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Tung Pi-wu: A Political Profile

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

Extract

The counterpoint of radical change and durable continuity which has characterised the Communist upheaval in China is nowhere so marked as in the ambivalent attitudes towards youth and age. Traditional China was a backward-looking civilisation, espousing a view of life and of history which esteemed past over present, age over youth, authority over innovation. The twentieth century has seen a definite, often violent, conflict between the generations, with the revolt of 1911, the May Fourth movement, and the Northern Expedition each expressing an aspect of the upsurge of youthful aspiration. The emergence of a Communist government has been marked by a drastic change in the official attitude, a new preoccupation with the future rather than the past, and sustained attention to the organisation of the youth of China, from which group will come the national leaders of the generation ahead.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 1964

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References

1 Hsu T'e-li (b. 1876), Wu Yu-chang (b. 1878), Lin Po-ch'ü (1882–1960), Hsieh Chueh-tsai (b. 1883), and Tung Pi-wu.Google Scholar

2 Huang-an (yellow peace) has now been renamed Hung-an (red peace) by the Communists. It is probable that the district formed part of the Communist-controlled Hupeh-Honan-Anhwei border area of the 1930s and that the change in nomenclature has commemorative significance.Google Scholar

3 See Wales, Nym (Mrs. Helen F. Snow), Red Dust, Autobiographies of Chinese Communists (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1952), p. 36. Tung Pi-wu's version of his career to 1937 is given on pp. 3543.Google Scholar

4 Nym Wales, op. cit., p. 36.Google Scholar

5 For a recent version of the Wuchang uprising by a fellow-elder of the Chinese Communist Party, see Yu-chang, Wu, The Revolution of 1911 (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1962), pp. 117123.Google Scholar

6 Ying, Shih (18791943) was also a native of Hupeh; he later became a prominent Kuomintang official and served as mayor of Nanking from 1932 to 1935.Google Scholar

7 Delegates to the first Congress included:Google Scholar

From Peking: Chang Kuo-t'ao, Liu Jen-ching.Google Scholar

From Shanghai: Li Ta, Li Han-chun.Google Scholar

From Canton: Ch'en Kung-po.Google Scholar

From Wuhan: Tung Pi-wu, Ch'en T'an-ch'iu.Google Scholar

From Changsha: Mao Tse-tung, Ho Shu-heng.Google Scholar

From Tsinan: Wang Chin-mei, Teng En-ming.Google Scholar

Representing Chinese in Japan: Chou Fo-hai.Google Scholar

Wilbur, C. Martin (ed.), The Communist Movement in China, an Essay Written in 1924 by Ch'en Kung-po (New York: East Asian Institute of Columbia University, 09 1960)Google Scholar, provides a full discussion of data bearing upon the first Congress (pp. 14–29) and texts of the only documents apparently extant from that historic meeting. T'an-ch'iu, Ch'en (Ch'en Pan-tsu) has given an account in his “Reminiscences of the First Congress of the Communist Part of China,” Communist International (New York), XIII, 10 1936, pp. 13611366Google Scholar. Pi-wu's, Tung account, “The Main Problems of the First National Congress,” appeared in the Peking People's Daily (Jen-min Jih-pao) on 06 30, 1961, and was translated in Survey of China Mainland Press (Hong Kong: U.S. Consulate-General), No. 2545, 07 26, 1961, pp. 15.Google Scholar

8 Communists elected to the second Central Executive Committee of the Kuomintang in 01 1926 were: T'an P'ing-shan, Lin Po-ch'ü, Li Ta-chao, Yu Shu-te, Wu Yu-chang, Yang P'ao-an and Yun Tai-ying.Google Scholar

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11 Deciphered, this statement presumably means that Tung was elevated to full membership on the new Central Committee formed in 01 1935; as indicated above, he had been elected to alternate membership in 01 1934.Google Scholar

12 The Chinese delegation included: T. V. Soong (chairman), Wellington Koo, Wang Ch'ung-hui, Wei Tao-ming, Hu Shih, Wu Yi-fang, Li Huang, Carsun Chang, Tung Pi-wu and Hu Lin.Google Scholar

13 See dispatch by Atkinson, Mr., New York Times, 04 22, 1945.Google Scholar

14 Chang Han-fu is now Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs in Peking. Ch'en Chia-k'ang has been ambassador to the United Arab Republic since 06 1956, accredited concurrently to Yemen since 1958. I am indebted to Mr. Donald W. Klein for these identifications.Google Scholar

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17 The delegation included Chou En-lai, Tung Pi-wu, Wang Jo-fei, Yeh Chien-ying, Wu Yu-chang, Lu Ting-yi and Teng Ying-ch'ao.Google Scholar

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20 The Communist allegations were denied by T. F. Tsiang, then director of CNRRA in Shanghai.Google Scholar

21 It was usually stated that the convoys were not adequately marked, that combat pilots had mistaken them for legitimate military targets, and that steps had been taken to prevent recurrence of such incidents.Google Scholar

22 Specifically, this new government represented an amalgamation of two large administrative areas which had developed during the Japanese war (Shansi-Chahar-Hopei and Shansi-Hopei-Shantung-Honan), as well as adjacent Communist-controlled areas in nearby provinces. For details, see “The Evolution of the North China Region (1948–1952),” Current Background (Hong Hong: U.S. Consulate-General) No. 161, 02 20, 1952.Google Scholar

23 The régime in the north-east (Manchuria) was earlier, but the top organ of government there remained the North-East Administrative Committee until the late summer of 1949. At that time, for reasons that are still obscure, the regional régime at Mukden was raised in status to become the North-East People's Government. That change took place on 08 27, 1949, only a month before the establishment of the Central People's Government in Peking.Google Scholar

24 K'o Ch'ing-shih, now a member of the Political Bureau of the party and mayor of Shanghai, was mayor of Shih-chia-chuang in 1948.Google Scholar

25 On 02 25, the North-East Administrative Committee transferred the East Hopei (Chi-tung) area to the jurisdiction of the North China People's Government. After the establishment of the Central People's Government on 10 1, 1949, the Government Administration Council decided on 10 25 to place the North China area under the direct jurisdiction of the central government. The North China People's Government thus terminated operations at the end of that month, and its functions were taken over by the Government Administration Council on 11 1, 1949.Google Scholar

26 Four of the five Communist party elders (Lin Po-ch'ü, Tung Pi-wu, Wu Yu-chang and Hsu T'e-li) were included in this group, as was Cheng Wei-san who, along with Tung Pi-wu and Ch'en T'an-ch'iu, had been one of the early leaders in the Hupeh branch of the party during the 1920s. Hsieh Chueh-tsai, the fifth elder, was included in the group representing the social scientists, along with Ch'en Po-ta, Ch'en Shao-yu and Ai Ssu-ch'i.Google Scholar

27 See Chung-hua Jen-min Kung-ho-kuo K'ai-kuo Wen-hsien (Hong Kong: Hsin Min-chu, Ch'u-pan-she, 1949), pp. 241245.Google Scholar

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29 Pi-wu's, Tung 1956 report on legal work is given in Eighth National Congress of the Communist Party of China, II, Speeches (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1956), pp. 7997.Google Scholar

30 The top members of the eighth Central Committee, ranked according to the number of votes received in the 09 1956 election, were: Mao Tse-tung, Liu Shao-ch'i, Lin Po'ch'ü (died 05 1960), Teng Hsiao-p'ing, Chu Teh, Chou En-lai, Tung Pi-wu, Ch'en Yun, Lin Pao and Wu Yu-chang.Google Scholar

31 The Central Control Commission is subordinate to, not parallel with, the Central Committee of the Communist Party. The Communist system thus differs from that in the pre-1949 Kuomintang. The Kuomintang had two top organs, the Central Executive Committee (CEC) and the Central Supervisory Committee (CSC), which were theoretically at the same level. Under the Communist system, the Control Commission is inferior in rank and authority to the Central Committee, and is thus ostensibly intended to deal with cases involving middle- or lower-level party members.Google Scholar

32 In becoming a vice-chairman of the government, Tung Pi-wu relinquished the Supreme Court post to his fellow party-elder, Hsieh Chueh-tsai.Google Scholar

33 His reminiscences of the 1921 congress appeared in the Peking People's Daily on 06 30, 1961; see full citation given in footnote 7, above. His speech of 10 9, 1961, at the rally marking the fiftieth anniversary of the 1911 revolution is translated in Current Background, No. 667, 11 6, 1961, pp. 4–11.Google Scholar

34 Li Hsien-nien is from Huang-an (now Hung-an), Tung Pi-wu's native hsien. Lin Piao is a native of neighbouring Huang-kang hsien, seat of Huang-chou prefecture under the empire.Google Scholar

35 Cheng was a member of the presidium of the Eighth National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party in 09 1956, and was re-elected to membership on the Central Committee at that time.Google Scholar

36 Nym Wales, op. cit., p. 35.Google Scholar