Commentary by the Central Committee on the Issuance of Instructions Concerning Several Issues in Striving for a Victorious Conclusion of the Five-Anti Campaign (May 20, 1952) To all Central Bureaus, Sub-bureaus, Provincial Committees, Regional Party Committees, and Municipal Party Committees of Major Cities:

We are hereby transmitting to you one document—the Central Committee’s Instructions on Several Issues in Striving for a Victorious Conclusion of the Five-Anti Campaign [1]. It is hoped that you will study it carefully and implement it strictly.

Printed from Mao Zedong’s manuscript, May 20.

Notes [ ] The Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, in its Instructions of May 20, 1952, concerning several issues in striving for a victorious conclusion of the Five-Anti Campaign, stipulated the following principles for finalizing cases and meting out punishment: “The struggle shall be conducted with strictness; punishment, however, shall be lenient. Those who deserve strict treatment should be treated strictly, and those who deserve leniency should be treated leniently.” It is imperative to ensure that all actions are based on facts, and are both reasonable and justifiable.

The criteria for classifying industrial and commercial operators should take both the amount of illegal gains and the nature of the violations as equally important factors. Relying solely on the amount of illegal gains as the sole criterion for differentiation would be incomplete.

The amount of illegal gains made by capitalists must be recalculated and finalized in accordance with the control ratios prescribed in the Central Committee’s instructions of May 9. As a general rule, offending industrial and commercial enterprises should be required only to return illicitly obtained property and pay back taxes; fines should be imposed only in a few exceptional cases. Except for three categories—namely, those whose illegal activities have caused extremely serious harm or disruption to the national economy and people’s livelihoods; those whose offenses are of the gravest and most heinous nature; and those where the property was illegally seized from former enemy or puppet regime assets—such enterprises should not, as a rule, be taken over or confiscated.

Any cases with counter-revolutionary or other political overtones discovered during the Five-Anti Campaign, with the exception of active saboteurs, shall first have their economic aspects resolved, after which they are to be handed over to the public security authorities or other appropriate departments for further handling.

All cases involving the trafficking and smuggling of narcotics and similar substances that are uncovered during the Five-Anti Campaign shall be processed as special cases in accordance with the Central Committee’s directives prohibiting drug trafficking.