On the Central Supervisory Committee in the History of Our Party

The Fifth Party Congress was held in Wuhan in 1927. This conference established the first central-level disciplinary inspection agency in the history of our party-the Central Supervisory Commission. The Central Supervisory Committee is composed of 10 persons. Among them, Wang Hebo, Yang Paoan, Zhang Zuochen, Xu Baihao, Liu Junshan, Zhou Zhensheng and Cai Yichen are members, and Yang Peisen, Xiao Shiyue and Ruan Xiaoxian are alternate members. Wang Hebo is the chairman and Yang Xianan is the vice chairman. However, in just over a year after the failure of the Great Revolution, six of the 10 members of the Central Supervisory Committee died, leaving only two in the end. At that time, our party was at a very severe revolutionary juncture, and it did not have the energy to replenish the members of the supervisory committee in time. At this time, the Central Supervisory Committee actually only had the existence of institutions, and it was basically impossible to carry out further work. In addition, at that time, it was in the low tide of the revolution after the failure of the great revolution. The party was busy restoring and rebuilding the party organizations and carrying out armed struggle in various places, and did not enrich the supervisory committee in time, which made it difficult for the supervisory committee to carry out supervision work when its personnel suffered heavy losses. In 1928, the Sixth National Congress of the Communist Party of China abolished the "Central Supervisory Committee", an inner-party supervisory body, and replaced it with the "Central Review Committee".
 

Why did the Fifth National Congress set up the Central Discipline Inspection Organization?
 

First of all, our party has attached great importance to strengthening the party's discipline construction since the founding of the party, which puts forward institutional requirements for the emergence of the supervisory committee. The first program of the party adopted at the first National Congress contains a lot of contents on discipline requirements and inner-party supervision. The Second National Congress of the Communist Party of China formulated the first party constitution, which clearly stipulated the party's political, economic, organizational, and work disciplines. The three major measures have been taken to strengthen party discipline and strengthen inner-party supervision to prevent individual arbitrariness and non-organizational activities within the party, and to ensure the purity and advanced nature of the party. The "Second Amendment to the Constitution of the Communist Party of China" passed by the Fourth National Congress of the Communist Party of China revised individual regulations on discipline and made the party discipline provisions more perfect. In addition to improving the system, our party has also severely dealt with violations of party discipline. For example, the Guangdong District Committee expelled Zhou Fohai, a major representative who had separated from the party organization and was opposed to the party.
 

Secondly, the rapid development of the party organization urgently needs to purify the team and strengthen its own construction, which puts forward the practical needs for the establishment of the supervisory committee. From the 4th to the 5th National Congress, the number of Party members increased from 994 to 57967. It is true that the development of the number of party members has strengthened the party organization and enhanced the party's influence under the situation of the great revolution. however, there have been some problems with the quality of party members. In the process of recruiting party members, some party organizations have neglected the inspection and education of applicants for party membership, and in some places they have even made surprise attacks and developed in batches. This caused some speculators to take advantage of the opportunity to infiltrate the party, and then embezzled public funds and turned the public into private corruption, which damaged the party's prestige among the masses. In addition, a large number of Communist Party members joined the Kuomintang in their personal capacity and served in the Kuomintang's party headquarters, army and government at all levels. In particular, many Communist Party members have mastered financial and property rights in public office. Due to lack of supervision, violations of party discipline and even corruption are becoming more and more serious. Although these people are in the minority, the seriousness of the problem cannot be ignored. At the same time, the Communist Party members working in other social organizations also have the problem of corruption, which has caused a certain negative impact on the party. For this reason, the establishment of the party's supervisory organization is an urgent requirement for the party to govern itself strictly and strengthen its own purity.
 

Third, party organizations at all levels urgently need to strengthen democratic style, improve organizational construction, and implement collective leadership, which puts forward organizational requirements for the establishment of the supervisory committee. From the first to the third, the Party Central Committee organizations are mainly the Central Executive Committee and its central organization department, the Propaganda Department, and the Ministry of industry and agriculture. Due to the needs of the revolutionary situation, after the first National Congress of the Communist Party of China, only two or three members of the Central Executive Committee were working all the year round, and other members were assigned to various places. In most cases, only one member of the Central Committee was working and giving orders. Chen Duxiu clearly pointed out this problem in the report of the Fifth National Congress of the Communist Party of China: "Our party is not a party with a perfect organization at present, but a group of various communists ...... In terms of organizational work, the most important thing is to make the Central Committee a strong Central Committee." The establishment of the Party's supervisory body is an organizational requirement for the Party to maintain unity and centralization.
 

Finally, the successful practice of the establishment of the supervisory committee by the Executive Committee of the Communist Party of Russia (Brasiab) and Guangdong District has accumulated valuable foreign and domestic experience for the establishment of the central disciplinary supervision agency. In foreign countries, in 1921, the Tenth Congress of the Communist Party of Russia (Brasilia) announced the establishment of the Central Supervisory Committee of the Communist Party of Russia (Brasilia), which effectively curbed corruption within the party and made democracy a common practice. At home, after the "Zhongshan warship incident", a small number of Communist Party members who were not firm in their stand gave up their membership in the Communist Party in order to stay in the Kuomintang army. In order to consolidate the party's organization, strictly enforce party discipline, and purify the party's ranks, the Guangdong District Executive Committee of the Communist Party of China decided to establish a special agency to strengthen internal party supervision. In April 1926, the Guangdong District Executive Committee of the Communist Party of China established the first local discipline inspection agency in the history of the Communist Party of China-the Supervisory Committee of the Guangdong District Executive Committee of the Communist Party of China. After the establishment of the Supervisory Committee of the Guangdong District Executive Committee of the Communist Party of China, it played a great role in the organization of the Pure Party.
 

What have the supervisory committees at all levels done?
 

The Fifth National Congress established a Central Supervisory Committee composed of ten members. After the Big Five, they fought on different fronts. The Central Supervisory Committee and the subsequent provincial supervisory committees of Hubei, Sichuan, and Manchuria performed their duties assigned to them by the Party Constitution to varying degrees and carried out certain work.
 

Just 20 days after the birth of the Central Supervisory Committee, the 13th meeting of the Standing Committee of the CPC Central Committee made a resolution: the issue of expulsion from the party-the Organization Department notified the Supervisory Committee to hold a meeting. this also marks the official start of the work of the central supervisory commission.
 

In September 1927, the Sichuan Provincial Supervisory Committee of the Communist Party of China was established in Chengdu with Cheng Zhiyun, Liu Yuanxiang, and Liu Zongpei as members and He Ruoshh as alternate member. In accordance with the provisions of the Fifth National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the party organization in Northeast China has also set up the party's discipline inspection organization in Northeast China. On October 24, the first Congress of Party members in Northeast China was held in Harbin. According to the provisions of the party constitution, the Manchuria Provincial Supervisory Committee of the Communist Party of China, with Liu Xiangyi and Wang Ligong as supervisory committee members and Zhang Ringuang as alternate supervisory committee members, was established through election.
　　

On December 14, 1927, the Hubei Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China held an enlarged meeting to elect the Hubei Provincial Supervisory Committee of the Communist Party of China with Chen Chunhe, Chen Guoliang, and Guan Xueshen as supervisory committee members, and Wang Emen and Wan Jiacai as alternate supervisory committee members. Chen Chunhe served as the provincial supervisory committee. Secretary of the committee. The newly established Hubei Provincial Supervision Committee quickly fulfilled its duties in reorganizing the party's organization and rectifying party discipline. On January 6, 1928, the Hubei Supervisory Committee issued a circular of the Hubei Provincial CPC Committee, which clearly put forward the specific measures for reorganizing the party organization in Hubei Province, and paid special attention to and emphasized the issue of strengthening the party's political discipline. The Hubei Provincial Supervisory Committee particularly emphasized that those who embezzle and retreat from the battle should be unconditionally expelled from the party and severely punished when necessary. Subsequently, the Provincial Party Committee and the Provincial Supervisory Committee issued Circular No. 17, which strictly regulated the discipline of party members during the riot. In order to prevent corruption, squandering and abuse of public funds, the Hubei Provincial Party Committee and the Provincial Supervisory Committee also formulated and promulgated the "Measures for the Economic Rectification of Party Departments at All Levels" and the "Regulations on the Living Expenses of Cadres at All Levels of Provincial, Municipal, District, and County Cadres" in the 3rd and 10th Provincial Party Committee Notices respectively, regulate the use of party dues by party organizations at all levels, and strictly stipulate the living expenses standards and standards and treatment for leading cadres at all levels. According to the circular, the living expenses of the Standing Committee of the provincial Party committee and the Secretary General are only 30 yuan, while that of the Standing Committee members and secretaries of the municipal, district and county Party committees is 25 yuan.
 

What role has the Central Supervisory Commission played in the construction of the Party's system?
 

From its establishment to its abolition, the Central Supervisory Commission existed for more than a year. In this short period of time, as the first central-level special disciplinary supervision agency of the Communist Party of China, it has had a profound impact on party building. The practice of establishing this institution is an important exploration of the construction of the party's discipline inspection institution, which has laid an important organizational and practical foundation for the establishment and development of the party's discipline inspection system.
 

The establishment of the Central Supervisory Commission is a major initiative of the party's discipline inspection work. From the first to the fourth National Congress, due to the small number of party members, no special inner-party supervision agency was established. The Central Bureau or the Central Executive Committee and local party organizations were directly responsible for handling party members' dishonesty and disciplinary violations. It was not until the Fifth National Congress that there was an inner-party supervision agency. The Central Supervisory Committee has initially formed a set of supervision models with the two committees (ie the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the Central Supervisory Committee of the Communist Party of China) basically parallel and mutually restricting each other, and the party's special supervisory agencies exercise their supervisory power relatively independently and completely. This shows that the party has realized that there must be not only external supervision, but also internal supervision. Although the mode of inner-party discipline inspection and supervision established by the Fifth CPC National Congress has undergone profound changes with the failure of the Great Revolution, the establishment of a special supervision body within the party is of far-reaching significance in the history of party building.
 

The establishment of the Central Supervisory Committee is an important sign that the discipline construction of the Communist Party of China has begun to become formal. The establishment of the supervision system takes strict party discipline as the most important obligation of all party members and all party organizations. It can effectively eliminate the party's disciplinary elements and speculators mixed into the party, and ensure the implementation of the party's line, principles, and policies. Ensure the purity of the party and the healthy development of the revolutionary team, and improve the party's prestige and combat effectiveness.

January 18, 2018 Source: Beijing Daily