During a scuffle between lawmakers in the Legislative Yuan’s main chamber, a portrait of Republic of China (ROC) founder Sun Yat-sen (孫中山) was damaged by a cup of water thrown by a Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator. According to customary practice, the legislature may ask the KMT for compensation.
The misconduct not only involves compensation under civil law, but also pertains to Article 160 of the Criminal Code, which states that “a person who with purpose to insult the founder the Republic of China, Dr Sun Yat-sen, openly damages, removes, or dishonors his portrait” is subject to imprisonment for not more than one year.
According to Article 160, “a person who with purpose to insult the Republic of China openly damages, removes, or dishonors the emblem of the Republic of China or the flag of the Republic of China shall be sentenced to imprisonment for not more than one year, short-term imprisonment, or a fine of not more than nine thousand dollars. A person who with purpose to insult the founder of the Republic of China, Dr Sun Yat-sen, openly damages, removes, or dishonors his portrait shall be subject to the same punishment.”
Since the KMT legislator inflicted damage to the portrait, will the state charge the legislator with one-year imprisonment?
What the legislature should do is to abolish Article 160, which would not only offer a “solution” to the KMT legislator, but would further ensure freedom of speech in Taiwan’s democratic society. In democratic countries, if citizens dishonor the national flag, the nation’s founder or any political emblem to express their discontent, they would not be committing any violation, because they are under the protection of the Constitution to engage in symbolic speech.
According to Interpretation Nos. 445 and 644 of the former Council of Grand Justices, the state should do its best to protect citizens’ right to political speech. In other words, democratic countries should not use the law to restrain citizens’ right to symbolic speech, such as dishonoring the national flag or portrait of the founder.
In the case Texas v. Johnson, 491 US 397 (1989), the US Supreme Court ruled that flag burning constitutes a form of symbolic speech that is protected by the First Amendment. In United States v. Eichman, 496 US 310 (1990), the US Supreme Court struck down the Flag Protection Act of 1989 on First Amendment grounds, reaffirming its ruling in Texas v. Johnson, which invalidated a Texas flag desecration statute.
Taiwan’s Article 160 is apparently outdated, 30 years behind the US. It is high time lawmakers repealed the statute; I am sure the KMT legislator in question would offer their wholehearted support to that motion.
Huang Di-ying is a lawyer and chairman of the Taiwan Forever Association.
Translated by Rita Wang
The White House’s decision to take a 9.9 percent stake in Intel Corp is looking like very shrewd business indeed. Since the government bought in at US$20.47 a share last August, the US chipmaker’s surging stock price has delivered the US a US$43 billion return. One of the reasons the investment has so far proved so sound is that the White House has made sure of it. According to The Wall Street Journal, Howard personally pushed deals on Intel’s behalf with some of the most lucrative clients imaginable. They include Nvidia Corp, the company at the heart of the AI
A single photograph can cut through a lot of noise, but it can also be used to misrepresent the truth. At the very least, it can concentrate the mind on something that requires further investigation. On Monday last week, Ma Ying-jeou Foundation CEO Tai Hsia-ling (戴遐齡) and former National Security Council secretary-general King Pu-tsung (金溥聰) held a news conference in which they showed a photograph of former foundation CEO Hsiao Hsu-tsen (蕭旭岑), now Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) deputy chairman. In the image Hsiao is seated next to Xiamen Taiwan Businessmen Association chairman Han Ying-huan (韓螢煥). The two men were holding
I first met Professor Ray Jiing (井迎瑞) as a film and documentary student at Shih Hsin University’s (SHU) Department of Radio Television and Film in 1988. The following year, he went on to become the director of the Chinese Taipei Film Archive — forerunner of the Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute (TFAI). Over his eight-year tenure, Jiing rescued and restored over 200 classic Taiwanese films. In 1997, he established the Graduate Institute of Studies in Documentary and Film Archiving at Tainan National University of the Arts (TNNUA), and I joined the program in his third cohort of students. Beyond a
President William Lai Ching-te’s (賴清德) May 20 second-anniversary address was not just a routine policy review; it was damage control. US President Donald Trump’s remarks — that he did not want to see anyone move toward independence and that the delivery of a major Taiwan arms package could depend on the progress of US-China relations — unsettled Taiwan’s public and created an opening for opposition parties to question whether Taiwan was being treated as a bargaining chip in Washington’s dealings with Beijing. Lai’s speech was designed to close that opening. The address covered the expected ground: sovereignty, cross-strait relations, defense spending,
RSS