Characteristic principle of legal evidence system

China used to practice a legal evidence system called "seeking truth from facts". China is a socialist country, and we must adhere to the principle of seeking truth from facts in all our work. The principle of seeking truth from facts embodies Marxist investigation and research methods, requiring judicial personnel to keep close contact with the masses, rely on the masses, give full play to their subjective initiative, proceed from reality and accurately identify the true situation of the case according to the verified evidence. It is also required that the evidence used to prove the facts of the case must be sufficient and meet the following four standards: (1) The evidence on which the case is finalized is verified; (2) There is necessary evidence to prove the facts of the case; (3) The contradiction between the evidence and the facts of the case is reasonably eliminated; (4) The conclusion is unique, excluding other possibilities. Only when these four criteria are met at the same time can the facts be confirmed clearly and be used as the basis for the judge's judgment. This proof requirement is theoretically called "objective truth theory" from the perspective of epistemology.

However, taking seeking truth from facts as China's evidence does not seem to have much positive effect on developing China's evidence theory and perfecting the evidence system. On the contrary, its negative effects are obvious. First of all, the requirement of taking objective truth as proof of litigation is divorced from the actual litigation, which provides a theoretical basis for ultra-authority in civil litigation and leads to the abuse of judges' judicial power; Secondly, it expounds serious and realistic legal problems with philosophical words and principles, rather than analyzing the actual problems of litigation proof. Based on the national conditions, we should establish a system of independent evaluation of evidence by judges according to law, and establish the freedom of judges to evaluate evidence with "legal truth" as the proof requirement. 1, objective truth proof requirements

For a long time, China's evidence system of seeking truth from facts has adhered to the objective and true proof requirements, which is considered to be in line with the epistemology of Marxist philosophy that existence comes first and consciousness comes second. At the same time, for a long time, "the judicial team is a team loyal to the interests of the people, the law and the objective truth." Under the influence of this thought, the legal profession generally believes that all the evidence of the final judgment is accurate and unquestionable; All the final evidence is not contradictory, and if there is contradiction, it can be reasonably explained and excluded; And all the evidence should be objective, true and beyond doubt. Under the guidance of this concept, in order to ensure that the facts of the case proved by the evidence are consistent with the true facts of the case, the judge should investigate and collect evidence at all costs, no matter whether the facts of the case are possible or not, no matter how much time, manpower and material resources are needed. It leads to low trial efficiency and wastes limited trial resources. Therefore, although the "objective truth theory" seems to be in line with materialist dialectics, it actually bears the imprint of metaphysics, does not analyze specific problems, unilaterally emphasizes epistemology's reflection theory and knowability theory, ignores epistemology's dialectics, and misinterprets the dialectical unity of absolute truth and relative truth. Specific to litigation cases, the professional quality and ethics of judges as individuals are certain, and the judge's understanding of the facts of the case can only reach a "relatively real" level. The requirement of "absolute truth" does not conform to the law of litigation practice and cognition.

2. Proof requirements of legal truthfulness

Objective truth is indeed the highest truth and the limit of truth. But it is unreasonable to regard it as the requirement of litigation proof. What is objective truth? The objective truth is the truth of existence, but the case does not exist, but the reality that has passed. It is obviously unrealistic and unattainable to ask the investigation and proof of the facts of past cases to be as true as the existing truth. Because the disputed case facts cannot be reproduced in court, the judge can only determine the case facts based on the evidence, and the evidence provided is sometimes not completely true or even contrary to the facts. Therefore, under the condition that the facts of the case are indistinguishable, the judge has to be satisfied with the relative truth of the law when judging and determining the facts of the case. In judicial practice, judges judge cases from pursuing objective truth to satisfying legal truth.

Article 63 of the Evidence Regulations promulgated by the Supreme Court in 2002 stipulates the requirements of the Civil Procedure Law for proving the truth; "The people's court shall make a judgment according to the facts of the case proved by evidence." Since 1970s, the judicial system in China has been greatly improved. But at the same time, China's judicial resources are very limited, and judges' ability to examine and judge evidence is also limited, which is far from the requirements of national legalization for judges. If we still insist on the proof requirement of objective truth and ask people to find the objective truth of the case as the basis of the judge's judgment in litigation, it will not only bring unbearable judicial burden to the country, but also easily lead to the inefficiency of the judge in handling cases, which is unfair in essence. As the saying goes, "the grass is green and the horse has starved to death." "belated justice is a kind of injustice", which actually sacrifices the ultimate goal of justice, judicial justice. Therefore, it is of great practical value to establish the proof requirements of "legal truth" in line with China's national conditions and the law of evidence development. 1, the principle for judges to examine and judge evidence.

"Evidence is the foundation of justice" and "Litigation is to beat evidence" show the important position of evidence in litigation. From the perspective of evidence application, the settlement of disputes is actually a process of "presenting evidence-examining and judging evidence-using evidence to determine cases-applying laws to solve disputes". Among them, examining and judging evidence is the key link for judges to make judgments according to law. According to the traditional concept in China, when examining and judging evidence, judges should take seeking truth from facts as the principle and objective truth as the standard. This provision is rooted in the super-authoritarian litigation mode of maximizing the power of judges. Its guiding ideology is to adopt the principle of seeking truth from facts to examine and identify evidence, reject and criticize the principle of free evaluation of evidence in civil law countries, and think that free evaluation of evidence is completely subjective and idealized, which will lead to the arbitrariness of judges' judgment and encourage judges' free speculation. However, the provisions of the Civil Procedure Law are too rough and unclear. In fact, it gives judges almost unlimited discretion, which not only fails to really solve the presumption of free evaluation of evidence, but also produces various drawbacks. In practice, judges often rely on intuition and experience to examine and judge evidence, which intensifies the authoritarianism and secrecy of evidence evaluation and objectively creates soil and conditions for judicial corruption. Therefore, Article 64 +0.65438 of the Provisions on Evidence promulgated by the Supreme Court in February 2006 established a clear principle for judges to examine and judge evidence: "Judges should comprehensively and objectively examine evidence according to legal procedures, follow judges' professional ethics according to law, use logical standards and daily life to independently judge whether evidence has probative force, and publicly judge the reasons and results." This provision emphasizes that judges should follow legal procedures and legal provisions when examining and judging evidence; It also emphasizes that judges should abide by judges' professional ethics (that is, conscience), make independent (that is, free) judgments on evidence, and make public the reasons and results of judgments (that is, publicly evaluate evidence). It absorbs the reasonable factors of modern free evaluation of evidence, embodies the principle of openness of evaluation of evidence, conforms to China's national conditions, and conforms to the general law of judges reviewing and judging evidence.

2. Criteria for judges to examine and judge evidence

The criteria for judges to examine and judge evidence refers to the criteria for judges to use rules to examine and identify the evidence materials related to the facts to be proved in the parties' evidence, cross-examination and court debate, to confirm the admissibility of evidence and the strength of evidence, and to make judgments accordingly. The standard of evidence judgment is the basis that judges must follow when determining whether evidence materials can be used as the basis for deciding a case. More than ten provisions such as Articles 65, 66, 67 and 68 of the Evidence Regulations have established the standards for judges to examine and judge evidence in China. That is, the criteria for examining and judging objectivity, relevance and legitimacy: (1) Objectivity means that the content reflected by evidence must be objective facts, not what people subjectively assume; (2) Relevance means that there must be an objective connection between evidence and undetermined facts. Relevance is an important condition for whether an evidence material can become evidence, and the relevance of evidence also determines the probative force of evidence; (3) legitimacy. Legality requires that the procedure, form and content of providing evidence must be legal.

3. Judge's evaluation of evidence

Who will grasp the principles and standards of evidence review and judgment? -Judge. Although there is no provision for free evaluation of evidence in China's laws, in practice, judges often review and judge evidence according to trial experience, which is a process of subjective and objective understanding, and in fact, they unconsciously apply the principle of free evaluation of evidence. Judicial practice shows that the correct handling of every case is inseparable from the objective evaluation of judges. Admitting the judge's free evaluation of evidence in litigation is conducive to the judge's timely judgment. However, on the premise of admitting free evaluation of evidence, we must ensure that evaluation of evidence is as objective as possible. In modern litigation, it is inevitable and necessary for judges to exercise moderate discretion. How to achieve justice and ensure the objectivity of evidence evaluation, the premise is that judges must be in a neutral position. As a faithful executor of the law, a judge should be free from any personal prejudice and partiality before the national law, but a judge is also a human being, and his personality, prejudice and values often play a decisive role in his trial and affect the objectivity of the judge's free evaluation of evidence. Therefore, it is necessary to restrict the judge's free evaluation of evidence with certain evidence rules and legal provisions.