Ching-wei, however, did not end the attacks on the Nanking Government. Constant attention was called to the fact that its special Committees were without constitutional members of Executive Committee, Borodin had selected in January 1926, insisted upon the holding of the Fourth Plenary Session of the Central Executive Committee so that the illegality of Nanking might be ended. Goi eral Chiang Kai-shek was entrusted with the task of guaranteeing that such a conference should take place in Nanking during the first week of Jan-vary and his energies have been devoted as much to the ensuring of a quorum for that meeting as to the organization of his own authority as commander-in-chief of the Nationalist Army.
Now, comes Dr. C. C. Wu, a leading member of the Nanking Government and a member of the Central Executive Committee, and raises the question of the: legality of the Central Executive Committee itself ter January 1, 1928. In a long' interview in the Chinese press, Dr. Wu points to the fact that the constitution of the Kuomintang provides that the Central Executive committee—shall serve for one year; that a Party Congress shall meet annually to elect a new Central Executive Committee; that in the event of the Congress failing to meet, a postponement for one year is possible, but not for longer. The Present Central Executive Committee was selected between January 7 and 20 of 1926 at a Party Congress when Comrade Borodin and the Communist were in complete control of the Party. To outsiders, it must appear that such a Central Executive Committee cannot and should not be representative of the new atmosphere which we are told prevails in the Kuomintang. Two of the members of this committee are at present in Mosecw; many have been expelled from the party for being implicated in Communist] plots; many "are semi-Communists, Wi the breach with Soviet Russia, if the Chinese Communists and their semi-Communist allies persist? Apparently that is the thought behind Dr. Wu's legalism, 'As soon as Dr, Wu raised this question of the constitution and the legality of the Central Executive Committee, those who had twitted the Nanking Government with its' illegality changed their colour. They, in turn, held a meeting in Route Tennant de la Tour and issued pronunciamento to the Chinese press denouncing Dr. Wu personally and politically and charging him with attempting to destroy the party. For if his interpretation of the Kuomintang constitution was correct, the Central Executive Committee must go out of existence on January 1, 1928, and then there would be no central organ to represent the Kuomintang and the so-called Nationalist Government would go out of exist~ ence. They reminded him that the ancient sages said that a whole nation can be destroyed by one word. Would he express that word? To students of Chinese politics, the entire verbal onslaught summarizes itself as follows: according to the legal minds of Route Tennant de la Tour, the present Nanking Government and its special committees are illegal because they are unconstitutional under the Kuomintang constitution; but according to the legal minds of the Nanking Government, the forthcoming Nanking Government and_ its Central Executive Committee will be equally illegal under the Kuomintang constitution. Therefore, there is no legality anywhere.
In a country where law operates without the whimsicalies of mighty individuals, such a state of affairs would be possible. There has been ample time to call a Party Congress and to elect a new Central Executive Committee in accordance with the Kuomintang constitution, and even now there is time to call together the Party Congress and to elect a legal Central Executive Committee.
General Chiang Kai-shek cannot afford to have his government as illegal as his friends say the current Nanking Government is, for how can any law or any act of his government have a illegal? Furthermore, how can foreign Powers ever come to an understanding with Nanking if there is no legal basis for any government in Nanking. Admitting that there has been a rebellion and that certain territory has been conquered by the Kuomintang and is governed by it, that territory is then under the Kuomintang -constitution. If that government is to be a factor at all, it must, at any rate, be constitutional. We are we striking at the proposed Chiang Kai-shek Government. We are merely suggesting in advance that the question of constitutionality once raised annet be buried until constitutionality is proved, and that therefore it is to the interest of the Kuomintang to call the Party Congress and to elect new non-Communistic Central Executive Comnttttee, There is one other point which cannot be disregarded: the Chinese public, unused to elec tions, voting, and cther constitutional means of determining official responsibility, may be prepared to accept self-appointed officials, Foreigners must view this problem quite differently. If there is a constitutional basis, for the selection of official there can only be two reassent for ignoring that basis. One reason may be that those in power fear to use the ordinary means of placing themselves in office because they do not believe that they have the confi ence of the poop and that therefore, should a test to made, they do net feel that they would be selected. The other reason is that they are establishing la dictatorship. If the Party Congress is not held and a government is established without it then it must be that those who oppose the congress fear results of such a meeting. they may plan a dictatorship. The latter, of course, we are customed to in China. The local colloquial term for it is Tuchun,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.