We hold no brief for He If he has been guilty of fraud on the scale that is generally believed, he deserves heavy punishment. But fraud, even on the scale alleged, is not @ capital offence, and is not a matter for military jurisdiction. I:
punishable, under the Criminal Cede, with imprisonment of from cone to ten years, Only a month ago Marshal 'Chang' Tso-lin, issued a Manidate ordaining that "no one shall be arrested by executive organs without due process of the law nor shall his or her property be confi seated." The transfer of Honan Chi to the military' prison, and his persecution by the military authorities are flagrant. violations of this mandate., And if he should be murdered for the express purpose of profiting from his life insurance Policies the whole world will resound: with the story. We credit Marshal Change Tso-lin with every desire to uphold the principles which he has ordained, but it is obvious that certain of his subordinates pay no attention to his mandates. It seems a pity, however, that the ingenious Project of murdering a man to secure the proceeds of his life in surance policy was not introduced during the visit to China of the Extraterritoriality Commission. brazen an outrage would certainly have received special mention in its report. We remember once hear-i of a Shantung s.ssuming control of the Province assessed each of the Magistrates then in office at such and such an amount in cash, with the alternative summary execution. He hit upon the ingenious expedient of inviting a foreign insurance company to insure each of these officials for the amount at which he had assessed] them, cynically explaining that when ther they lived or died he would (hus obtain the sums. he required. We never expected that a similar} expedient would be adopted in Tien tsin, in the year of Grace 1927. 'There will be a heavy slump life insurance in this country _if Chinese militarists once get the idea'
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.