Comrade Shaoqi and all comrades of the Central Committee: The Constitution Drafting Group commenced its work on drafting the constitution on January 9, with the following plan: (1) Strive to complete the first draft of the constitution by January 31 and promptly send this draft to all comrades of the Central Committee for review.
(2) Prepare to re-examine the first draft once in the first half of February, with the participation of Comrades Deng Xiaoping and Li Weihan [1]. It will then be submitted to the Political Bureau (and all members of the Central Committee present in Beijing) for discussion and preliminary approval.
(3) In early March, submit it to the Constitution Drafting Committee for discussion, to be completed and preliminarily approved within the month of March.
(4) In April, the Constitution Drafting Group will review and revise it again, then submit it to the Political Bureau for discussion, and then to the Constitution Drafting Committee for approval.
(5) On May 1, the Constitution Drafting Committee will promulgate the draft constitution and submit it to the people nationwide for four months of discussion, so that in September, after necessary revisions are made based on the people’s opinions, it can be submitted to the National People’s Congress for final approval.
To facilitate discussion by the Political Bureau in February, it is hoped that all members of the Political Bureau and all members of the Central Committee present in Beijing will, from now on, take time to review the following major reference documents: (1) The 1936 Soviet Constitution and Stalin’s report (available in a separate booklet); (2) The 1918 Soviet Russian Constitution (see Compilation of Materials on Constitutions and Electoral Laws, Volume 1, compiled by the Government General Office); (3) The constitutions of Romania, Poland, Germany, Czechoslovakia, and other countries (see the People’s Publishing House’s Compilation of Constitutions of People’s Democratic Countries; the constitutions collected in this book are largely similar with minor differences—Romania and Poland are chosen for their relatively newer versions, Germany and Czechoslovakia for their greater detail and distinctive features; for the others, one may read more if time permits); (4) The 1913 Temple of Heaven Draft Constitution, the 1923 Cao Kun Constitution, and the 1946 Chiang Kai-shek Constitution (see Compilation of Materials on Constitutions and Electoral Laws, Volume 3, which can represent the three models of the cabinet system, the provincial autonomy system, and the presidential dictatorship system); (5) The 1946 French Constitution (see Compilation of Materials on Constitutions and Electoral Laws, Volume 4, which can represent a relatively progressive and complete bourgeois cabinet-system constitution).
Any opinions, please let me know.
Mao Zedong
January 15, 1954
Printed based on the original document preserved in the Central Archives.

Note
[1] Deng Xiaoping, then serving as Vice Premier of the Government Administration Council.
Li Weihan, then serving as Director of the United Front Work Department of the CPC Central Committee.
Both were members of the Constitution Drafting Committee of the People’s Republic of China.