political rights for another five years after his prison sentence
is served. The Central Executive Committee believes that it is necessary for the
Provisional Supreme Court, from its perspective of safeguarding the victory of
the soviet revolution, strengthening the discipline of the Red Army, and consolidating the revolutionary front, to sentence to death Ji, Huang, and six other
traitors to the revolution. As the class struggle intensifies, as the revolutionary
movement rises daily, and as the Red Army continues to win great victories in
the country, at a time when the imperialist Guomindang, in order to forestall its
imminent demise, is exerting every effort to attack the revolution, especially the
soviets and the Red Army, the reactionary régime of landlords and the bourgeoisie, in addition to mobilizing the largest possible forces of the reactionary
régime's army to launch, under the command of the imperialists, the Fourth
Encirclement Campaign against the Soviet Red Army, will push forward even
more the organization of all the reactionary forces in the soviet areas to sabotage
the Soviet and the Red Army from within, and serve as an internal attacking
force. At the same time, precisely because at the moment the class struggle has
reached the stage of a life-and-death decisive battle, the class-alien elements
within the revolutionary ranks, for reasons of their class interests, are changing from wavering to openly betraying the revolution. Ji, Huang, and company are from the landlord and bourgeois classes. Although they joined the
revolutionary forces, they betrayed the revolution as soon as the class struggle reached its critical stage. This comes as no surprise. On the basis of the

This resolution was first published in 𝘏𝘰𝘯𝘨𝘴𝘦 𝘡𝘩𝘰𝘯𝘨𝘩𝘶𝘢, no. 32, September 6, 1932. We
have translated it from 𝘔𝘢𝘰 𝘡𝘦𝘥𝘰𝘯𝘨 𝘫𝘪. 𝘉𝘶𝘫𝘶𝘢𝘯, Vol. 4, pp. 75-76, which reproduces this
text.


evidence of the counterrevolutionary acts committed by Ji, Huang, and company,
they deserve the death penalty. However, Ji, Huang, and company all participated in the Ningdu Uprising and they earned considerable revolutionary merits.¹
Therefore, the Central Executive Committee is of the opinion that although Ji
and Huang are the chief conspirators in this case, both of them were leaders of
the Ningdu Uprising and their sentences should be reduced to spare their lives.
Zhu Guanfu, Gao Dafu, and Zhang Shaoyi all participated in the Ningdu Upris-ing and were not chief conspirators in this case; their sentences may be reduced
to jail terms. Therefore, the Central Executive Committee has reached the following resolutions on the case:

1. Ji Zhentong's sentence is reduced from death to ten years in prison, starting
on May 8, 1932.
2. Huang Zhongyue's sentence is reduced from death to ten years in prison,
starting on May 5, 1932.
3. Zhu Guanfu's sentence is reduced from death to eight years in prison, starting
on May 19, 1932.
4. Zhang Shaoyi's sentence is reduced from death to eight years in prison,
starting on May 8, 1932.
5. Gao Dafu's sentence is reduced from death to eight years in prison, starting
on May 17, 1932.

All of them will have their political rights revoked for five years after serving
out their sentences.
The sentences of Liu Zuohua, Li Pinqing, Xiao Shijun, and Cai Peiyu are to
be carried out as originally ordered.

Chairman Mao Zedong
Vice-Chairmen Xiang Ying
Zhang Guotao

1. The Ningdu Uprising (Ningdu qiyi) occurred in December 1931, when a group of
officers in the Nationalist Twenty-sixth Army, which was stationed in Ningdu xian in the
Central Soviet Area, mutinied and led the entire force over to join the Red Army.