CARRY OUT AN EXTENSIVE AND PROFOUND LAND INVESTIGATION MOVEMENT

Directive No 11 of People's Committee of the Provisional Central Government

1 June 1933

[Text] There are now a large number of districts in the various soviet areas and especially in the central soviet area which have not thoroughly resolved the land question. In the central soviet, these areas make up almost 50 percent of the area, with a population of more than 2 million, such as Jui-chin (excluding the Wu-yang district), Hui-ch'ang, Hsun-wu, An-yuan, Hsin-feng, Yu-tu (excluding Hsin P'in district), Lo-k'ou, I-huang, Kuang-ch'ang, Shih-sh'ang, Chien-ning, Yi-ch'uan, Ning-hua, Ch'ang-t'ing, and Yung-p'in in all 15 entire counties. Large parts of Po-sheng, Sheng-li and Kung-feng and parts of Kung-lueh, Wan-t'ai, Shang-hang, Yung-ting and Hsin-ch'uan, as well as the districts of An-min-t'un and Huang-t'ang in Hsing-kuo, all are places which have not thoroughly resolved the land question. The peasant masses in these areas have not been extensively mobilized, and the remnants of feudal power have not been finally overcome; and in the soviet organs the mass organizations and the armed units there are still a good many alien class elements concealing hidden activity, and there are still a good many secret counterrevolutionary organizations in the localities engaging in activities subversive to the revolution. For this reason, wartime mobilization and cultural and economic construction in these areas have fallen behind those in the progressive areas (almost all of Hsing-kuo, part of Sheng-li, Kan-hsien, Wan-t'ai, Kung-lueh, Yung-feng and Shang-hang; Huang-p'o and An-fu districts in Po-sheng; Hsiao-yang district in Jui-chin; and Hsueh-an district in Yung-ting). The carrying out of a universal and profound land investigation movement in these extensive areas, the development of an extremely high level of class struggle among the more than 2 million masses, and the final assault on and thorough destruction of feudal power are tasks which in the various soviets will not brook a moment's delay. As for the concrete details of the carrying out of the land investigation movement, the People's Committee has determined as follows:

1. The governmental chairmen at the various levels are charged with using the greatest attention in leading the entire land investigation movement.

2. The land departments, the worker-peasant investigation departments, the judicial departments and the state political security offices and their agents at all levels are charged with devoting all their energies to directing the movement, and thoroughly resolving land problems, reforming local soviets and wiping out counterrevolution in the countryside. The people's committee of the central land department, the worker-peasant investigation department, the judicial committees, the state political security office, must devote their whole energy to directing the various subordinate organs in the thorough performance of the task.

3. The people's committee of the central financial department is charged with directing financial departments at various levels in attacking feudal and semi-feudal power by taxing landlords and exacting contributions from rich peasants, and at the same time increasing state revenues. The central people's military committee is charged with directing the military department at the various levels in the land investigation movement, overhauling and expanding the local armed organizations, and mobilizing the masses to serve in the Red Army. The central people's economic committee is charged with directing the economic committees at the various levels in carrying out recovery and development of agricultural and handicraft production, the development of cooperatives, and the distribution of products and commodities within the development of the land investigation movement. The central education people's committee is charged with directing the education committees at the various levels in supplying all sorts of simple and colloquial textbooks and booklets to all cadres and masses investigating land in order to develop the land investigation movement and expanding mass cultural education as the land investigation movement expands.

4. Governments at the provincial and county levels should summon cadres from the areas being investigated and from all progressive and relatively progressive areas to run brief land-investigation movement training classes. The county soviets should convene a meeting of the district soviet responsible persons every month and the district soviets should convene a meeting of the township soviet chairmen and poor peasant association chairmen every 10 days to investigate the experience of land investigation.

5. Meetings of main responsible persons in the soviets at the district level and above in eight counties of Jui-chin, Hui-ch'ang, Po-sheng, Yu-tu, Sheng-li, Shih-ch'eng, Ning-hua and Ch'ang-ning and meetings of poor peasant associations and electoral congresses in eight counties should be held at the central government to stimulate the land investigation movement in them.

6. In the course of the movement the class line should be persistently adhered to, taking the proletariat in the countryside as the leader and relying upon the poor peasants, resolutely uniting with the middle peasants to stage resolute attacks against feudal and semi-feudal power and ferret out all landlords and rich peasants masquerading as middle peasants or poor peasants, to confiscate all land and property of the landlord class and confiscate the land and excess draft animals, farm implements and dwellings of the rich peasants, and distribute them to workers, poor and middle peasants who previously did not receive enough land or received none at all; the rich peasants should be given relatively poor land to work.

7. In the land investigation movement thorough attention should be paid to mobilizing the majority of the masses to arise and struggle with the remnants of feudalism. First, by means of extensive propaganda and agitation, a thorough investigation of people of landlord and rich-peasant origin should be made, and their land and property should be confiscated. This should be done with the agreement and participation of as large a majority as possible, and the confiscated property should all, with the exception of money, be given out as the property of the masses. Special attention should be paid to giving it out to poor Red Army dependents and a larger share of it should be given out to the masses in the villages from whence the property came.

8. The poor peasants association is an extremely important mass organization in the land investigation movement, and the district and township soviets should strive to lead the poor peasants association in purging bad elements from within it and attracting large numbers of active elements to join it. The worker team within the poor peasant association should be the active leader of the poor peasant association.

9. In the land investigation movement, energetic attention should be concentrated on all backward districts, townships and villages, and especially on the most backward of them. In developing the land investigation movement in backward districts and townships and particularly in large villages attention should be paid to mobilizing the impoverished masses to arise of themselves and struggle against the landlords and rich peasants of the village. The utmost efforts should be directed toward avoiding all incorrect activity involving struggles in areas with a single lineage.

10. In the land investigation movement all secret counterrevolutionary organs and activities should be purged and rumor-mongering and subversion by landlords and rich peasants should be prevented and exposed.

11. In the course of the movement the local soviets should be reformed and all alien class elements and other bad elements should be cleaned out of them and large numbers of revolutionary activist elements should be attracted into the soviets.

12. All people in the soviets at all levels who directly or indirectly hinder the land investigation movement should receive severe or the severest punishment.

Only by persistently implementing the above decisions can we broadly and profoundly develop class struggle in the countryside and whip up the activism of the broadest range of the masses, thoroughly destroy all feudal and semi-feudal power in the countryside and complete the task of the land investigation movement. It is so ordered.

Chairman Mao Tse-tung
Vice-Chairmen Hsiang Ying, Chang Kuo-tao

1 June 1933

*Red China,* No. 87, 20 June 1933
**(Guide to the Land Investigation Movement),** ("Directive of the Central Government on Land Investigation Movement"), issued by the Central Government, 1933
**Collected Red Counterrevolutionary Documents, Vol. 3, "Directive of the Central Government on Land Investigation Movement," 1935