The China of Chiang K'ai-Shek: A Political Study. Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger
Chêng-fu) is employed in two senses. In the broad sense, it refers to the entire central government of China. In the narrow sense, it is a synonym for National Government Committee (Kuo-min Chêng-fu Wei-yüan-hui), commonly translated as Council of State. The highest governmental officer of China is the Kuo-min Chêng-fu Chu-hsi—literally, the Chairman of the National Government. Since this officer is the formal head of the National Government in both senses of the term, his office may with equal appropriateness be described as Chairmanship of the Council of State and as Presidency of the National Government. The latter has been most commonly accepted, although it obscured the clarity of the Chinese governmental pattern. It is essential to note, however, that in the National Government period there has been no President of the Chinese Republic; the highest officer has been the President of the National Government of the Chinese Republic, and as such the titular head of the Chinese state for international purposes. This officer possesses prestige rather than power, and is roughly analogous to the President of the Third French Republic.
In his official capacity, the President acts as chairman of the meetings of the Council of State, performs the ceremonial functions entailed by his office, and serves as the custodian of the symbols of continuity and legitimacy. Wang Shih-chieh writes: " … the Chairman more or less occupies a nominal position. At most, he can give occasional advice, only within certain limits, to the Executive or other Yüan, with no power at all to decide or to reject the policies adopted by the Yüan. As a matter of fact, from the end of the Year XXI (1932) down to the present, since the man filling the office of Chairman [President] of the National Government is very calm and law-abiding, he has never interfered in the activities or policies of the various Yüan."[11] This officer has been the veteran Kuomintang leader, Lin Shên, long a resident of the United States, a key man in overseas affairs of the Party, and a person of much dignity, charm, poise and prestige. With a long beard and a humane, scholarly demeanor, President Lin has fulfilled most admirably the requirements of his office.
Generalissimo Chiang regularly reports on government activities to Lin Chu-hsi, addressing him attentively and respectfully. This is no perfunctory sham, but appears to be a very real search for advice and guidance. The two men are close associates and have been such for many years; the Generalissimo gives every indication of regarding his venerable colleague with affectionate esteem. During the Chungking bombings, the President has commonly resided in a secure place outside the city. He is not needed for the daily prosecution of the war, but both the office and its incumbent are strongly stabilizing factors in the National Government. (The Japanophile Wang Ch'ing-wei, establishing his duplicate regime in Nanking, left the Presidency open for many months, pirating Lin Shên's name. Finally Wang gave himself the title, although he patently would have preferred Lin.)
The Council of State
The Council of State (Kuo-min Chêng-fu Wei-yüan-hui, National Government Committee) is the formal governmental core of the Chinese Republic. Even in peacetime, however, its importance was seriously undermined by the vigorous activity of the Central Political Council. The members of the State Council are commonly persons who do not hold other important office; hence the Council does not include the most effective leaders. Although its sphere of activity is wide, its role as ratifier of the decisions of the Supreme National Defense Council reduces its plenary powers to a shadow. Amnesties, general appropriation bills, appointments and removals, solemnification of legislation adopted by the Legislative Yüan, and inter-Yüan problems are all within the scope of the State Council's authority, but except for the power of organizing and supervising the central independent agencies, subordinate only to itself, there has been little practical power for it to exercise.[12]
The independent agencies under the Council of State, together with the latter's relation to the Yüan and the Military Affairs Commission, are best shown on the chart on p. 55.[13]
Minor agencies are thus attached directly to the Council of State, which also serves as a link and common formal superior to the five Yüan and the Military Affairs Commission. Authority of the Council is directed primarily upon these agencies which, while minor, serve useful needs. The Offices of Military (Tsan-chün Ch'u) and of Civil Affairs (Wên-kuan Ch'u) are transmission and ceremonial agencies, charged with the formal correctness of state documents and ceremonies; the military office was originally designed to carry on more important functions, including an independent inspectorate of troops, but now seems to be restricted to matters of protocol. Chinese government has for centuries operated on the basis of a two-way current of written materials: memorials, petitions, and other communications come from the provinces and dominions to the metropolis; orders, laws and other commands flow outward in response.[14]
The other four agencies directly dependent on the Council of State are all of important character, but likely to be impaired by a period of crisis. The Academia Sinica (Kuo-li Chung-yang Yen-chiu Yüan) serves scientific and educational work through its own research bureaus, through systems of extended aid, and through a program of publications; despite war, it has continued, making heroic efforts to preserve the national cultural vitality and continuity. The three remaining agencies are of less importance, although the Planning Committee for the Western Capital (Hsi-ching Ch'ou-pei Wei-yüan-hui) found its work considerably extended when, on October 1, 1940, Chungking was formally denominated an auxiliary capital of the Chinese Republic, and a long-standing anomaly—that of the city's uncertain status—was removed.
The Council of State could be regarded, therefore, as a mere excrescence upon the design of government were it not that ceremonial and formal functions, indispensable to any government but particularly salient in China, can be delegated to it, and the actual policy-making agencies thereby stripped down to maximal utility and efficacy.
The Executive Yüan
The Executive Yüan is the political organ which includes the ministries, and is therefore roughly analogous to a cabinet, just as the Council of State is in loose parallel to a Privy Council. Together with the Supreme National Defense Council and the Military Affairs Commission, it exercises actual control over the National Government in war time. Its growth involves executive giantism, and atrophy for the remaining Yüan. The President (Yüan-chang) of the Executive Yüan (Hsing-chêng Yüan) is the highest executive officer of the government. This post has not always been held by Chiang K'ai-shek. At various times Wang Ch'ing-wei (now in Nanking) and H. H. K'ung (now Minister of Finance and Vice-President [Fu-yüan-chang] of the Yüan) have held this office.
The Executive Yüan may be compared to a parliamentary cabinet in respect to its relations to the President of the National Government, but it possesses no authority whatever over the Supreme National Defense Council, nor over the Kuomintang C. E. C. and the Kuomintang Congress. It cannot ask for its own dissolution, nor demand the dissolution of the higher policy-making agency whose will it executes.[15] It resembles a cabinet, therefore, in its service as a consultative and unifying agency for the entire executive, but differs in its lack of controlling interdependence with a broad parliament. Again, the Yüan is unique among national executive agencies in the modern world with respect to its division of the task of policy-making and policy-supervising. Most cabinets consist