This research was conducted to investigate the influence of kind and concentration of organic ligands such as humic (HA) or fulvic acid (FA) on the removal of Cu or Pb from the aqueous solution employing the principles in metal-ligand complexation. Increasing HA concentration enhanced the efficiency of Cu or Pb removal, but there existed upper critical concentrations capable of forming maximum HA-metal complex. which ranged 53-289 and 42-315mg/L for Cu and Pb, respectively. At these concentrations. efficiency of removal was 70 to 95 % for Pb, but 13 to 65 % for Cu. Amounts of Cu and Pb which complexed with 100mg HA were estimated to be 7.5 and 34.1mg, respectively. FA-metal complex forming reactions were fitted significantly to the empirical models of Freundlich for Cu and Langmuir for Pb. Fulvic acid precipitated nearly 100% of Pb in solution, but formed precipitates with Cu in only 13 to 29%. Comparing organic ligands. HA had a higher removal efficiency for Cu but FA had such for Pb. Metalligand complex formation was differed from kinds and concentrations of corresponding ligands and metals. Results demonstrated that this principle has a strong potential to be employed for treating heavy metals in aqueous solution.