The China of Chiang K'ai-Shek: A Political Study. Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger
President and all five Yüan, almost covers the full reach of Chinese government.
This Chapter contemplates the creation of a strong President. In the Organic Law of 1928, the five Presidents of the Yüan were relatively less strong, and the Chairman of the Kuo-min Chêng-fu Wei-yüan-hui (National Government Council; or, Council of State) was the key figure in the government. Most of this time, Chiang himself was Chairman. In the 1931 Provisional Constitution, now in force, the Chairman of the National Government—termed President by courtesy—is an officer comparable to the President of the Third French Republic; the President of the Executive Yüan is a more active officer: Chiang K'ai-shek is President of the Executive Yüan. The new President, under the Draft Constitution, is one of the world's most powerful officers. Holding office for six years, eligible for re-election, commander of all armed forces, declarer of war, negotiator of peace, treaty-maker, chief appointing and removing officer of the state, holder of an emergency power greater than that conveyed by Article 48 of the German Weimar Constitution, and superior to the executive, legislative, judicial, examinative and control branches of the government—such a President is fully responsible to the triennial People's Congress, and to that only! Since the proposed President may be recalled at any time by the People's Congress, he is in that respect similar to parliamentary chiefs of state.[9]
The President of the Executive Yüan, together with his subordinates, is to be appointed and removed by the President of the Republic. The Yüan includes Cabinet Ministers—appointed to their posts from among a special group of Executive Members of the Yüan, thereby providing a simple, rational equivalent of Cabinet and Privy Council, as in Japan or (less similarly) in Great Britain.
The Legislative Yüan is an interesting semi-cameral legislative body, which seeks to embody the better features of legislative research organs and of representative bodies. The Judicial Yüan rationalizes the structure and administration of courts and of judicial process.
The Control [or Censor] Yüan is, like the Legislative Yüan, a quasi-cameral body, with indirect election of members by the People's Congress from territorial electorates. Its functions are audit, inquiry, and impeachment, with such ancillary powers as practice to date has already indicated.[10]
Chapter V of the Draft Permanent Constitution deals with local government. The institutions of provincial government are wittingly minimized, because of recent trouble with provincial satrapies and the dangerously centrifugal effect of provincial autonomism. In contrast to this, government at the district (hsien) level is designed in strict accordance with the realities of twenty-odd centuries' experience. It is probable that no other constitution in the world provides for such careful guarantee of district, county, canton, or Kreis autonomy. The old Imperial Chinese system was a loose pseudo-centralized federation of two thousand near-autarkic and near-autonomous commonwealths; the Draft Constitution attempts to reinstitute (at the political level) this vigorous cooperative independence of the hsien. The hsien meeting, extrapolitical, unsystematic, and occasional in the past, is made the foundation for the new legal structure. (These proposed reforms are now being anticipated under the Provisional Constitution and current statutory changes.[11])
Chapter VI provides that the economic system shall rest on Sun Yat-sen's principle of min shêng (q.v., below). Willing to apply whatever worked best, Sun himself had no theoretical objections to capitalism, communism, state socialism, or any other economic doctrine. Hence, proletarian ownership of the means of production is not guaranteed; yet state ownership is not restricted, and is specifically required in the case of "all public utilities and enterprises of a monopolistic nature" (Art. 123). Henry George's influence on Sun is shown by mandatory taxation of unearned increment (Art. 119). Room for free future adaptation from corporative economic techniques successful in the outside world is assured (Art. 125): "Labor and capital shall, in accordance with the principles of mutual help and cooperation, develop together productive enterprises." It is likely that any imaginable economic system would be constitutional on this basis, provided that it was initiated by due legal procedure and without hardships irresponsibly imposed.
Chapter VII, on Education, opens: "The educational aim of the Republic of China shall be to develop a national spirit, to cultivate a national morality, to train the people for self-government and to increase their ability to earn a livelihood, and thereby to build up a sound and healthy body of citizens" (Art. 131), and continues, "Every citizen of the Republic of China shall have an equal opportunity to receive education" (Art. 132). State, secular control of educational policy is assured. Articles 134 and 135 provide for tuition-free elementary education for children and free elementary education for previously non-privileged adults. (The constitutional guarantee concerning tuition is indicative of the scholastic traditions of the Chinese, of the modern educational revolution, and is reminiscent of Art. 12 of the 1931 Constitution of the Chinese Soviet Republic: "The Soviet Government in China shall guarantee to all workers, peasants, and the toiling masses the right to education. The Soviet Government will, as far as possible, begin at once to introduce free universal education.")[12]
Chapter VIII deals with the interpretation and enforcement of the Constitution. It was a labor of love by shrewd legal theorists, and defines terms with great clarity. Interpretive power is vested in the Judicial Yüan.
The Issue of Constitutional Change
Nowhere in China is there outright denial of a need for constitutional change. The need exists; the Double Five Draft is the government's answer. Yet there are few patent demerits in the existing constitutional system; the present political structure is more realistic, more broadly national, more expressive of effective opinion than any other in modern China. The question arises from commitments (dating back to the Empire) promising to create actual constitutional government. The National Government was established on the basis of this pledge. The democratic ideology, whatever sects it may include, has a clean sweep of the field of doctrine in China. No one seriously advocates monarchy, separatism, or permanent dictatorship. The only question is: how and when?
At the close of the third session of the advisory People's Political Council, Chiang K'ai-shek replied to demands for immediate broadening of popular control over the government by reaffirmation of his adherence to the democratic dogma of Sun Yat-sen, together with the following warnings:
The democracy which Tsung-Li [The Leader, i.e., Sun Yat-sen] wished to establish was of the purest kind without the slightest vestige of make-believe or artificiality. Unfortunately, the Chinese people, having inherited all the evil practices handed down throughout the numerous dynasties of autocratic rule, were then at a low ebb both in intelligence and in vitality. The people were used to disorganization and selfishness. …
We have to wait until our lost territories have been recovered and domestic disorders liquidated before we can have political tutelage and prepare ourselves for constitutionalism. …
People at that time [the inauguration of the Republic in 1912] made the mistake of neglecting the necessary procedures and instead they rivalled each other in talking about democracy. … As a result, democracy has remained an ideal. …
We must make it clear to our people that democracy is not a synonym for lack of law and order, or for anarchy.
The public opinion on which democracy is based must be sound, collective, and representative of the majority of the people's wills. The freedom which democracy endows on people should not conflict with public welfare, nor should it go beyond the sphere as marked by laws of the State. With our nation facing the worst invasion in history,