Constitutional Party Research Articles

The Rise to Power of the Chinese Communist Party: Documents and Analysis (review)

Reviews 229 Tony Saich, editor. The Rise to Power ofthe Chinese CommunistParty: Documents and Analysis. With a contribution by Benjamin Yang. Armonk, New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1996. lxix, 1,431 pp. Hardcover $195.00, isbn 156324 -154-4. Paperback $45.00, isbn 1-56324-155-2. This imposing work, the culmination ofa ten-year project, is a major contribution toward our understanding ofthe Chinese Revolution. Saich couches his presentation of 212 major Communist Party documents in compeUing analyses (totaling 120 pages), which, together with his thirty-page general introduction, provide a "cutting edge" interpretation and, I fhink, the best short history ofthe rise ofthe Chinese Communist Party. The Party that emerges here is one that was continuously beset by factional struggles and by tensions between the Party Center and non-centers and between loyalty to organization and leader; one that had great difficulty in mobüizing support among the masses and was successful only where cadres based their approaches and policies on local realities and contexts; and one, belying the standard mythic Maoist history offhe Party, that was polycentric in leadership and program into the 1940s. Saich divides fhe documents and analysis into eight periods, some ofwhich overlap on the basis ofintra-Party development and extra-Party relationships; for example, Commentary F deals with united front difficulties from 1939 to 1941 while Commentary G focuses on "establishing the orfhodoxy" from October 1939 to April 1945. The periodization itselfdraws attention to the significance ofboth internal Party developments and relations with the outside world in the contours ofthe Party's rise. The documents are the heart of this work. They come from a wide variety of sources: archives (among them, the central Party archives in Beijing and the van Ravesteyn archives in Amsterdam); from previously published English-language translations (e.g., documents in works like C. Martin Wübur and Julie How, Missionaries ofRevolution [Harvard University Press, 1989] and Boyd Compton, Mao's China: Party Reform Documents, 1942-1944 [University ofWashington Press, 1952]); from newspapers and periodicals ofthe period; and from various studies and coUections published in the 1980s—such as biographies of Zhang Guotao and Zhang Wentian and accounts ofnon-central base areas and movements. The range ofdocument types gives this work its richness; my examples serve as only a hint ofthe scholarly wealth in this volume. The documents deal with the panoply ofParty concerns—political, müitary, social, cultural, and economic; the© 1997 by University bane offactionalism that dogged the Partyateverystep; and die host ofnon-Chinese Communist Party institutions and/or their representatives with which the Party had to deal: warlords, the Guomindang, the Comintern, the Japanese, and the Americans. Among the most formal legal documents are fhe various constituofHawai 'i Press 230 China Review International: Vol. 4, No. ?, Spring 1997 tions and laws issued by fhe Party. These include the 1922 Constitution (and its three révisions of 1923, 1925, and 1927), the 1928 Constitution, the 1931 Constitution and Land Law ofthe Chinese Soviet Republic, the 1934 Organic Law ofthe Chinese Soviet Republic, and the 1945 Constitution. Saich uses these documents to point to changes over time in Party directions and to emphasize the importance oforganization to the movement. But they are only skeletons to which the editor through his choice of the other documents endows historical flesh and blood; these documents bring to life fhe Party's rise and such dramatic struggles as the late 1920s attack on the role and person ofChen Duxiu, the battle between Zhang Guotao and the Party Center, and the competition in the 1930s and 1940s between Mao on the one hand and Wang Ming and Bo Gu on the ofher. Less formaUy imposing than Party constitutions and edicts are Party resolutions (such as that on fhe Guangdong peasant movement in 1926); several ofMao Zedong's classic writings (his 1927 report on fhe Hunan peasant movement, the 1942 speech at the Yan'an Forum on Literature and Art, and his essays on coalition government [1945] and die people's democratic dictatorship [1949]); and speeches at Party conferences. The last reveal the struggles ofparticular historical contexts, giving striking evidence that Party debates, far from being dominated by ideology or dogma, were generaUy deeply...

Constitutional Revolution, Party and Faction n the Scottish Parliaments of Charles I*

Constitutional Revolution, Party and Faction n the Scottish Parliaments of Charles I*

The ballot bomb: Terrorism and the electoral process in northern ireland

Why Republican and Loyalist paramilitaries intervened in elections in Northern Ireland during the 1980s to buttress their credibility is examined. The failure of Loyalist candidates to attract votes is contrasted with the success achieved by Republican candidates as a result of the 1981 hunger strike crisis. It is argued that the British public's stereotype of terrorism in Northern Ireland amplified the political impact of Sinn Fein's electoral breakthrough in 1982 and 1983. The alarm in both Britain and the Irish Republic at Sinn Fein's rise led to the Anglo‐Irish Agreement of November 1985. A decline in support for Sinn Fein followed. The party was marginalized in the Republic. While it continued to attract significant support in Catholic working‐class areas in Northern Ireland, it lost ground in the Catholic community as a whole to the constitutional nationalist party, the Social Democratic and Labour Party. The Loyalist paramilitaries were unable to translate support for their activities as paramilita...

General Rosecrans' Forthright Diplomacy with Juárez's Mexico, 1868-1869

One Mexican historian has described the post-war years of Benito Juárez' Administration (1867-72) in Mexico and that of his successor, Sebastián Lerdo de Tejada (1872-76) as “a dictatorship without peace or progress.” The nation suffered from a breakdown in public order and morality; misery, anarchy and banditry were widespread. Indian uprisings occurred in Yucatán, Chiapas, Durango, Chihuahua, Nuevo León and Coahuila. Insurrections against the government of Juárez broke out in Tamaulipas, Puebla, Sinaloa, Jalisco, Guerrero; and conflicts between candidates for the government in Aguascalientes, Guanajuato and San Luis Potosi destroyed the public order. The causes of this breakdown in commonweal may be attributed to the long history of civil war in Mexico, the inadequacy of governmental institutions and lack of respect for a Constitution (1857) which incorporated many injustices within its Liberal framework. An important cause of recurring revolt was the presidential ambition of Juárez and his conflicts with Congress and the Supreme Court. His suspension of the Constitutional guarantees, by decree of January 17, 1870, and his dictatorial use of extraordinary powers brought much resentment; and, in the election of 1870, the Constitutional Party (Liberal) supported Porifirio Díaz against Juárez. Through a “reform” of the electoral law, Benito Juárez was able to gain a plurality. He was only exceeded in his autocratic use of power by his successor, Sebastián Lerdo de Tejada who vigorously enforced theReform Lawsthat made of the anti-Church program a Lerdistkulturkampf. It was during a year of Juárez' Administration that Brevet Major General William S. Rosecrans served as Envoy Extraordinary & Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States to Mexico. Officially he held this post from July 27, 1968 to June 26, 1869. The American Minister spoke bluntly in criticism of the Juárez Administration, and of Lerdo de Tejada who was then President of the Supreme Court, a position equivalent to the Vice-presidency.

From the Eighth Congress to the Ninth Congress

Any intelligent CCP cadre, when looking through the Party Constitution of the Eighth Congress [of the Chinese Communist Party (1956)] and making a close comparison with the Party Constitution of the Ninth Congress [1969], will no doubt be unable to avoid a shock of surprise and a sigh that "the present just isn't like the past." Some may say, "The Party is already dead!" And it is true, today's "Party" is not the same as yesterday's "Party," at least judging by the two Party constitutions. In the new Constitution, there is no "nation" [kuo-chia], nor is there any "people" [jen-min], and even "the working class" [kung-jen chieh-chi] has been replaced by the "proletariat" [wu-ch'an chieh-chi]. According to the Constitution of the Ninth Party Congress, Party members have only obligations, no rights; basic-level Party organizations have only responsibilities, no power. No longer is there collective leadership, and in some places there is only an oligarch, a dictator, a leader worshipped as an individual who is no longer among the masses, but who remains high above the masses. No longer is there supervision from below, but in some places only orders from above. "Inner-Party democracy" has been totally buried, and all that is left is centralism. The new Party Constitution not only concentrates political power in the hands of Mao [Tsetung] and Lin [Piao] but also attempts to guarantee that the group now in power will remain in power forever. Even if Mao and Lin were never to convene a national congress, lower-level Party organizations and Party members in general could do nothing about it!.

Political Parties in South Vietnam Under the Republic

T HE EMERGENCE OF POLITICAL PARTIES in the United States and Western Europe was intimately related to the development of representative government. As the franchise broadened in various Western countries in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, so did political parties grow as necessary agencies in the competitive efforts of political candidates to gather support from enlarging electorates. Moreover, the development of representative government appears to have been related to the existence of certain social and economic conditions, including urbanism, industrialism, a fairly high standard of living, and literacy.1 In Vietnam, as in Asia generally, the representative tradition has been largely absent. The selection of Vietnamese village chiefs by local populations, which extends from the fifteenth century, was probably done by cooptation, and the same is true of the election of village councils, introduced shortly before the arrival of the French in the middle of the nineteenth century and maintained by them. The French on their part introduced regional elective councils, but these bodies were dominated by them, were chosen by severely limited electorates, and had but restricted powers of consultation. As for the social requisites for representative government, it should be noted that Vietnam is a predominantly agricultural country, with a low standard of living and a high, though decreasing, rate of illiteracy. Thus, Vietnamese political parties developed under different circumstances and had different objectives from those in the West. They were essentially instruments for dealing with the foreign ruler. Some groups, like the Constitutional Party (active in the i920S and i930S), sought accommodation, limiting their demands to greater economic opportunity and political freedom for Vietnamese and some participation in the running of the country; but for most the goal was independence, and as moderation failed to achieve sufficient concessions from the French, extremist parties during the i920S and I930S steadily increased their strength. The only legal avenues to power were the elective councils, the most attractive of which were the Saigon Municipal Council and the Colonial Council of Cochin-china. While indigenous groups, including the Communists and Trotskyites, participated in elections to these

The Crisis of Politics and Government in France

The French elections of June 1951 and the serious difficulties experienced by the victorious constitutional parties in the formation of a government call attention once more to the problems of a parliamentary system in a multiparty state, and underline the urgency of a redefinition of the roles of parties and government within a constitutional democracy. These developments also draw attention to the basic constitutional problems which affect the political stability of France, and thereby weaken the Western community. With an occasional glance at parallel Italian developments, this article will first analyze the new electoral law and the election returns before proceeding to a discussion of the constitutional issues that contribute to the deepening crisis of the Fourth Republic.

The European Christian Democrats

CHRISTIAN Democracy1 is a comparatively new political force that has emerged from the chaos of World War II to challenge the old Liberal, Socialist, and Communist forces. Political parties in eight Western European states subcribe to its principles and attend its international conventions,2 as do exile committees from five dictator states3 and adherents from other countries, including Great Britain.4 In Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, and Italy Christian Democrats are the largest parliamentary party; in France they are second, and in Switzerland, third. The German Christian Democrats are a majority in the state legislatures of the western zones and in the Bizonal Government. A smaller group in Norway called the Christian People's Party, although unaffiliated with the others, is based on many of the same principles, and has increased in popularity since the war.5 The nucleus of all these organizations existed before the war, but the post-war Christian Democrat parties differ from their pre-war next-of-kin in several important respects. Made up for the most part of younger men who played prominent roles in the various resistance movements,6 the post-war parties are non-denominational7 and genuinely democratic. In collaboration with Socialists and other constitutional parties they are playing an important role in preserving law-limited government in Western Europe, in extending economic well-being, and in keeping the peace as part of the Atlantic community of nations. The Christian Democrat parties have, for the most part, a social and political heterogeneity which distinguishes them from the Liberal, Socialist, and Communist political groupings; they are the only political parties in continental Europe which are similar to major American parties, in that they cut across the great interest groupings of the population.8

The Japanese Privy Council

The growth of the democratic element in Japanese government has not been without effect on the Privy Council. In the early years of its history, the Council and the ministry were institutions serving the same classes and seeing eye to eye. This was true not only under the presidency of Ito, Oki, and Yamagata (1889-94), but also even during a considerable part of the period when party government was struggling for supremacy. In those days, political parties in the House of Representatives were balked by the bureaucrats, clansmen, and militarists entrenched in the administrative branch, while the seats in the Council were occupied by the great leaders of these controlling classes. But the doctrine of ministerial responsibility had begun to take root. In 1895, the Ito ministry abandoned the principle of executive independence of political parties and accepted an alliance with the Jiyuto, or Liberal party. In 1898, the Kenseito, or Constitutional party, under the leadership of Okuma and Itagaki, was given the opportunity of forming the first party cabinet in the history of Japan. Upon its fall, caused by internal dissension, the succeeding ministry under Yamagata (1898-1900) contained no party men, although the premier condescended to an alliance with the Kenseito. In 1900, Ito himself formed the Seiyukai, and brought the second party cabinet into office. But it was not until the first Kenseikai ministry, under Okuma and Kato (1914-16), and the fifth Seiyukai ministry under Hara (1918-21), that well-grounded ministerial parties controlled the lower house.

Greetings to the World from the New Liberal Constitutional Party in Mexico

Greetings to the World from the New Liberal Constitutional Party in Mexico

Admiral Manners

ADMIRAL RUSSELL HENRY MANNERS was born in London on the 31st of January, 1800, entered the Royal Naval College the 6th of May, 1813, and embarked March the 6th, 1816, as a volunteer on board the Minden, 74, Captain Paterson, in which, after assisting at the bombardment of Algiers, he proceeded to the East Indies, where he served under the flag of Sir Richard King, until nominated midshipman, the 1st of July, 1818, to the Orlando, 36, commanded by Captain John Clavell, with whom, in 1819, he returned to England on the Malabar, 74. After an intermediate employment on the Channel and West India stations in the Spartan and Pyramus frigates under Captains William Furlong Wise and Francis Newcombe, he became, the 29th of July, 1822, Acting Lieutenant of the Tyne, 26, Captain John Edward Walcot, to which vessel the Admiralty confirmed him the 19th of October following. In May 1823, he rejoined the Pyramus, still commanded by Captain Newcombe, under whom he continued until he obtained his promotion on the 16th of August, 1825. His last appointment was on the 21st of October, 1827, to the command of the Britomart, 10. The Britomart was first employed and intended for the Channel service under the order of the Commander-in-Chief, the Earl of Northesk, at Plymouth. She accompanied the squadron of ships escorting Don Miguel to Lisbon in the early part of 1828. In consequence of the revolution that followed in Portugal on Don Miguel declaring himself absolute, the Britomart was stationed at and off Oporto to watch the British interests there. The Constitutional party, failing to restore the Constitution against the usurped position of Don Miguel, the British Government withdrew her Minister from Lisbon, leaving the British interests in the hands of the Consul only, and Capt. Manners was selected to be in readiness to support him in case of need by keeping in sight of signals from Lisbon as long as the safety of the vessel permitted, but not to anchor within any Portuguese port unless absolutely necessary. This involved a long and vigilant cruising off and on the coast for about eight months, and through the whole of the winter. The only place communicated with during that time was Gibraltar, and then only to receive a supply of provisions and water from the dockyard. The yellow fever unfortunately breaking out at Gibraltar just before going there for this object, no communication could be had with the town, and the stay was confined to from twenty-four to forty-eight hours. The zeal and ability with which this service was carried out by Capt. Manners, as witnessed by Sir George Sartorius, there in command of the Portuguese Constitutional Squadron, and under whose orders in some degree the Britomart was placed, led to Capt Manners receiving his Post-rank on the 4th of March, 1829. He retired from active service in March 1849, became Rear-Admiral in July 1855, Vice-Admiral in April 1862, and Admiral in September 1865.