Trial of the Gang of Four and the Special Court
In September 1980 the NPC Standing Committee established a Special Court of the Supreme People's Court, which from 20 November 1980 to 25 January 1981 publicly tried ten principal members of the Lin Biao and Jiang Qing cliques. Jiang Qing and Zhang Chunqiao were sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve (commuted to life in 1983), Wang Hongwen to life imprisonment, and the other seven to terms of sixteen to twenty years. The trial addressed criminal offences only; responsibility for the Cultural Revolution as a movement, including Mao Zedong's own, was not brought before the court.
Preparation: From Detention to a Special Court
After the "Gang of Four" were detained for investigation in October 1976, the question of how to deal with the leading members of the Lin Biao and Jiang Qing cliques remained unresolved for several years. In March 1980 the CCP Central Secretariat set up a Central "Two Cases" Trial Guidance Committee, chaired by Peng Zhen, to direct the handling of both cases; acting on Deng Xiaoping's proposal that the trial be held in public, the committee began preparing for an open trial that August. On 29 September 1980, the 16th session of the Standing Committee of the Fifth National People's Congress decided to establish a Special Procuratorate under the Supreme People's Procuratorate and a Special Court under the Supreme People's Court. Procurator-General Huang Huoqing was named head of the Special Procuratorate, and Supreme Court President Jiang Hua president of the Special Court, with Wu Xiuquan, Zeng Hanzhou and Huang Yukun as vice-presidents.
Indictment: Ten Defendants, Four Categories of Crimes
The Special Procuratorate's indictment (Te Jian Zi No. 1) was dated 2 November 1980 and filed with the Special Court on 5 November. It grouped the charges into four categories: framing and persecuting Party and state leaders and plotting to overthrow the dictatorship of the proletariat; persecuting and suppressing large numbers of cadres and ordinary people; plotting to assassinate Mao Zedong and instigating a counter-revolutionary armed coup; and plotting an armed rebellion in Shanghai. It cited specific figures for a number of regional frame-up cases — for example, in the Inner Mongolian "Inner Mongolian People's Party" case, more than 346,000 cadres and ordinary people were framed and persecuted and 16,222 were persecuted to death. There were ten defendants: Jiang Qing, Zhang Chunqiao, Yao Wenyuan, Wang Hongwen and Chen Boda were tried by the First Trial Chamber; five former military commanders — Huang Yongsheng, Wu Faxian, Li Zuopeng, Qiu Huizuo and Jiang Tengjiao — by the Second Trial Chamber. Lin Biao, Kang Sheng, Xie Fuzhi, Ye Qun, Lin Liguo and Zhou Yuchi were already dead, and the indictment stated that they would not be held criminally liable.
The Trial: Forty-Two Sessions and Television Coverage
The Special Court opened on 20 November 1980 at No. 1 Zhengyi Road, just east of Tiananmen Square in Beijing. According to the report Jiang Hua delivered to the NPC Standing Committee in March 1981, the court held 42 sessions — 33 of courtroom investigation and 9 of debate — heard 49 witnesses in person, examined 873 items of evidence, and admitted more than 60,000 person-visits to the public gallery; television broadcast excerpts of the proceedings and relayed them abroad by satellite. The defendants' conduct differed sharply. Jiang Qing repeatedly clashed with the judges and witnesses, was removed from the courtroom several times, and in her final statement insisted that everything she had done followed the instructions of Mao Zedong and the Party Central Committee; the line "I was Chairman Mao's dog — whoever he told me to bite, I bit" was later widely attributed to her. Zhang Chunqiao, by contrast, refused to answer any of the court's questions throughout and remained silent.
Verdict and Aftermath
The Special Court's judgment (Te Fa Zi No. 1) was dated 23 January 1981 and pronounced in court on 25 January: Jiang Qing and Zhang Chunqiao were sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve and deprived of political rights for life; Wang Hongwen received life imprisonment; Yao Wenyuan twenty years; Chen Boda, Huang Yongsheng and Jiang Tengjiao eighteen years each; Wu Faxian and Li Zuopeng seventeen years each; and Qiu Huizuo sixteen years. On 25 January 1983, when the two-year reprieves expired, the death sentences of Jiang Qing and Zhang Chunqiao were commuted to life imprisonment. Jiang Qing took her own life on 14 May 1991 while on medical parole; Wang Hongwen died of illness on 3 August 1992; Yao Wenyuan was released on completing his sentence in 1996 and died on 23 December 2005; Zhang Chunqiao died on 21 April 2005.
Scope of the Trial and Assessments
The Special Court's mandate was confined to trying the criminal offences of the two cliques under the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China; matters unrelated to criminal offences were excluded. As a result, responsibility for the Cultural Revolution as a movement — and in particular Mao Zedong's own responsibility — never came before the court; the Party's political verdict on that question was delivered six months later in the 1981 "Resolution on Certain Questions in the History of Our Party Since the Founding of the People's Republic of China." Official accounts present the trial as a landmark in the restoration of socialist legality; many foreign observers and scholars describe it as a "show trial" whose outcome was settled in advance and whose main purpose was political, while also acknowledging its significance as a turning point in China's transition from the Mao era to the reform era.
Narrative Comparison
| Source | Narrative |
|---|---|
| 1981 Party History Resolution and the Special Court judgment | The official account characterizes the Lin Biao and Jiang Qing groups as "counter-revolutionary cliques" and holds that the trial was conducted openly, under the Criminal Law and through statutory procedure, as an important step toward strengthening socialist democracy and the legal system. The 1981 Resolution treats Mao Zedong's errors during the Cultural Revolution and the crimes of the two cliques as different in nature: the former were grave errors committed by a revolutionary leader in his later years; the latter were counter-revolutionary crimes to be prosecuted under the law. |
| Alexander C. Cook, The Cultural Revolution on Trial (2016) | Cook treats the trial as an exercise in transitional justice and, at the same time, a show trial with a predetermined outcome: it used legal form to make a break with the Cultural Revolution and laid the foundation for a new model of socialist legality in the reform era. By concentrating guilt on a handful of defendants and keeping Mao's responsibility out of the courtroom, he argues, the trial saved Chinese socialism as a ruling ideology at the cost of its revolutionary soul. |
| Defendant's account: Jiang Qing's final statement in court (as reported by The Christian Science Monitor, 30 Dec 1980) | Jiang Qing refused to admit guilt, arguing that everything she had done was in accordance with the instructions of Mao Zedong and the Party Central Committee, and that to vilify her was to vilify Chairman Mao and the Cultural Revolution. Stressing her thirty-eight years as Mao's wife, she accused the court of "calling black white" and "finding bones in eggs," and denied its right to judge her. |
Key Milestones
- NPC Standing Committee establishes the Special Procuratorate and Special Court
The 16th session of the Fifth NPC Standing Committee makes the decision, naming Huang Huoqing head of the Special Procuratorate and Jiang Hua president of the Special Court.
- Special Procuratorate files the indictment
The indictment (Te Jian Zi No. 1, dated 2 November) charges ten defendants with four categories of crimes.
- Special Court opens at No. 1 Zhengyi Road
The First Trial Chamber hears Jiang Qing and four others; the Second hears five former military commanders led by Huang Yongsheng. Excerpts are broadcast on television.
- Special Court pronounces sentence
Jiang Qing and Zhang Chunqiao receive death sentences with two-year reprieves, Wang Hongwen life imprisonment, and the other seven terms of sixteen to twenty years.
- Jiang Hua reports on the trial to the NPC Standing Committee
The report states that the court held 42 sessions, heard 49 witnesses in person, and admitted more than 60,000 person-visits to the public gallery.
- Death sentences of Jiang Qing and Zhang Chunqiao commuted to life
With the two-year reprieves expired, both sentences are commuted to life imprisonment in accordance with the law.
- Jiang Qing takes her own life on medical parole
Jiang Qing dies by suicide in Beijing while on medical parole, aged 77.
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