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This article is reproduced from [People's Daily Online];

Adhering to the principle of maintaining a balance between strictness and leniency, and unifying law, reason and emotion is not only a safeguard for the law, but also often leads to better governance results.

Zeng, an individual business owner, was fined 50,000 yuan for selling a bottle of expired wine for 78 yuan. He believed that the punishment was too heavy and had been suing for many years without success. The Supreme People's Procuratorate held a public hearing to review the situation and prompted the administrative agency to take the initiative to correct the problem. At a recent press conference held by the Supreme People's Procuratorate, this case was introduced to the public as a typical case of "heavy penalties for minor offenses".

In recent years, similar cases have repeatedly become the focus of attention. The disparity between the amount of profit and the amount of the fine is too great, which can easily make people feel that the punishment is "excessive and inappropriate" based on simple common sense.Problems such as "heavy penalties for minor offenses" and "different penalties for the same case" violate the original intention of law enforcement, do not meet the requirements of fairness and justice, and damage the legitimate rights and interests of the parties involved, and are not conducive to their recognition and correction of mistakes.The procuratorate should carry out legal supervision on these issues in accordance with the law.

Correcting "minor offenses with heavy penalties" is in line with common sense and is also a legal requirement. my country's Administrative Penalty Law clearly states that"The setting and imposition of administrative penalties must be based on facts and be commensurate with the facts, nature, circumstances and degree of social harm of the illegal act,"It also makes specific provisions for situations where punishment can be mitigated, reduced, or not given. It should be noted that the principle of proportionality between punishment and offence is a basic legal principle. The governance of “heavy punishment for minor offences” is not inconsistent with the improvement of the system of punitive compensation and huge fines for serious violations. The latter is mainly to punish serious offenders, while “heavy punishment for minor offences” is a situation where the punishment is not proportional to the offence. The legal provisions clearly convey the following legislative purpose and spirit:In administrative law enforcement, we must not only enforce the law strictly, but also correctly exercise discretion to avoid "heavy penalties for minor offenses" and "light penalties for major offenses" to ensure that the offenses and penalties are commensurate.