In this assignment you have one secondary source on the Qing system of criminal punishment review and three documents to consider in light of the readings and study questions assigned for this week.
In this case, you must discern what motivated the officials involved in the case of Woman Xie, who fatally maimed her father-in-law to defend herself from sexual assault. Begin by reading the secondary source selection on the Qing legal system for specifying criminal punishments to gain a sense for the Qing judiciary’s operation (see “Law and Society in the Qing,” a brief introduction to the capital punishment review process in Qing China). Then read the description of Woman Xie’s case (see Handout 1, which is a Case Description from the Beijing Gazette) as well as the decision of the Autumn Assizes (See Handout 4 for the Comments of the Autumn Assizes Board on the Case of Woman Xie), as well as The Classic of Filial Piety (The Classic of Filial Piety). Having completed these readings answer the following questions in a detailed analysis using the primary and secondary sources available, being careful to document your work in accordance with the conventions used by historians (see the discussion on documenting your work below):
1) To what extent and in what ways did the officials of the Autumn Assizes and those who described the case of Woman Xie make use of the principles in The Classic of Filial Piety?
2) In what ways does the Qing legal system satisfy the needs of Chinese society?
3) Having analyzed the case of Woman Xie, and done the readings of the past few weeks relate major developments in state power in the Qing dynasty to the major developments in its legal system. Having done that, answer this question: did the Qing state’s application of the principles of filial piety to the Qing legal system change Qing society in your view, or just confirm its values?
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