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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of China, Japan and the U.S.A., by John Dewey
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: China, Japan and the U.S.A.
+       Present-Day Conditions in the Far East and Their Bearing
+       on the Washington Conference
+
+Author: John Dewey
+
+Release Date: October 25, 2009 [EBook #28393]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHINA, JAPAN AND THE U.S.A. ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Barbara Tozier, Bill Tozier and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+                    CHINA, JAPAN AND THE U. S. A.
+
+                        Present-day Conditions
+                           in the Far East
+                         and Their Bearing on
+                            the Washington
+                              Conference
+
+
+                                 _by_
+
+
+                              JOHN DEWEY
+
+                      Professor of Philosophy at
+                         Columbia University
+
+
+                     _New Republic Pamphlet No. 1_
+
+                           Published by the
+                    REPUBLIC PUBLISHING CO., INC.
+                     421 West Twenty-first Street
+                           _New York City_
+                                 1921
+
+
+
+
+                            Copyright 1921
+                     REPUBLIC PUBLISHING CO. INC.
+
+
+
+
+_Introductory Note_
+
+
+_The articles following are reprinted as they were written in spite of
+the fact that any picture of contemporary events is modified by
+subsequent increase of knowledge and by later events. In the main,
+however, the writer would still stand by what was said at the time. A
+few foot notes have been inserted where the text is likely to give
+rise to misapprehensions. The date of writing has been retained as a
+guide to the reader._
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+On Two Sides of the Eastern Seas
+
+
+It is three days' easy journey from Japan to China. It is doubtful
+whether anywhere in the world another journey of the same length
+brings with it such a complete change of political temper and belief.
+Certainly it is greater than the alteration perceived in journeying
+directly from San Francisco to Shanghai. The difference is not one in
+customs and modes of life; that goes without saying. It concerns the
+ideas, beliefs and alleged information current about one and the same
+fact: the status of Japan in the international world and especially
+its attitude toward China. One finds everywhere in Japan a feeling of
+uncertainty, hesitation, even of weakness. There is a subtle nervous
+tension in the atmosphere as of a country on the verge of change but
+not knowing where the change will take it. Liberalism is in the air,
+but genuine liberals are encompassed with all sorts of difficulties
+especially in combining their liberalism with the devotion to
+theocratic robes which the imperialist militarists who rule Japan have
+so skilfully thrown about the Throne and the Government. But what one
+senses in China from the first moment is the feeling of the
+all-pervading power of Japan which is working as surely as fate to its
+unhesitating conclusion--the domination of Chinese politics and
+industry by Japan with a view to its final absorption. It is not my
+object to analyze the realities of the situation or to inquire whether
+the universal feeling in China is a collective hallucination or is
+grounded in fact. The phenomenon is worthy of record on its own
+account. Even if it be merely psychological, it is a fact which must
+be reckoned with in both its Chinese and its Japanese aspects. In the
+first place, as to the differences in psychological atmosphere.
+Everybody who knows anything about Japan knows that it is the land of
+reserves and reticences. The half-informed American will tell you that
+this is put on for the misleading of foreigners. The informed know
+that it is an attitude shown to foreigners only because it is deeply
+engrained in the moral and social tradition of Japan; and that, if
+anything, the Japanese are more likely to be communicative--about many
+things at least--to a sympathetic foreigner, than to one another. The
+habit of reserve is so deeply embedded in all the etiquette,
+convention and daily ceremony of living, as well as in the ideals of
+strength of character, that only the Japanese who have subjected
+themselves to foreign influences escape it--and many of them revert.
+To put it mildly, the Japanese are not a loquacious people; they have
+the gift of doing rather than of gab.
+
+When accordingly a Japanese statesman or visiting diplomatist engages
+in unusually prolonged and frank discourse setting forth the aims and
+procedures of Japan, the student of politics who has been long in the
+East at once becomes alert, not to say suspicious. A recent
+illustration is so extreme that it will doubtless seem fantastic
+beyond belief. But the student at home will have to take these seeming
+fantasies seriously if he wishes to appreciate the present atmosphere
+of China. Cables have brought fragmentary reports of some addresses of
+Baron Goto in America. Doubtless in the American atmosphere these have
+the effect of reassuring America as to any improper ambitions on the
+part of Japan. In China, they were taken as announcements that Japan
+has about completed its plans for the absorption of China, and that
+the lucubration preliminary to operations of swallowing are about to
+begin. The reader is forgiven in advance any scepticism he feels about
+both the fact itself and the correctness of my report of the belief in
+the alleged fact. His scepticism will not surpass what I should feel
+in his place. But the suspicion aroused by such statements as this and
+the recent interview of Foreign Minister Uchida and Baron Ishii must
+be noted as evidences of the universal belief in China that Japan has
+one mode of diplomacy for the East and another for the West, and that
+what is said in the West must be read in reverse in the East.
+
+China, whatever else it is, is not the land of privacies. It is a
+proverb that nothing long remains secret in China. The Chinese talk
+more easily than they act--especially in politics. They are adepts in
+revealing their own shortcomings. They dissect their own weaknesses
+and failures with the most extraordinary reasonableness. One of the
+defects upon which they dwell is the love of finding substitutes for
+positive action, of avoiding entering upon a course of action which
+might be irrevocable. One almost wonders whether their power of
+self-criticism is not itself another of these substitutes. At all
+events, they are frank to the point of loquacity. Between the opposite
+camps there are always communications flowing. Among official enemies
+there are "sworn friends." In a land of perpetual compromise,
+etiquette as well as necessity demands that the ways for later
+accommodations be kept open. Consequently things which are spoken of
+only under the breath in Japan are shouted from the housetops in
+China. It would hardly be good taste in Japan to allude to the report
+that influential Chinese ministers are in constant receipt of Japanese
+funds and these corrupt officials are the agencies by which political
+and economic concessions were wrung from China while Europe and
+America were busy with the war. But in China nobody even takes the
+trouble to deny it or even to discuss it. What is psychologically most
+impressive is the fact that it is merely taken for granted. When it is
+spoken of, it is as one mentions the heat on an unusually hot day.
+
+In speaking of the feeling of weakness current in Japan about Japan
+itself, one must refer to the economic situation because of its
+obvious connection with the international situation. In the first
+place, there is the strong impression that Japan is over-extended.
+Even in normal times, Japan relies more upon production for foreign
+markets than is regarded in most countries as safe policy. And there
+is the belief that Japan _must_ do so, because only by large foreign
+sellings--large in comparison with the purchasing power of a people
+still having a low standard of life--can it purchase the raw
+materials--and even food--it has to have. But during the war, the
+dependence of manufacturing and trade at home upon the foreign market
+was greatly increased. The domestic increase of wealth, though very
+great, is still too much in the hands of the few to affect seriously
+the internal demand for goods. Item one, which awakens sympathy for
+Japan as being in a somewhat precarious situation.
+
+Another item concerns the labor situation. Japan seems to feel itself
+in a dilemma. If she passes even reasonably decent factory laws (or
+rather attempts their enforcement) and regulates child and women's
+labor, she will lose that advantage of cheap labor which she now
+counts on to offset her many disadvantages. On the other hand,
+strikes, labor difficulties, agitation for unions, etc., are
+constantly increasing, and the tension in the atmosphere is
+unmistakable. The rice riots are not often spoken of, but their memory
+persists, and the fact that they came very near to assuming a directly
+political aspect. Is there a race between fulfillment of the
+aspirations of the military clans who still hold the reins, and the
+growth of genuinely democratic forces which will forever terminate
+those aspirations? Certainly the defeat of Germany gave a blow to
+bureaucratic militarism in Japan which in time will go far. Will it
+have the time required to take effect on foreign policy? The hope that
+it will is a large factor in stimulating liberal sympathy for a Japan
+which is beginning to undergo the throes of transition.
+
+As for the direct international situation of Japan, the feeling in
+Japan is that of the threatening danger of isolation. Germany is gone;
+Russia is gone. While those facts simplify matters for Japan somewhat,
+there is also the belief that in taking away potential allies, they
+have weakened Japan in the general game of balance and counter-balance
+of power. Particularly does the removal of imperialistic Russia
+relieve the threat on India which was such a factor in the willingness
+of Great Britain to make the offensive-defensive alliance. The
+revelation of the militaristic possibilities of America is another
+serious factor. Certainly the new triple entente cordiale of Japan,
+Italy and France is no adequate substitute for a realignment of
+international forces in which a common understanding between Great
+Britain and America is a dominant factor. This factor explains, if it
+does not excuse, some of the querulousness and studied discourtesies
+with which the Japanese press for some months treated President
+Wilson, the United States in general and its relation to the League of
+Nations in particular, while it also throws light on the ardor with
+which the opportune question of racial discrimination was discussed.
+(The Chinese have an unfailing refuge in a sense of humor. It was
+interesting to note the delight with which they received the utterance
+of the Japanese Foreign Minister, after Japanese success at Paris,
+that "his attention had recently been called" to various press attacks
+on America which he much deprecated). In any case there is no
+mistaking the air of tension and nervous overstrain which now attends
+all discussion of Japanese foreign relations. In all directions, there
+are characteristic signs of hesitation, shaking of old beliefs and
+movement along new lines. Japan seems to be much in the same mood as
+that which it experienced in the early eighties before, toward the
+close of that decade, it crystallized its institutions through
+acceptance of the German constitution, militarism, educational system,
+and diplomatic methods. So that, once more, the observer gets the
+impression that substantially all of Japan's energy, abundant as that
+is, must be devoted to her urgent problems of readjustment.
+
+Come to China, and the difference is incredible. It almost seems as if
+one were living in a dream; or as if some new Alice had ventured
+behind an international looking-glass wherein everything is reversed.
+That we in America should have little idea of the state of things and
+the frame of mind in China is not astonishing--especially in view of
+the censorship and the distraction of attention of the last few years.
+But that Japan and China should be so geographically near, and yet
+every fact that concerns them appear in precisely opposite
+perspective, is an experience of a life time. Japanese liberalism?
+Yes, it is heard of, but only in connection with one form which the
+longing for the miraculous _deus ex machina_ takes. Perhaps a
+revolution in Japan may intervene to save China from the fate which
+now hangs over her. But there is no suggestion that anything less than
+a complete revolution will alter or even retard the course which is
+attributed to Japanese diplomacy working hand in hand with Japanese
+business interests and militarism. The collapse of Russia and Germany?
+These things only mean that Japan has in a few years fallen complete
+heir to Russian hopes, achievements and possessions in Manchuria and
+Outer Mongolia, and has had opportunities in Siberia thrown into her
+hands which she could hardly have hoped for in her most optimistic
+moments. And now Japan has, with the blessing of the great Powers at
+Paris, become also the heir of German concessions, intrigues and
+ambitions, with added concessions, wrung (or bought) from incompetent
+and corrupt officials by secret agreements when the world was busy
+with war. If all the great Powers are so afraid of Japan that they
+give way to her every wish, what is China that she can escape the doom
+prepared for her? That is the cry of helplessness going up all over
+China. And Japanese propagandists take advantage of the situation,
+pointing to the action of the Peace Conference as proof that the
+Allies care nothing for China, and that China must throw herself into
+the arms of Japan if she is to have any protection at all. In short,
+Japan stands ready as she stood ready in Korea to guarantee the
+integrity and independence of China. And the fear that the latter
+must, in spite of her animosity toward Japan, accept this fate in
+order to escape something worse swims in the sinister air. It is the
+exact counterpart of the feeling current among the liberals in Japan
+that Japan has alienated China permanently when a considerate and
+slower course might have united the two countries. If the economic
+straits of Japan are alluded to, it is only as a reason why Japan has
+hurried her diplomatic coercion, her corrupt and secret bargainings
+with Chinese traitors and her industrial invasion. While the western
+world supposes that the military and the industrial party in Japan
+have opposite ideas as to best methods of securing Japanese supremacy
+in the East, it is the universal opinion in China that they two are
+working in complete understanding with one another, and the
+differences that sometimes occur between the Foreign Office in Tokyo
+and the Ministry of War (which is extra-constitutional in its status)
+are staged for effect.
+
+These are some of the aspects of the most complete transformation
+scene that it has ever been the lot of the writer to experience. May
+it turn out to be only an extraordinary psychological experience! But
+in the interests of truth it must be recorded that every resident of
+China, Chinese or American, with whom I have talked in the last four
+weeks has volunteered the belief that all the seeds of a future great
+war are now deeply implanted in China. To avert such a calamity they
+look to the League of Nations or to some other force outside the
+immediate scene. Unfortunately the press of Japan treats every attempt
+to discuss the state of opinion in China or the state of facts as
+evidence that America, having tasted blood in the war, now has its
+eyes on Asia with the expectation later on of getting its hands on
+Asia. Consequently America is interested in trying to foster ill-will
+between China and Japan. If the pro-American Japanese do not enlighten
+their fellow-countrymen as to the facts, then America ought to return
+some of the propaganda that visits its shores. But every American who
+goes to Japan ought also to visit China--if only to complete his
+education.
+
+May, 1919.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+Shantung, As Seen From Within
+
+
+1.
+
+American apologists for that part of the Peace Treaty which relates to
+China have the advantage of the illusions of distance. Most of the
+arguments seem strange to anyone who lives in China even for a few
+months. He finds the Japanese on the spot using the old saying about
+territory consecrated by treasure spent and blood shed. He reads in
+Japanese papers and hears from moderately liberal Japanese that Japan
+must protect China, as well as Japan, against herself, against her own
+weak or corrupt government, by keeping control of Shantung to prevent
+China from again alienating that territory to some other power.
+
+The history of European aggression in China gives this argument great
+force among the Japanese, who for the most part know nothing more
+about what actually goes on in China than they used to know about
+Korean conditions. These considerations, together with the immense
+expectations raised among the Japanese during the war concerning their
+coming domination of the Far East and the unswerving demand of excited
+public opinion in Japan during the Versailles Conference for the
+settlement that actually resulted, give an ironic turn to the
+statement so often made that Japan may be trusted to carry out her
+promises. Yes, one is often tempted to say, that is precisely what
+China fears, that Japan will carry out her promises, for then China is
+doomed. To one who knows the history of foreign aggression in China,
+especially the technique of conquest by railway and finance, the irony
+of promising to keep economic rights while returning sovereignty lies
+so on the surface that it is hardly irony. China might as well be
+offered Kant's Critique of Pure Reason on a silver platter as be
+offered sovereignty under such conditions. The latter is equally
+metaphysical.
+
+A visit to Shantung and a short residence in its capital city, Tsinan,
+made the conclusions, which so far as I know every foreigner in China
+has arrived at, a living thing. It gave a vivid picture of the many
+and intimate ways in which economic and political rights are
+inextricably entangled together. It made one realize afresh that only
+a President who kept himself innocent of any knowledge of secret
+treaties during the war, could be naïve enough to believe that the
+promise to return complete sovereignty retaining _only_ economic
+rights is a satisfactory solution. It threw fresh light upon the
+contention that at most and at worst Japan had only taken over German
+rights, and that since we had acquiesced in the latter's arrogations
+we had no call to make a fuss about Japan. It revealed the hollowness
+of the claim that pro-Chinese propaganda had wilfully misled Americans
+into confusing the few hundred square miles around the port of
+Tsing-tao with the Province of Shantung with its thirty millions of
+Chinese population.
+
+As for the comparison of Germany and Japan one might suppose that the
+objects for which America nominally entered the war had made, in any
+case, a difference. But aside from this consideration, the Germans
+exclusively employed Chinese in the railway shops and for all the
+minor positions on the railway itself. The railway guards (the
+difference between police and soldiers is nominal in China) were all
+Chinese, the Germans merely training them. As soon as Japan invaded
+Shantung and took over the railway, Chinese workmen and Chinese
+military guards were at once dismissed and Japanese imported to take
+their places. Tsinan-fu, the inland terminus of the ex-German railway,
+is over two hundred miles from Tsing-tao. When the Japanese took over
+the German railway business office, they at once built barracks, and
+today there are several hundred soldiers still there--where Germany
+kept none. Since the armistice even, Japan has erected a powerful
+military wireless within the grounds of the garrison, against of
+course the unavailing protest of Chinese authorities. No foreigner can
+be found who will state that Germany used her ownership of port and
+railway to discriminate against other nations. No Chinese can be found
+who will claim that this ownership was used to force the Chinese out
+of business, or to extend German economic rights beyond those
+definitely assigned her by treaty. Common sense should also teach even
+the highest paid propagandist in America that there is, from the
+standpoint of China, an immense distinction between a national menace
+located half way around the globe, and one within two days' sail over
+an inland sea absolutely controlled by a foreign navy, especially as
+the remote nation has no other foothold and the nearby one already
+dominates additional territory of enormous strategic and economic
+value--namely, Manchuria.
+
+These facts bear upon the shadowy distinction between the Tsing-tao
+and the Shantung claim, as well as upon the solid distinction between
+German and Japanese occupancy. If there still seemed to be a thin wall
+between Japanese possession of the port of Tsing-tao and usurpation of
+Shantung, it was enough to stop off the train in Tsinan-fu to see the
+wall crumble. For the Japanese wireless and the barracks of the army
+of occupation are the first things that greet your eyes. Within a few
+hundred feet of the railway that connects Shanghai, via the important
+center of Tientsin, with the capital, Peking, you see Japanese
+soldiers on the nominally Chinese street, guarding their barracks.
+Then you learn that if you travel upon the ex-German railway towards
+Tsing-tao, you are ordered to show your passport as if you were
+entering a foreign country. And as you travel along the road
+(remembering that you are over two hundred miles from Tsing-tao) you
+find Japanese soldiers at every station, and several garrisons and
+barracks at important towns on the line. Then you realize that at the
+shortest possible notice, Japan could cut all communications between
+southern China (together with the rich Yangste region) and the
+capital, and with the aid of the Southern Manchurian Railway at the
+north of the capital, hold the entire coast and descend at its good
+pleasure upon Peking.
+
+You are then prepared to learn from eye-witnesses that when Japan made
+its Twenty-one Demands upon China, machine guns were actually in
+position at strategic points throughout Shantung, with trenches dug
+and sandbags placed. You know that the Japanese liberal spoke the
+truth, who told you, after a visit to China and his return to protest
+against the action of his government, that the Japanese already had
+such a military hold upon China that they could control the country
+within a week, after a minimum of fighting, if war should arise. You
+also realize the efficiency of official control of information and
+domestic propaganda as you recall that he also told you that these
+things were true at the time of his visit, under the Terauchi cabinet,
+but had been completely reversed by the present Hara ministry. For I
+have yet to find a single foreigner or Chinese who is conscious of any
+difference of policy, save as the end of the war has forced the
+necessity of caution, since other nations can now look China-wards as
+they could not during the war.
+
+An American can get an idea of the realities of the present situation
+if he imagines a foreign garrison and military wireless in Wilmington,
+with a railway from that point to a fortified sea-port controlled by
+the foreign power, at which the foreign nation can land, without
+resistance, troops as fast as they can be transported, and with bases
+of supply, munitions, food, uniforms, etc., already located at
+Wilmington, at the sea-port and several places along the line. Reverse
+the directions from south to north, and Wilmington will stand for
+Tsinan-fu, Shanghai for New York, Nanking for Philadelphia with Peking
+standing for the seat of government at Washington, and Tientsin for
+Baltimore. Suppose in addition that the Pennsylvania road is the sole
+means of communication between Washington and the chief commercial and
+industrial centers, and you have the framework of the Shantung picture
+as it presents itself daily to the inhabitants of China. Upon second
+thought, however, the parallel is not quite accurate. You have to add
+that the same foreign nation controls also all coast communications
+from, say, Raleigh southwards, with railway lines both to the nearby
+coast and to New Orleans. For (still reversing directions) this
+corresponds to the position of Imperial Japan in Manchuria with its
+railways to Dairen and through Korea to a port twelve hours sail from
+a great military center in Japan proper. These are not remote
+possibilities nor vague prognostications. They are accomplished facts.
+
+Yet the facts give _only_ the framework of the picture. What is
+actually going on within Shantung? One of the demands of the
+"postponed" group of the Twenty-one Demands was that Japan should
+supply military and police advisers to China. They are not so much
+postponed but that Japan enforced specific concessions from China
+during the war by diplomatic threats to reintroduce their discussion,
+or so postponed that Japanese advisers are not already installed in
+the police headquarters of the city of Tsinan, the capital city of
+Shantung of three hundred thousand population where the Provincial
+Assembly meets and all the Provincial officials reside. Within recent
+months the Japanese consul has taken a company of armed soldiers with
+him when he visited the Provincial Governor to make certain demands
+upon him, the visit being punctuated by an ostentatious surrounding of
+the Governor's yamen by these troops. Within the past few weeks, two
+hundred cavalry came to Tsinan and remained there while Japanese
+officials demanded of the Governor drastic measures to suppress the
+boycott, while it was threatened to send Japanese troops to police the
+foreign settlement if the demand was not heeded.
+
+A former consul was indiscreet enough to put into writing that if the
+Chinese Governor did not stop the boycott and the students' movement
+by force if need be, he would take matters into his own hands. The
+chief tangible charge he brought against the Chinese as a basis of his
+demand for "protection" was that Chinese store-keepers actually
+refused to accept Japanese money in payment for goods, not ordinary
+Japanese money at that, but the military notes with which, so as to
+save drain upon the bullion reserves, the army of occupation is paid.
+And all this, be it remembered, is more than two hundred miles from
+Tsing-tao and from eight to twelve months after the armistice. Today's
+paper reports a visit of Japanese to the Governor to inform him that
+unless he should prevent a private theatrical performance from being
+given in Tsinan by the students, they would send their own forces into
+the settlement to protect themselves. And the utmost they might need
+protection from, was that the students were to give some plays
+designed to foster the boycott!
+
+Japanese troops overran the Province before they made any serious
+attempt to capture Tsing-tao. It is only a slight exaggeration to say
+that they "took" the Chinese Tsinan before they took the German
+Tsing-tao. Propaganda in America has justified this act on the ground
+that a German railway to the rear of Japanese forces would have been a
+menace. As there were no troops but only legal and diplomatic papers
+with which to attack the Japanese, it is a fair inference that the
+"menace" was located in Versailles rather than in Shantung, and
+concerned the danger of Chinese control of their own territory.
+Chinese have been arrested by Japanese gendarmes in Tsinan and
+subjected to a torturing third degree of the kind that Korea has made
+sickeningly familiar. The Japanese claim that the injuries were
+received while the men were resisting arrest. Considering that there
+was no more legal ground for arrest than there would be if Japanese
+police arrested Americans in New York, almost anybody but the pacifist
+Chinese certainly would have resisted. But official hospital reports
+testify to bayonet wounds and the marks of flogging. In the interior
+where the Japanese had been disconcerted by the student propaganda
+they raided a High School, seized a school boy at random, and took him
+to a distant point and kept him locked up several days. When the
+Japanese consul at Tsinan was visited by Chinese officials in protest
+against these illegal arrests, the consul disclaimed all jurisdiction.
+The matter, he said, was wholly in the hands of the military
+authorities in Tsing-tao. His disclaimer was emphasized by the fact
+that some of the kidnapped Chinese were taken to Tsing-tao for
+"trial."
+
+The matter of economic rights in relation to political domination will
+be discussed later in this article. It is no pleasure for one with
+many warm friends in Japan, who has a great admiration for the
+Japanese people as distinct from the ruling military and bureaucratic
+class, to report such facts as have been stated. One might almost say,
+one might positively say from the standpoint of Japan itself, that the
+worst thing that can be charged against the policy of Japan in China
+for the last six years is its immeasurable stupidity. No nation has
+ever misjudged the national psychology of another people as Japan has
+that of China. The alienation of China is widespread, deep, bitter.
+Even the most pessimistic of the Chinese who think that China is to
+undergo a complete economic and political domination by Japan do not
+think it can last, even without outside intervention, more than half a
+century.
+
+Today, at the beginning of a new year, (1920) the boycott is much more
+complete and efficient than in the most tense days of last summer.
+Unfortunately, the Japanese policy seems to be under a truly Greek
+fate which drives it on. Concessions that would have produced a
+revulsion of feeling in favor of Japan a year ago will now merely
+salve the surface of the wound. What would have been welcomed even
+eight months ago would now be received with contempt. There is but one
+way in which Japan can now restore herself. It is nothing less than
+complete withdrawal from Shantung, with possibly a strictly commercial
+concession at Tsing-tao and a real, not a Manchurian, Open Door.
+
+According to the Japanese-owned newspapers published in Tsinan, the
+Japanese military commander in Tsing-tao recently made a speech to
+visiting journalists from Tokyo in which he said: "The suspicions of
+China cannot now be allayed merely by repeating that we have no
+territorial ambitions in China. We must attain complete economic
+domination of the Far East. But if Chino-Japanese relations do not
+improve, some third party will reap the benefit. Japanese residing in
+China incur the hatred of the Chinese. For they regard themselves as
+the proud citizens of a conquering country. When the Japanese go into
+partnership with the Chinese they manage in the greater number of
+cases to have the profits accrue to themselves. If friendship between
+China and Japan is to depend wholly upon the government it will come
+to nothing. Diplomatists, soldiers, merchants, journalists should
+repent the past. The change must be complete." But it will not be
+complete until the Japanese withdraw from Shantung leaving their
+nationals there upon the footing of other foreigners in China.
+
+
+2.
+
+In discussing the return to China by Japan of a metaphysical
+sovereignty while economic rights are retained, I shall not repeat the
+details of German treaty rights as to the railway and the mines. The
+reader is assumed to be familiar with those facts. The German seizure
+was outrageous. It was a flagrant case of Might making Right. As von
+Buelow cynically but frankly told the Reichstag, while Germany did not
+intend to partition China, she also did not intend to be the passenger
+left behind in the station when the train started. Germany had the
+excuse of prior European aggressions, and in turn her usurpation was
+the precedent for further foreign rape. If judgments are made on a
+comparative basis, Japan is entitled to all of the white-washing that
+can be derived from the provocations of European imperialistic powers,
+including those countries that in domestic policy are democratic. And
+every fairminded person will recognize that, leaving China out of the
+reckoning, Japan's proximity to China gives her aggressions the color
+of self-defence in a way that cannot be urged in behalf of any
+European power.
+
+It is possible to look at European aggressions in, say, Africa as
+incidents of a colonization movement. But no foreign policy in Asia
+can shelter itself behind any colonization plea. For continental Asia
+is, for practical purposes, India and China, representing two of the
+oldest civilizations of the globe and presenting two of its densest
+populations. If there is any such thing in truth as a philosophy of
+history with its own inner and inevitable logic, one may well shudder
+to think of what the closing acts of the drama of the intercourse of
+the West and East are to be. In any case, and with whatever comfort
+may be derived from the fact that the American continents have not
+taken part in the aggression and hence may act as a mediator to avert
+the final tragedy, residence in China forces upon one the realization
+that Asia is, after all, a large figure in the future reckoning of
+history. Asia is really here after all. It is not simply a symbol in
+western algebraic balances of trade. And in the future, so to speak,
+it is going to be even more here, with its awakened national
+consciousness of about half the population of the whole globe.
+
+Let the agreements of France and Great Britain made with Japan during
+the war stand for the measure of western consciousness of the reality
+of only a small part of Asia, a consciousness generated by the
+patriotism of Japan backed by its powerful army and navy. The same
+agreement measures western unconsciousness of the reality of that part
+of Asia which lies within the confines of China. An even better
+measure of western unconsciousness may be found perhaps in such a
+trifling incident as this:--An English friend long resident in
+Shantung told me of writing indignantly home concerning the British
+part in the Shantung settlement. The reply came, complacently stating
+that Japanese ships did so much in the war that the Allies could not
+properly refuse to recognize Japan's claims. The secret agreements
+themselves hardly speak as eloquently for the absence of China from
+the average western consciousness. In saying that China and Asia are
+to be enormously significant figures in future reckonings, the spectre
+of a military Yellow Peril is not meant nor even the more credible
+spectre of an industrial Yellow Peril. But Asia has come to
+consciousness, and her consciousness of herself will soon be such a
+massive and persistent thing that it will force itself upon the
+reluctant consciousness of the west, and lie heavily upon its
+conscience. And for this fact, China and the western world are
+indebted to Japan.
+
+These remarks are more relevant to a consideration of the relationship
+of economic and political rights in Shantung than they perhaps seem.
+For a moment's reflection will call to mind that all political foreign
+aggression in China has been carried out for commercial and financial
+ends, and usually upon some economic pretext. As to the immediate part
+played by Japan in bringing about a consciousness which will from the
+present time completely change the relations of the western powers to
+China, let one little story testify. Some representatives of an
+English missionary board were making a tour of inspection through
+China. They went into an interior town in Shantung. They were received
+with extraordinary cordiality by the entire population. Some time
+afterwards some of their accompanying friends returned to the village
+and were received with equally surprising coldness. It came out upon
+inquiry that the inhabitants had first been moved by the rumor that
+these people were sent by the British government to secure the removal
+of the Japanese. Later they were moved by indignation that they had
+been disappointed.
+
+It takes no forcing to see a symbol in this incident. Part of it
+stands for the almost incredible ignorance which has rendered China so
+impotent nationally speaking. The other part of it stands for the new
+spirit which has been aroused even among the common people in remote
+districts. Those who fear, or who pretend to fear, a new Boxer
+movement, or a definite general anti-foreign movement, are, I think,
+mistaken. The new consciousness goes much deeper. Foreign policies
+that fail to take it into account and that think that relations with
+China can be conducted upon the old basis will find this new
+consciousness obtruding in the most unexpected and perplexing ways.
+
+One might fairly say, still speaking comparatively, that it is part of
+the bad luck of Japan that her proximity to China, and the opportunity
+the war gave her to outdo the aggressions of European powers, have
+made her the first victim of this disconcerting change. Whatever the
+motives of the American Senators in completely disassociating the
+United States from the peace settlement as regards China, their action
+is a permanent asset to China, not only in respect to Japan but with
+respect to all Chinese foreign relations. Just before our visit to
+Tsinan, the Shantung Provincial Assembly had passed a resolution of
+thanks to the American Senate. More significant is the fact that they
+passed another resolution to be cabled to the English Parliament,
+calling attention to the action of the American Senate and inviting
+similar action. China in general and Shantung in particular feels the
+reinforcement of an external approval. With this duplication, its
+national consciousness has as it were solidified. Japan is simply the
+first object to be affected.
+
+The concrete working out of economic rights in Shantung will be
+illustrated by a single case which will have to stand as typical.
+Po-shan is an interior mining village. The mines were not part of the
+German booty; they were Chinese owned. The Germans, whatever their
+ulterior aims, had made no attempt at dispossessing the Chinese. The
+mines, however, are at the end of a branch line of the new Japanese
+owned railway--owned by the government, not by a private corporation,
+and guarded by Japanese soldiers. Of the forty mines, the Japanese
+have worked their way, in only four years, into all but four.
+Different methods are used. The simplest is, of course, discrimination
+in the use of the railway for shipping. Downright refusal to furnish
+cars while competitors who accepted Japanese partners got them, is one
+method. Another more elaborate method is to send but one car when a
+large number is asked for, and then when it is too late to use cars,
+send the whole number asked for or even more, and then charge a large
+sum for demurrage in spite of the fact the mine no longer wants them
+or has cancelled the order. Redress there is none.
+
+Tsinan has no special foreign concessions. It is, however, a "treaty
+port" where nationals of all friendly powers can do business. But
+Po-shan is not even a treaty port. Legally speaking no foreigners can
+lease land or carry on any business there. Yet the Japanese have
+forced a settlement as large in area as the entire foreign settlement
+in the much larger town of Tsinan. A Chinese refused to lease land
+where the Japanese wished to relocate their railway station. Nothing
+happened to him directly. But merchants could not get shipping space,
+or receive goods by rail. Some of them were beaten up by thugs. After
+a time, they used their influence with their compatriot to lease his
+land. Immediately the persecutions ceased. Not all the land has been
+secured by threats or coercion; some has been leased directly by
+Chinese moved by high prices, in spite of the absence of any legal
+sanction. In addition, the Japanese have obtained control of the
+electric light works and some pottery factories, etc.
+
+Now even admitting that this is typical of the methods by which the
+Japanese plant themselves, a natural American reaction would be to say
+that, after all, the country is built up industrially by these
+enterprises, and that though the rights of some individuals may have
+been violated, there is nothing to make a national, much less an
+international fuss about. More or less unconsciously we translate
+foreign incidents into terms of our own experience and environment,
+and thus miss the entire point. Since America was largely developed by
+foreign capital to our own economic benefit and without political
+encroachments, we lazily suppose some such separation of the economic
+and political to be possible in China. But it must be remembered that
+China is not an open country. Foreigners can lease land, carry on
+business, and manufacture only in accord with express treaty
+agreements. There are no such agreements in the cases typified by the
+Po-shan incident. We may profoundly disagree with the closed economic
+policy of China, or we may believe that under existing circumstances
+it represents the part of prudence for her. That makes no difference.
+_Given the frequent occurrence of such economic invasions, with the
+backing of soldiers of the Imperial Army, with the overt aid of the
+Imperial Railway, and with the refusal of Imperial officials to
+intervene, there is clear evidence of the attitude and intention of
+the Japanese government in Shantung._
+
+Because the population of Shantung is directly confronted with an
+immense amount of just such evidence, it cannot take seriously the
+professions of vague diplomatic utterances. What foreign nation is
+going to intervene to enforce Chinese rights in such a case as
+Po-shan? Which one is going effectively to call the attention of Japan
+to such evidences of its failure to carry out its promise? Yet the
+accumulation of precisely such seemingly petty incidents, and not any
+single dramatic great wrong, will secure Japan's economic and
+political domination of Shantung. It is for this reason that
+foreigners resident in Shantung, no matter in what part, say that they
+see no sign whatever that Japan is going to get out; that, on the
+contrary, everything points to a determination to consolidate her
+position. How long ago was the Portsmouth treaty signed, and what were
+its nominal pledges about evacuation of Manchurian territory?
+
+Not a month will pass without something happening which will give a
+pretext for delay, and for making the surrender of Shantung
+conditional upon this, that and the other thing. Meantime the
+penetration of Shantung by means of railway discrimination, railway
+military guards, continual nibblings here and there, will be going on.
+It would make the chapter too long to speak of the part played by
+manipulation of finance in achieving this process of attrition of
+sovereignty. Two incidents must suffice. During the war, Japanese
+traders with the connivance of their government gathered up immense
+amounts of copper cash from Shantung and shipped it to Japan against
+the protests of the Chinese government. What does sovereignty amount
+to when a country cannot control even its own currency system? In
+Manchuria the Japanese have forced the introduction of several hundred
+million dollars of paper currency, nominally, of course, based on a
+gold reserve. These notes are redeemable, however, only in Japan
+proper. And there is a law in Japan forbidding the exportation of
+gold. And there you are.
+
+Japan itself has recently afforded an object lesson in the actual
+connection of economic and political rights in China. It is so
+beautifully complete a demonstration that it was surely unconscious.
+Within the last two weeks, Mr. Obata, the Japanese minister in Peking,
+has waited upon the government with a memorandum saying that the
+Foochow incident was the culminating result of the boycott; that if
+the boycott continues, a series of such incidents is to be
+apprehended, saying that the situation has become "intolerable" for
+Japan, and disavowing all responsibility for further consequences
+unless the government makes a serious effort to stop the boycott.
+Japan then immediately makes certain specific demands. China must stop
+the circulation of handbills, the holding of meetings to urge the
+boycott, the destruction of Japanese goods that have become Chinese
+property--none have been destroyed that are Japanese owned. Volumes
+could not say more as to the real conception of Japan of the
+connection between the economic and the political relations of the two
+countries. Surely the pale ghost of "Sovereignty" smiled ironically as
+he read this official note. President Wilson after having made in the
+case of Shantung a sharp and complete separation of economic and
+political rights, also said that a nation boycotted is within sight of
+surrender. Disassociation of words from acts has gone so far in his
+case that he will hardly be able to see the meaning of Mr. Obata's
+communication. The American sense of humor and fair-play may however
+be counted upon to get its point.
+
+January, 1920.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+Hinterlands in China
+
+
+One of the two Presidents of China--it is unnecessary to specify
+which--recently stated that a renewal of the Anglo-Japanese alliance
+meant a partition of China. In this division, Japan would take the
+north and Great Britain the south. Probably the remark was not meant
+to be taken literally in the sense of formal conquest or annexation,
+but rather symbolically with reference to the tendency of policies and
+events. Even so, the statement will appear exaggerated or wild to
+persons outside of China, who either believe that the Open Door policy
+is now irrevocably established or that Japan is the only foreign Power
+which China has to fear. But a recent visit to the south revealed that
+in that section, especially in Canton, the British occupy much the
+same position of suspicion and dread which is held by the Japanese in
+the north.
+
+Upon the negative side, the Japanese menace is negligible in the
+province of Kwantung, in which Canton is situated. There are said to
+be more Americans in Canton than Japanese, and the American colony is
+not extensive. Upon the positive side the history of the Cassell
+collieries contract is instructive. It illustrates the cause of the
+popular attitude toward the British, and quite possibly explains the
+bitterness in the remark quoted. The contract is noteworthy from
+whatever standpoint it is viewed, whether that of time, of the
+conditions it contains or of the circumstances which accompany it.
+
+Premising that the contract delivers to a British company a monopoly
+of the rich coal deposits of the province for a period of ninety years
+and--quite incidentally of course--the right to use all means of
+transportation, water or rail, wharves and ports now in existence, and
+also to "construct, manage, superintend and work other roads, railways
+waterways as may be deemed advisable"--which reads like a monopoly of
+all further transportation facilities of the province--first take up
+the time of the making of the contract. It was drawn in April, 1920
+and confirmed a few months later. It was made, of course, with the
+authorities of the Kwantung province, subject to confirmation at
+Peking. During this period, Kwantung province was governed by military
+carpet-baggers from the neighboring province of Kwangsei, which was
+practically alone of the southern provinces allied with the northern
+government, then under the control of the Anfu party. It was matter of
+common knowledge that the people of Canton and of the province were
+bitterly hostile to this outside control and submitted to it only
+because of military coercion. Civil strife for the expulsion of the
+outsiders was already going on, continually gaining headway, and a few
+months later the Kwangsei troops were defeated and expelled from the
+province by the forces of General Chen, now the civil governor of
+Kwantung, who received a triumphal ovation upon his entrance into
+Canton. At this time the present native government was established, a
+change which made possible the return of Sun Yat Sen and his followers
+from their exile in Shanghai. It is evident, then, that the collieries
+contract giving away the natural resources of the people of the
+province, was knowingly made by a British company with a government
+which no more represented the people of the province than the military
+government of Germany represented the people of Belgium during the
+war.
+
+As to the terms of the contract, the statement that it gave the
+British company a monopoly of all the coal mines in the province, was
+not literally accurate. Verbally, twenty-two districts are enumerated.
+But these are the districts along the lines of the only railways in
+the province and the only ones soon to be built, including the as yet
+uncompleted Hankow-Canton railway. Possibly this fact accounts for the
+anxiety of the British partners in the Consortium that the completion
+of this line be the first undertaking financed by the Consortium. The
+document also includes what is perhaps a novelty in legal documents
+having such a momentous economic importance, namely, the words "etc."
+after the districts enumerated by name.
+
+For this concession, the British syndicate agreed to pay the
+provincial government the sum of $1,000,000 (silver of course). This
+million dollars is to bear six per cent interest to the company, and
+capital and interest are to be paid back to the company by the
+provincial government out of the dividends (if any) it is to receive.
+The nature of these "dividends" is set forth in an article which
+should receive the careful attention of promoters elsewhere as a model
+of the possibilities of exploiting contracts. The ten million capital
+is divided equally into "A" shares and "B" shares. The "A" shares go
+unreservedly to the directors of the company, and three millions of
+the "B" shares are to be allotted by the directors of the company at
+their discretion. The other two million are again divided into equal
+portions, one portion representing the sum advanced by the company to
+the province and to be paid back as just specified, while the other
+million--one-tenth of the capitalization--is to be a trust fund the
+dividends of which are to go for the "benefit of the poor people of
+the province" and for an educational fund for the province. But before
+any dividends are paid upon the "B" shares, eight per cent dividends
+are to be paid upon the "A" shares and a _dollar a ton royalty_ upon
+all coal mined. Those having any familiarity with the coal business
+with its usual royalty of about ten cents a ton can easily calculate
+the splendid prospects of the "poor people" and the schools, prospects
+which represent the total return to the provinces of a concession of
+untold worth. The contract also guarantees to the company the
+assistance of the provincial government in expropriating the owners of
+all coal mines which have been granted to other companies but not yet
+worked. These technical details make dry reading, but they throw light
+upon the spirit with which the British company undertook its predatory
+negotiations with a government renounced by the people it professed to
+govern. In comparison with the relatively crude methods of Japan in
+Shantung, they show the advantages of wide business experience.
+
+As for the circumstances and context which give added menace to the
+contract, the following facts are significant. Hong Kong, a British
+crown colony, lies directly opposite the river upon which Canton is
+situated. It is the port of export and import for the vast districts
+served by the mines and railways of the province. It is unnecessary to
+point out the hold upon all economic development which is given
+through a monopolistic control of coal. It is hardly too much to say
+that the enforcement of the contract would enable British interests in
+Hong Kong to control the entire industrial development of the most
+flourishing of the provinces of China. It would be a comparatively
+easy and inexpensive matter to provide the main land with a first
+class modern harbor and port near Canton. But such a port would tend
+to reduce the assets of Hong Kong to the possession of the most
+beautiful scenery in the world. There is already fear that a new
+harbor will be built. Many persons think that the concession of
+building such railways etc., "as are deemed advisable for the purpose
+of the business of the company and to improve those now existing" is
+the object of the contract, even more than the coal monopoly. For the
+British already own a considerable part of the mainland, including
+part of the railway connecting the littoral with Canton. By building a
+cross-cut from the British owned portion of this railway to the
+Hankow-Canton line, the latter would become virtually the Hankow-Hong
+Kong line, and Canton would be a way-station. With the advantages thus
+secured, the project for building a new port could be indefinitely
+blocked.
+
+During the period in which the contract was being secured, a congress
+of British Chambers of Commerce was held in Shanghai. Resolutions were
+passed in favor of abolishing henceforth the whole principle of
+special nationalistic concessions, and of cooperating with the Chinese
+for the upbuilding of China. At the close of the meeting the Chairman
+announced that a new era for China had finally dawned. All of the
+British newspapers in China lauded the wise action of the Chambers. At
+the same time, Mr. Lamont was in Peking, and was setting forth that
+the object of the Consortium was the abolition of further concessions,
+and the uniting of the financial resources of the banks in the
+Consortium for the economic development of China itself. By an
+ironical coincidence, the Hong Kong-Shanghai Bank, which is the
+financial power behind the contract and the new company, is the
+leading British partner in the Consortium. It is difficult to see how
+the British can henceforth accuse the Japanese of bad faith if any of
+the banking interests of that country should enter upon independent
+negotiations with any government in China.
+
+By the time the scene of action was transferred to Peking in order to
+secure the confirmation of the central government, the Anfu regime was
+no more, and as yet no confirmation has been secured. The new
+government at Canton has declined to recognize the contract as having
+any validity. An official of the Hong Kong government has told an
+official of the Canton government that the Hong Kong government stands
+behind the enforcement of the contract, and that Kwantung province is
+a British Hinterland. Within the last few weeks the Governor of Hong
+Kong and a leading Chinese banker of Hong Kong who is a British
+subject have visited Peking. Rumors were rife in the south as to the
+object of the visit. British sources published the report that one
+object was to return Weihaiwei to China--in case Peking agreed to turn
+over more of the Kwantung mainland to Hong Kong as a quid pro quo.
+Chinese opinion in the south was that one main object was to secure
+the Peking confirmation of the Cassell contract, in which case
+$900,000 more would be forthcoming, $100,000 having been paid down
+when the contract was signed with the provincial government. Peking
+does not recognize the present Canton government but regards it as an
+outlaw. The crowd that signed the contract is still in control of the
+neighboring province of Kwangsei and they are relied upon by the north
+to effect the military subjugation of the seceded province. Fighting
+has already, indeed, begun, but the Kwangsei militarists are badly in
+need of money; if Peking ratifies the contract, a large part of the
+funds will be paid over to them--all that isn't lost by the wayside to
+the northern militarists.[1] Meantime British news agencies keep up a
+constant circulation of reports tending to discredit the Kwantung
+government, although all impartial observers on the spot regard it as
+altogether the most promising one in China.
+
+    [1] Since the text was written, the newspapers have stated
+        that the Peking Government has officially refused to
+        validate the agreement.
+
+These considerations not only throw light on some of the difficulties
+of the functioning of the Consortium, but they give an indispensable
+background for judging the actual effect of the renewal of the
+Anglo-Japanese alliance. By force of circumstances each government,
+even against its own wish, will be compelled to wink at the predatory
+policies of the other; and the tendency will be to create a division
+of spheres of influence between the north and south in order to avoid
+more direct conflicts. The English liberals who stand for the renewal
+of the alliance on the ground that it will enable England to exercise
+a check on Japanese policies, are more naïve than was Mr. Wilson with
+his belief in the separation of the economic and political control of
+Shantung.
+
+It cannot be too often repeated that the real point of friction
+between the United States and Japan is not in California but in China.
+It is silly--unless it is calculated--for English authorities to keep
+repeating that under no circumstances does the alliance mean that
+Great Britain would support Japan in a war with the United States. The
+day the alliance is renewed, the hands of the militarists in Japan
+will be strengthened and the hands of the liberals--already weak
+enough--be still further weakened. In consequence, all the sources of
+friction in China between the United States and Japan will be
+intensified. I do not believe in the predicted war. But should it
+come, the first act of Japan--so everyone in China believes--will be
+to seize the ports of northern China and its railways in order to make
+sure of an uninterrupted supply of food and raw materials. The act
+would be justified as necessary to national existence. Great Britain
+in alliance with Japan would be in no position to protest in anything
+but the most perfunctory way. The guarantee of such abstinence would
+be for Japan the next best thing to open naval and financial support.
+Without the guarantee they would not dare the seizure of Chinese
+ports. In recent years diplomatists have shown themselves capable of
+unlimited stupidity. But it is not possible that the men in the
+British Foreign Office are not aware of these elementary facts. If
+they renew the alliance they knowingly take the responsibility for the
+consequences.
+
+May 24, 1921.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+A Political Upheaval in China
+
+
+Even in America we have heard of one Chinese revolution, that which
+thrust the Manchu dynasty from the throne. The visitor in China gets
+used to casual references to the second revolution, that which
+frustrated Yuan Shi Kai's aspirations to be emperor, and the third,
+the defeat in 1917 of the abortive attempt to put the Manchu boy
+emperor back into power. And within the last few weeks the (September
+1920) fourth upheaval has taken place. It may not be dignified by the
+name of the fourth revolution, for the head of the state has not been
+changed by it. But as a manifestation of the forces that shape Chinese
+political events, for evil and for good, perhaps this last disturbance
+surpasses the last two "revolutions" in significance.
+
+Chinese politics in detail are highly complicated, a mess of
+personalities and factions whose oscillations no one can follow who
+does not know a multitude of personal, family and provincial
+histories. But occasionally something happens which simplifies the
+tangle. Definite outlines frame themselves out of the swirling
+criss-cross of strife, intrigue and ambition. So, at present, the
+complete collapse of the Anfu clique which owned the central
+government for two years marks the end of that union of internal
+militarism and Japanese foreign influence which was, for China, the
+most marked fruit of the war. When China entered the war a "War
+Participation" army was formed. It never participated; probably it was
+never meant to. But its formation threw power wholly into the hands of
+the military clique, as against the civilian constitutionalists. And
+in return for concessions, secret agreements relating to Manchuria,
+Shantung, new railways, etc., Japan supplied money, munitions,
+instructors for the army and a benevolent supervision of foreign and
+domestic politics. The war came to an unexpected and untimely end, but
+by this time the offspring of the marriage of the militarism of Yuan
+Shi Kai and Japanese money and influence was a lusty youth. Bolshevism
+was induced to take the place of Germany as a menace requiring the
+keeping up of the army, and loans and teachers. Mongolia was persuaded
+to cut her strenuous ties with Russia, to renounce her independence
+and come again under Chinese sovereignty.
+
+The army and its Japanese support and instruction was, accordingly,
+continued. In place of the "War Participation" army appeared the
+"Frontier Defense" army. Marshal Tuan, the head of the military party,
+remained the nominal political power behind the presidential chair,
+and General Hsu (commonly known as little Hsu, in distinction from old
+Hsu, the president) was the energetic manager of the Mongolian
+adventure which, by a happy coincidence, required a bank, land
+development companies and railway schemes, as well as an army. About
+this military centre as a nucleus gathered the vultures who fed on the
+carrion. This flock took the name of the Anfu Club. It did not control
+the entire cabinet, but to it belonged the Minister of Justice, who
+manipulated the police and the courts, persecuted the students,
+suppressed liberal journals and imprisoned inconvenient critics. And
+the Club owned the ministers of finance and communications, the two
+cabinet places that dispense revenues, give out jobs and make loans.
+It also regulated the distribution of intelligence by mail and
+telegraph. The reign of corruption and despotic inefficiency, tempered
+only by the student revolt, set in. In two years the Anfu Club got
+away with two hundred millions of public funds directly, to say
+nothing of what was wasted by incompetency and upon the army. The
+Allies had set out to get China into the war. They succeeded in
+getting Japan into control of Peking and getting China, politically
+speaking, into a seemingly hopeless state of corruption and confusion.
+
+The militaristic or Pei-Yang party was, however, divided into two
+factions, each called after a province. The Anwhei party gathered
+about little Hsu and was almost identical with the Anfus. The Chili
+faction had been obliged, so far as Peking was concerned, to content
+itself with such leavings as the Anfu Club tossed to it. Apparently it
+was hopelessly weaker than its rival, although Tuan, who was
+personally honest and above financial scandal, was supported by both
+factions and was the head of both. About three months ago there were a
+few signs that, while the Anfu Club had been entrenching itself in
+Peking, the rival faction had been quietly establishing itself in the
+provinces. A league of Eight Tuchuns (military governors of the
+provinces) came to the assistance of the president against some
+unusually strong pressure from the Anfu Club. In spite of the fact
+that the military governor of the three Manchurian provinces, Chang
+Tso Lin, popularly known as the Emperor of Manchuria, lined up with
+this league, practically nobody expected anything except some
+manoeuvering to get a larger share of the spoils.
+
+But late in June the president invited Chang Tso Lin to Peking. The
+latter saw Tuan, told him that he was surrounded by evil advisers,
+demanded that he cut loose from little Hsu and the Anfu Club, and
+declared open war upon little Hsu--the two had long and notoriously
+been bitter enemies. Even then people had great difficulty in
+believing that anything would happen except another Chinese
+compromise. The president was known to be sympathetic upon the whole
+with the Chili faction, but the president, if not a typical Chinese,
+is at least typical of a certain kind of Chinese mandarin,
+non-resistant, compromising, conciliating, procrastinating, covering
+up, evading issues, face-saving. But finally something happened. A
+mandate was issued dismissing little Hsu from office, military and
+civil, dissolving the frontier defense corps as such, and bringing it
+under the control of the Ministry of War (usually armies in China
+belong to some general or Tuchun, not to the country). For almost
+forty-eight hours it was thought that Tuan had consented to sacrifice
+little Hsu and that the latter would submit at least temporarily. Then
+with equally sensational abruptness Tuan brought pressure to bear on
+the president. The latter was appointed head of a national defense
+army, and rewards were issued for the heads of the chiefs of the Chili
+faction, nothing, however, being said about Chang Tso Lin, who had
+meanwhile returned to Mukden and who still professed allegiance to
+Tuan. Troops were mobilized; there was a rush of officials and of the
+wealthy to the concessions of Tientsin and to the hotels of the
+legation quarter.
+
+This sketch is not meant as history, but simply as an indication of
+the forces at work. Hence it is enough to say that two weeks after
+Tuan and little Hsu had intimidated the president and proclaimed
+themselves the saviors of the Republic, they were in hiding, their
+enemies of the Chili party were in complete control of Peking, and
+rewards from fifty thousand dollars down were offered for the arrest
+of little Hsu, the ex-ministers of justice, finance and
+communications, and other leaders of the Anfu Club. The political
+turnover was as complete as it was sensational. The seemingly
+impregnable masters of China were impotent fugitives. The carefully
+built up Anfu Club, with its military, financial and foreign support,
+had crumbled and fallen. No country at any time has ever seen a
+political upheaval more sudden and more thoroughgoing. It was not so
+much a defeat as a dissolution like that of death, a total
+disappearance, an evaporation.
+
+Corruption had worked inward, as it has a way of doing.
+Japanese-bought munitions would not explode; quartermasters vanished
+with the funds with which stores were to be bought; troops went
+without anything to eat for two or three days; large numbers,
+including the larger part of one division, went over to the enemy en
+masse; those who did not desert had no heart for fighting and ran away
+or surrendered on the slightest provocation, saying they were willing
+to fight for their country but saw no reason why they should fight for
+a faction, especially a faction that had been selling the country to a
+foreign nation. In the manner of the defeat of the Anfu clique at the
+height of its supremacy, rather than in the mere fact of its defeat,
+lies the credit side of the Chinese political balance sheet. It is a
+striking exhibition of the oldest and best faith of the Chinese--the
+power of moral considerations. Public opinion, even that of the coolie
+on the street, was wholly against the Anfu party. It went down not so
+much because of the strength of the other side as because of its own
+rottenness.
+
+So far the results are to all appearances negative. The most marked is
+the disappearance of Japanese prestige. As one of the leading men in
+the War Office said: "For over a year now the people have been
+strongly opposed to the Japanese government on account of Shantung.
+But now even the generals do not care for Japan any more." It is
+hardly logical to take the easy collapse of the Japanese-supported
+Anfu party as a proof of the weakness of Japan, but prestige is always
+a matter of feeling rather than of logic. Many who were intimidated to
+the point of hypnotism by the idea of the irresistible power of Japan
+are now freely laughing at the inefficiency of Japanese leadership. It
+would not be safe to predict that Japan will not come back as a force
+to be reckoned with in the internal as well as external politics of
+China, but it is safe to say that never again will Japan figure as
+superman to China. And such a negation is after all a positive result.
+
+And so in its way is the overthrow of the Anwhei faction of the
+militarist party. The Chinese liberals do not feel very optimistic
+about the immediate outcome. They have mostly given up the idea that
+the country can be reformed by political means. They are sceptical
+about the possibility of reforming even politics until a new
+generation comes on the scene. They are now putting their faith in
+education and in social changes which will take some years to
+consummate themselves visibly. The self-styled southern republican
+constitutional party has not shown itself in much better light than
+the northern militarist party. In fact, its old leader Sun Yat Sen now
+cuts one of the most ridiculous figures in China, as shortly before
+this upheaval he had definitely aligned himself with Tuan and little
+Hsu.[2]
+
+    [2] This was written of course several months before Sun Yat
+        Sen was reinstated in control of Canton by the successful
+        revolt of his local adherents against the southern
+        militarists who had usurped power and driven out Sun Yat Sen
+        and his followers. But up to the time when I left China, in
+        July of this year, it was true that the liberals of northern
+        and central China who were bitterly opposed to the Peking
+        Government, did not look to the Southern Government with
+        much hope. The common attitude was a "plague upon both of
+        your houses" and a desire for a new start. The conflict
+        between North and South looms much larger in the United
+        States than it did in China.
+
+This does not mean, however, that democratic opinion thinks nothing
+has been gained. The demonstration of the inherent weakness of corrupt
+militarism will itself prevent the development of any militarism as
+complete as that of the Anfus. As one Chinese gentleman said to me:
+"When Yuan Shi Kai was overthrown, the tiger killed the lion. Now a
+snake has killed the tiger. No matter how vicious the snake may
+become, some smaller animal will be able to kill him, and his life
+will be shorter than that of either lion or tiger." In short, each
+successive upheaval brings nearer the day when civilian supremacy will
+be established. This result will be achieved partly because of the
+repeated demonstrations of the uncongeniality of military despotism to
+the Chinese spirit, and partly because with every passing year
+education will have done its work. Suppressed liberal papers are
+coming to life, while over twenty Anfu subsidized newspapers and two
+subsidized news agencies have gone out of being. The soldiers,
+including many officers in the Anwhei army, clearly show the effects
+of student propaganda. And it is worth while to note down the name of
+one of the leaders on the victorious side, the only one whose troops
+did any particular fighting, and that against great odds in numbers.
+The name is Wu Pei Fu. He at least has not fought for the Chili
+faction against the Anwhei faction. He has proclaimed from the first
+that he was fighting to rid the country of military control of civil
+government, and against traitors who would sell their country to
+foreigners. He has come out strongly for a new popular assembly, to
+form a new constitution and to unite the country. And although Chang
+Tso Lin has remarked that Wu Pei Fu as a military subordinate could
+not be expected to intervene in politics, he has not as yet found it
+convenient to oppose the demand for a popular assembly. Meanwhile the
+liberals are organizing their forces, hardly expecting to win a
+victory, but resolved, win or lose, to take advantage of the
+opportunity to carry further the education of the Chinese people in
+the meaning of democracy.
+
+August, 1920.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+Divided China
+
+
+1.
+
+In January 1920 the Peking government issued an edict proclaiming the
+unification of China. On May 5th Sun Yat Sen was formally inaugurated
+in Canton as president of all China. Thus China has within six months
+been twice unified, once from the northern standpoint and once from
+the southern. Each act of "unification" is in fact a symbol of the
+division of China, a division expressing differences of language,
+temperament, history, and political policy as well as of geography,
+persons and factions. This division has been one of the outstanding
+facts of Chinese history since the overthrow of the Manchus ten years
+ago and it has manifested itself in intermittent civil war. Yet there
+are two other statements which are equally true, although they flatly
+contradict each other and the one just made. One statement is that so
+far as the people of China are concerned there is no real division on
+geographical lines, but only the common division occurring everywhere
+between conservatives and progressives. The other is that instead of
+two divisions in China, there are at least five, two parties in both
+the north and south, and another in the central or Yangtse region,[3]
+each one of the five splitting up again more or less on factional and
+provincial lines. And so far as the future is concerned, probably this
+last statement is the most significant of the three. That all three
+statements are true is what makes Chinese politics so difficult to
+understand even in their larger features.
+
+    [3] Since the writing of this and the former chapter there
+        are some signs that Wu Pei Fu wants to set up in control of
+        the middle districts.
+
+By the good fortune of circumstances we were in Canton when the
+inauguration occurred. Peking and Canton are a long way apart in more
+than distance. There is little exchange of actual news between the two
+places; what filters through into either city and gets published
+consists mostly of rumors tending to discredit the other city. In
+Canton, the monarchy is constantly being restored in Peking; and in
+Peking, Canton is Bolshevized at least once a week, while every other
+week open war breaks out between the adherents of Sun Yat Sen, and
+General Chen Kwang Ming, the civil governor of the province. There is
+nothing to give the impression--even in circles which accept the
+Peking government only as an evil necessity--that the pretensions of
+Sun Yat Sen represent anything more than the desires of a small and
+discredited group to get some slight power for themselves at the
+expense of national unity. Even in Fukien, the province next north of
+Kwantung, one found little but gossip whose effect was to minimize the
+importance of the southern government. In foreign circles in the north
+as well as in liberal Chinese circles upon the whole, the feeling is
+general that bad as the de facto Peking government may be, it
+represents the cause of national unity, while the southern government
+represents a perpetuation of that division of China which makes her
+weak and which offers the standing invitation to foreign intrigue and
+aggression. Only occasionally during the last few months has some
+returned traveller timidly advanced the opinion that we had the "wrong
+dope" on the south, and that they were really trying "to do something
+down there."
+
+Consequently there was little preparation on my part for the spectacle
+afforded in Canton during the week of May 5th. This was the only
+demonstration I have seen in China during the last two years which
+gave any evidence of being a spontaneous popular movement. New Yorkers
+are accustomed to crowds, processions, street decorations and
+accompanying enthusiasm. I doubt if New York has ever seen a
+demonstration which surpassed that of Canton in size, noise, color or
+spontaneity--in spite of tropical rains. The country people flocked in
+in such masses, that, being unable to find accommodation even in the
+river boats, they kept up a parade all night. Guilds and localities
+which were not able to get a place in the regular procession organized
+minor ones on their own account on the day before and after the
+official demonstration. Making all possible allowance for the
+intensity of Cantonese local loyalty and the fact that they might be
+celebrating a Cantonese affair rather than a principle, the scene was
+sufficiently impressive to revise one's preconceived ideas and to make
+one try to find out what it is that gives the southern movement its
+vitality.
+
+A demonstration may be popular and still be superficial in
+significance. However one found foreigners on the ground--at least
+Americans--saying that in the last few months the men in power in
+Canton were the only officials in China who were actually doing
+something for the people instead of filling their own pockets and
+magnifying their personal power. Even the northern newspapers had not
+entirely omitted reference to the suppression of licensed gambling. On
+the spot one learned that this suppression was not only genuine and
+thorough, but that it meant a renunciation of an annual revenue of
+nearly ten million dollars on the part of a government whose chief
+difficulty is financial, and where--apart from motives of personal
+squeeze--it would have been easy to argue that at least temporarily
+the end justified the means in retaining this source of revenue.
+English papers throughout China have given much praise to the
+government of Hong Kong because it has cut down its opium revenue from
+eight to four millions annually with the plan for ultimate extinction.
+Yet Hong Kong is prosperous, it has not been touched by civil war, and
+it only needs revenue for ordinary civil purposes, not as a means of
+maintaining its existence in a crisis.
+
+Under the circumstances, the action of the southern government was
+hardly less than heroic. This renunciation is the most sensational act
+of the Canton government, but one soon learns that it is the
+accompaniment of a considerable number of constructive administrative
+undertakings. Among the most notable are attempts to reform the local
+magistracies throughout the province, the establishment of municipal
+government in Canton--something new in China where local officials are
+all centrally appointed and controlled--based upon the American
+Commission plan, and directed by graduates of schools of political
+science in the United States; plans for introducing local
+self-government throughout the province; a scheme for introduction of
+universal primary education in Canton to be completed in three steps.
+
+These reforms are provincial and local. They are part of a general
+movement against centralization and toward local autonomy which is
+gaining headway all over China, a protest against the appointment of
+officials from Peking and the management of local affairs in the
+interests of factions--and pocketbooks--whose chief interest in local
+affairs is what can be extracted in the way of profit. For the only
+analogue of provincial government in China at the present time is the
+carpet bag government of the south in the days following our civil
+war. These things explain the restiveness of the country, including
+central as well as southern provinces, under Peking domination. But
+they do not explain the setting up of a new national, or federal
+government, with the election of Mr. Sun Yat Sen as its president. To
+understand this event it is necessary to go back into history.
+
+In June, 1917, the parliament in Peking was about to adopt a
+constitution. The parliament was controlled by leaders of the old
+revolutionary party who had been at loggerheads with Yuan and with the
+executive generally. The latter accused them of being obstructionists,
+wasting time in discussing and theorizing when the country needed
+action. Japan had changed her tactics regarding the participation of
+China in the war, and having got her position established through the
+Twenty-one Demands, saw a way of controlling Chinese arsenals and
+virtually amalgamating the Chinese armies with her own through
+supervising China's entrance into the war. The British and French were
+pressing desperately for the same end. Parliament was slow to act, and
+Tang Shao Yi, Sun Yat Sen and other southern leaders were averse,
+since they regarded the war as none of China's business and were upon
+the whole more anti-British than anti-German--a fact which partly
+accounts for the share of British journals in the present press
+propaganda against the Canton government. But what brought matters to
+a head was the fact that the constitution which was about to be
+adopted eliminated the military governors or tuchuns of the provinces,
+and restored the supremacy of civil authority which had been destroyed
+by Yuan Shi Kai, in addition to introducing a policy of
+decentralization. Coached by members of the so-called progressive
+party which claimed to be constitutionalist and which had a
+factionalist interest in overthrowing the revolutionaries who
+controlled the legislative branch if not the executive, the military
+governors demanded that the president suspend parliament and dismiss
+the legislators. This demand was more than passively supported by all
+the Allied diplomats in Peking with the honorable exception of the
+American legation. The president weakly yielded and issued an edict
+dispelling parliament, virtually admitting in the document the
+illegality of his action. Less than a month afterwards he was a
+refugee in the Dutch legation on account of the farce of monarchical
+restoration staged by Chang Shun--who at the present time is again
+coming to the front in the north as adjutant to the plans of Chang Tso
+Lin, the present "strong man" of China. Later, elections were held and
+a new parliament elected. This parliament has been functioning as the
+legislature of China at Peking and elected the president, Hsu Shi
+Chang, the head of the government recognized by the foreign Powers--in
+short it is the Chinese government from an international standpoint,
+the Peking government from a domestic standpoint.
+
+The revolutionary members of the old parliament never recognized the
+legality of their dispersal, and consequently refused to admit the
+legal status of the new parliament, called by them the bogus
+parliament, and of the president elected by it, especially as the new
+legislative body was not elected according to the rules laid down by
+the constitution. Under the lead of some of the old members, the old
+parliament, called by its opponents the defunct parliament, has led an
+intermittent existence ever since. Claiming to be the sole authentic
+constitutional body of China, it finally elected Dr. Sun president of
+China and thus prepared the act of the fifth of May, already reported.
+
+Such is the technical and formal background of the present southern
+government. Its attack upon the legality of the Peking government is
+doubtless technically justified. But for various reasons its own
+positive status is open to equally grave doubts. The terms "bogus" and
+"defunct," so freely cast at each other, both seem to an outsider to
+be justified. It is less necessary to go into the reasons which appear
+to invalidate the position of the southern parliament because of the
+belated character of its final action. A protest which waits four
+years to assert itself in positive action is confronted not with legal
+technicalities but with accomplished facts. In my opinion, legality
+for legality, the southern government has a bare shade the better of
+the technical argument. But in the face of a government which has
+foreign recognition and which has maintained itself after a fashion
+for four years, a legal shadow is a precarious political basis. It is
+wiser to regard the southern government as a revolutionary government,
+which in addition to the prestige of continuing the revolutionary
+movement of ten years ago has also a considerable sentimental asset as
+a protest of constitutionalism against the military usurpations of the
+Peking government.
+
+It is an open secret that the southern movement has not received the
+undivided support of all the forces present in Canton which are
+opposed to the northern government. Tang Shao Yi, for example, was
+notable for his absence at the time of the inauguration, having found
+it convenient to visit the graves of his ancestors at that time. The
+provincial governor, General Chen Kwang Ming, was in favor of
+confining efforts to the establishment of provincial autonomy and the
+encouragement of similar movements in other provinces, looking forward
+to an eventual federal, or confederated, government of at least all
+the provinces south of the Yangtse. Many of his generals wanted to
+postpone action until Kwantung province had made a military alliance
+with the generals in the other southwestern provinces, so as to be
+able to resist the north should the latter undertake a military
+expedition. Others thought the technical legal argument for the new
+move was being overworked, and while having no objections to an out
+and out revolutionary movement against Peking, thought that the time
+for it had not yet come. They are counting on Chang Tso Lin's
+attempting a monarchical restoration and think that the popular
+revulsion against that move would create the opportune time for such a
+movement as has now been prematurely undertaken. However in spite of
+reports of open strife freely circulated by British and Peking
+government newspapers, most of the opposition elements are now loyally
+suppressing their opposition and supporting the government of Sun Yat
+Sen. A compromise has been arranged by which the federal government
+will confine its attention to foreign affairs, leaving provincial
+matters wholly in the hands of Governor Chen and his adherents. There
+is still room for friction however, especially as to the control of
+revenues, since at present there are hardly enough funds for one
+administration, let alone two.
+
+
+2.
+
+The members of the new southern government are strikingly different in
+type from those one meets elsewhere whether in Peking or the
+provincial capitals. The latter men are literally mediaeval when they
+are not late Roman Empire, though most of them have learned a little
+modern patter to hand out to foreigners. The former are educated men,
+not only in the school sense and in the sense that they have had some
+special training for their jobs, but in the sense that they think the
+ideas and speak the language current among progressive folk all over
+the world. They welcome inquiry and talk freely of their plans, hopes
+and fears. I had the opportunity of meeting all the men who are most
+influential in both the local and federal governments; these
+conversations did not take the form of interviews for publication, but
+I learned that there are at least three angles from which the total
+situation is viewed.
+
+Governor Chen has had no foreign education and speaks no English. He
+is distinctively Chinese in his training and outlook. He is a man of
+force, capable of drastic methods, straightforward intellectually and
+physically, of unquestioned integrity and of almost Spartan life in a
+country where official position is largely prized for the luxuries it
+makes possible. For example, practically alone among Chinese
+provincial officials of the first rank he has no concubines. Not only
+this, but he proposed to the provincial assembly a measure to
+disenfranchise all persons who have concubines. (The measure failed
+because it is said its passage would have deprived the majority of the
+assemblymen of their votes.) He is by all odds the most impressive of
+all the officials whom I have met in China. If I were to select a man
+likely to become a national figure of the first order in the future,
+it would be, unhesitatingly, Governor Chen. He can give and also
+command loyalty--a fact which in itself makes him almost unique.
+
+His views in gist are as follows: The problem of problems in China is
+that of real unification. Industry and education are held back because
+of lack of stability of government, and the better elements in society
+seclude themselves from all public effort. The question is how this
+unification is to be obtained. In the past it has been tried by force
+used by strong individuals. Yuan Shi Kai tried and failed; Feng Kuo
+Chang tried and failed; Tuan Chi Jui tried and failed. That method
+must be surrendered. China can be unified only by the people
+themselves, employing not force but the methods of normal political
+evolution. The only way to engage the people in the task is to
+decentralize the government. Futile efforts at centralization must be
+abandoned. Peking and Canton alike must allow the provinces the
+maximum of autonomy; the provincial capitals must give as much
+authority as possible to the districts, and the districts to the
+communities. Officials must be chosen by and from the local districts
+and everything must be done to encourage local initiative. Governor
+Chen's chief ambition is to introduce this system into Kwantung
+province. He believes that other provinces will follow as soon as the
+method has been demonstrated, and that national unity will then be a
+pyramid built out of the local blocks.
+
+With extreme self-government in administrative matters, Governor Chen
+will endeavor to enforce a policy of centralized economic control. He
+says in effect that the west has developed economic anarchy along with
+political control, with the result of capitalistic domination and
+class struggle. He wishes to avert this consequence in China by having
+government control from the first of all basic raw materials and all
+basic industries, mines, transportation, factories for cement, steel,
+etc. In this way the provincial authorities hope to secure an equable
+industrial development of the province, while at the same time
+procuring ample revenues without resorting to heavy taxation. Since
+almost all the other governors in China are using their power, in
+combination with the exploiting capitalists native and foreign, to
+monopolize the natural resources of their provinces for private
+profit, it is not surprising that Governor Chen's views are felt to be
+a menace to privilege and that he is advertised all over China as a
+devout Bolshevist. His views have special point in view of British
+efforts to get an economic stranglehold upon the province--efforts
+which are dealt with in a prior chapter.
+
+Another type of views lays chief stress upon the internal political
+condition of China. Its adherents say in effect: Why make such a fuss
+about having two governments for China, when, in point of fact, China
+is torn into dozens of governments? In the north, war is sure to break
+out sooner or later between Chang Tso Lin and his rivals. Each
+military governor is afraid of his division generals. The brigade
+generals intrigue against the division leaders, and even colonels are
+doing all they can to further their personal power. The Peking
+government is a stuffed sham, taking orders from the military
+governors of the provinces, living only on account of jealousies among
+these generals, and by the grace of foreign diplomatic support. It is
+actually bankrupt, and this actual state will soon be formally
+recognized. The thing for us to do is to go ahead, maintain in good
+faith the work of the revolution, give this province the best possible
+civil administration; then in the inevitable approaching débâcle, the
+southern government will be ready to serve as the nucleus of a genuine
+reconstruction. Meantime we want, if not the formal recognition of
+foreign governments, at least their benevolent neutrality.
+
+Dr. Sun still embodies in himself the spirit of the revolution of
+1911. So far as that was not anti-Manchu it was in essence
+nationalistic, and only accidentally republican. The day after the
+inauguration of Dr. Sun, a memorial was dedicated to the seventy-two
+patriot heroes who fell in an abortive attempt in Canton to throw off
+the Manchu yoke, some six months before the successful revolt. The
+monument is the most instructive single lesson which I have seen in
+the political history of the revolution. It is composed of seventy-two
+granite blocks. Upon each is engraved: Given by the Chinese National
+League of Jersey City, or Melbourne, or Mexico, or Liverpool, or
+Singapore, etc. Chinese nationalism is a product of Chinese migration
+to foreign countries; Chinese nationalism on foreign shores financed
+the revolution, and largely furnished its leaders and provided its
+organization. Sun Yat Sen was the incarnation of this nationalism,
+which was more concerned with freeing China--and Asia--from all
+foreign domination than with particular political problems. And in
+spite of the movement of events since that day, he remains essentially
+at that stage, being closer in spirit to the nationalists of the
+European irredentist type than to the spirit of contemporary young
+China. A convinced republican, he nevertheless measures events and men
+in the concrete by what he thinks they will do to promote the
+independence of China from foreign control, rather than by what they
+will do to promote a truly democratic government. This is the sole
+explanation that can be given for his unfortunate coquetting a year
+ago with the leaders of the now fallen Anfu Club. He allowed himself
+to be deceived into thinking that they were ready to turn against the
+Japanese if he would give them his support; and his nationalist
+imagination was inflamed by the grandiose schemes of little Hsu for
+the Chinese subjugation of Mongolia.
+
+More openly than others, Dr. Sun admits and justifies the new southern
+government as representing a division of China. If, he insists, it had
+not been for the secession of the south in 1917, Japan would now be in
+virtually complete control of all China. A unified China would have
+meant a China ready to be swallowed whole by Japan. The secession
+localized Japanese aggressions, made it evident that the south would
+fight rather than be devoured, and gave a breathing spell in which
+public opinion in the north rallied against the Twenty-one Demands and
+against the military pact with Japan. Thus it saved the independence
+of China. But, while it checked Japan, it did not checkmate her. She
+still expects with the assistance of Chang Tso Lin to make northern
+China her vassal. The support which foreign governments in general and
+the United States in particular are giving Peking is merely playing
+into the hands of the Japanese. The independent south affords the only
+obstacle which causes Japan to pause in her plan of making northern
+China in effect a Japanese province. A more than usually authentic
+rumor says that upon the occasion of the visit of the Japanese consul
+general to the new president (no other foreign official has made an
+official visit), the former offered from his government the official
+recognition of Dr. Sun as president of all China, if the latter would
+recognize the Twenty-one Demands as an accomplished fact. From the
+Japanese standpoint the offer was a safe one, as this acceptance of
+Japanese claims is the one thing impossible to the new government. But
+meantime the offer naturally confirms the nationalists of Dr. Sun's
+type in their belief that the southern split is the key to maintaining
+the political independence of China; or, as Dr. Sun puts it, that a
+divided China is for the time being the only means to an ultimately
+independent China.
+
+These views are not given as stating the whole truth of the situation.
+They are ex parte. But they are given as setting forth in good faith
+the conceptions of the leaders of the southern movement and as
+requiring serious attention if the situation of China, domestic and
+international, is to be understood. Upon my own account, and not
+simply as expressing the views of others, I have reached a conclusion
+quite foreign to my thought before I visited the south. While it is
+not possible to attach too much importance to the unity of China as a
+part of the foreign policy of the United States, it is possible to
+attach altogether too much importance to the Peking government as a
+symbol of that unity. To borrow and adapt the words of one southern
+leader, while the United States can hardly be expected to do other
+than recognize the Peking as the de facto government, there is no need
+to coddle that government and give it face. Such a course maintains a
+nominal and formal unity while in fact encouraging the military and
+corrupt forces that keep China divided and which make for foreign
+aggression.
+
+In my opinion as the outcome of two years' observation of the Chinese
+situation, the real interests of both China and the United States
+would be served if, in the first place, the United States should take
+the lead in securing from the diplomatic body in Peking the serving of
+express notice upon the Peking government that in no case would a
+restoration of the monarchy be recognized by the Powers. This may seem
+in America like an unwarranted intervention in the domestic affairs of
+a foreign country. But in fact such intervention is already a fact.
+The present government endures only in virtue of the support of
+foreign Powers. The notice would put an end to one kind of intrigue,
+one kind of rumor and suspicion, which is holding industry and
+education back and which is keeping China in a state of unrest and
+instability. It would establish a period of comparative quiet in which
+whatever constructive forces exist may come to the front. The second
+measure would be more extreme. The diplomacy of the United States
+should take the lead in making it clear that unless the promises about
+the disbanding of the army, and the introduction of general
+retrenchment are honestly and immediately carried out, the Powers will
+pursue a harsh rather than a benevolent policy toward the Peking
+government, insisting upon immediate payment of interest and loans as
+they fall due and holding up the government to the strictest meeting
+of all its obligations. The notification to be effective might well
+include a virtual threat of withdrawal of recognition in case the
+government does not seriously try to put its profuse promises into
+execution. It should also include a definite discouragement of any
+expenditures designed for military conquest of the south.
+
+Diplomatic recognition of the southern government is out of the
+question at present. It is not out of the question to put on the
+financial screws so that the southern government will be allowed space
+and time to demonstrate what it can do by peaceful means to give one
+or more provinces a decent, honest and progressive civil
+administration. It is unnecessary to enumerate the obstacles in the
+way of carrying out such a policy. But in my judgment it is the only
+policy by which the Great Powers will not become accomplices in
+perpetuating the weakness and division of China. It is the most
+straightforward way of meeting whatever plans of aggression Japan may
+entertain.
+
+May, 1921.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+Federalism in China
+
+
+The newcomer in China in observing and judging events usually makes
+the mistake of attaching too much significance to current happenings.
+Occurrences take place which in the western world would portend
+important changes--and nothing important results. It is not easy to
+loosen the habit of years; and so the visitor assumes that an event
+which is striking to the point of sensationalism must surely be part
+of a train of events having a definite trend; some deep-laid plan must
+be behind it. It takes a degree of intellectual patience added to time
+and experience to make one realize that even when there is a rhythm in
+events the tempo is so retarded that one must wait a long time to
+judge what is really going on. Most political events are like daily
+changes in the weather, fluctuations back and forth which may
+seriously affect individuals but which taken one by one tell little
+about the movement of the seasons. Even the occurrences which are due
+to human intention are usually sporadic and casual, and the observer
+errs by reading into them too much plot, too comprehensive a scheme,
+too farsighted a plan. The aim behind the event is likely to be only
+some immediate advantage, some direct increase of power, the overthrow
+of a rival, the grasping at greater wealth by an isolated act, without
+any consecutive or systematic looking ahead.
+
+Foreigners are not the only ones who have erred, however, in judging
+the Chinese political situation of the last few years. Beginning two
+years ago, one heard experienced Chinese with political affiliations
+saying that it was impossible for things to go on as they were for
+more than three months longer. Some decisive change must occur. Yet
+outwardly the situation has remained much the same not only for three
+months but for two years, the exception being the overthrow of the
+Anfu faction a year ago. And this occurrence hardly marked a definite
+turn in events, as it was, to a considerable extent, only a shifting
+of power from the hands of one set of tuchuns to another set.
+Nevertheless at the risk of becoming a victim of the fallacy which I
+have been setting forth, I will hazard the remark that the last few
+months _have_ revealed a definite and enduring trend--that through the
+diurnal fluctuations of the strife for personal power and wealth a
+seasonal political change in society is now showing itself. Certain
+lines of cleavage seem to show themselves, so that through the welter
+of striking, picturesque, sensational but meaningless events, a
+definite pattern is revealed.
+
+This pattern is indicated by the title of this chapter--a movement
+toward the development of a federal form of government. In calling the
+movement one toward federalism, there is, however, more of a jump into
+the remote future than circumstances justify. It would be more
+accurate, as well as more modest, to say that there is a well defined
+and seemingly permanent trend toward provincial autonomy and local
+self-government accompanied by a hope and a vague plan that in the
+future the more or less independent units will recombine into the
+United or Federated States of China. Some who look far into the future
+anticipate three stages; the first being the completion of the present
+secessionist movement; the second the formation of northern and
+southern confederations respectively; the third a reunion into a
+single state.
+
+To go into the detailed evidence for the existence of a definite and
+lasting movement of this sort would presume too much on the reader's
+knowledge of Chinese geography and his acquaintance with specific
+recent events. I shall confine myself to quite general features of the
+situation. The first feature is the new phase which has been assumed
+by the long historic antagonism of the north and the south. Roughly
+speaking, the revolution which established the republic and overthrew
+the Manchus represented a victory for the south. But the
+transformation during the last five years of the nominal republic into
+a corrupt oligarchy of satraps or military governors or feudal lords
+has represented a victory for the north. It is a significant fact,
+symbolically at least, that the most powerful remaining tuchun or
+military governor in China--in some respects the only powerful one who
+has survived the vicissitudes of the last few years--namely Chang Tso
+Lin, is the uncrowned king of the three Manchurian provinces. The
+so-called civil war of the north and south is not, however, to be
+understood as a conflict of republicanism located in the south and
+militarism in the north. Such a notion is directly contrary to facts.
+The "civil war" till six or eight months ago was mainly a conflict of
+military governors and factions, part of that struggle for personal
+power and wealth which has been going on all over China.
+
+But recently events have taken a different course. In four of the
+southern provinces, tuchuns who seemed all powerful have toppled over,
+and the provinces have proclaimed or tacitly assumed their
+independence of both the Peking and the former military Canton
+governments--the province in which Canton situated being one of the
+four. I happened to be in Hunan, the first of the southerly provinces
+to get comparative independence, last fall, not long after the
+overthrow of the vicious despot who had ruled the province with the
+aid of northern troops. For a week a series of meetings were held in
+Changsha, the capital of the province. The burden of every speech was
+"Hunan for the Hunanese." The slogan embodies the spirit of two powers
+each aiming at becoming the central authority; it is a conflict of the
+principle of provincial autonomy, represented by the politically more
+mature south, with that of militaristic centralization, represented by
+Peking.
+
+As I write, in early September (1921), the immediate issue is obscured
+by the fight which Wu Pei Fu is waging with the Hunanese who with
+nominal independence are in aim and interest allied with the south.
+If, as is likely, Wu Pei Fu wins, he may take one of two courses. He
+may use his added power to turn against Chang Tso Lin and the northern
+militarists which will bring him into virtual alliance with the
+southerners and establish him as the antagonist of the federal
+principle. This is the course which his earlier record would call for.
+Or he may yield to the usual official lust for power and money and try
+once more the Yuan Shi Kai policy of military centralization with
+himself as head, after trying out conclusions with Chang Tso Lin as
+his rival. This is the course which the past record of military
+leaders indicates. But even if Wu Pei Fu follows precedent and goes
+bad, he will only hasten his own final end. This is not prophecy. It
+is only a statement of what has uniformly happened in China just at
+the moment a military leader seemed to have complete power in his
+grasp. In other words, a victory for Wu Pei Fu may either accelerate
+or may retard the development of provincial autonomy according to the
+course he pursues. It cannot permanently prevent or deflect it.
+
+The basic factor that makes one sure that this trend toward local
+autonomy is a reality and not merely one of those meaningless
+shiftings of power which confuse the observer, is that it is in accord
+with Chinese temperament, tradition and circumstance. Feudalism is
+past and gone two thousand years ago, and at no period since has China
+possessed a working centralized government. The absolute empires which
+have come and gone in the last two millenniums existed by virtue of
+non-interference and a religious aura. The latter can never be
+restored; and every episode of the republic demonstrates that China
+with its vast and diversified territories, its population of between
+three hundred and fifty and four hundred million, its multitude of
+languages and lack of communications, its enormous local attachments
+sanctified by the family system and ancestral worship, cannot be
+managed from a single and remote centre. China rests upon a network of
+local and voluntary associations cemented by custom. This fact has
+given it its unparallelled stability and its power to progress even
+under the disturbed political conditions of the past ten years. I
+sometimes think that Americans with their own traditional contempt for
+politics and their spontaneous reliance upon self-help and local
+organization are the ones who are naturally fitted to understand
+China's course. The Japanese with their ingrained reliance upon the
+state have continually misjudged and misacted. The British understand
+better than we do the significance of local self-government; but they
+are misled by their reverence for politics so that they cannot readily
+find or see government when it does not take political form.
+
+It is not too much to say that one great cause for the overthrow of
+the Manchus was the fact that because of the pressure of international
+relations they attempted to force, especially in fiscal matters, a
+centralization upon the provinces wholly foreign to the spirit of the
+people. This created hostility where before there had been
+indifference. China may possibly not emerge from her troubles a
+unified nation, any more than a much smaller and less populous Europe
+emerged from the break-up of the Holy Roman Empire, a single state.
+Indeed one often wonders, not that China is divided, but that she is
+not much more broken up than she is. But one thing is certain.
+Whatever progress China finally succeeds in making will come from a
+variety of local centres, not from Peking or Canton. It will be
+effected by means of associations and organizations which even though
+they assume a political form are not primarily political in nature.
+
+Criticisms are passed, especially by foreigners, upon the present
+trend of events. The criticisms are more than plausible. It is evident
+that the present weakness of China is due to her divided condition.
+Hence it is natural to argue that the present movement being one of
+secession and general disintegration will increase the weakness of the
+country. It is also evident that many of China's troubles are due to
+the absence of any efficient administrative system; it is reasonable
+to argue that China cannot get even railways and universal education
+without a strong and stable central government. There is no doubt
+about the facts. It is not surprising that many friends of China
+deeply deplore the present tendency while some regard it as the final
+accomplishment of the long predicted breakup of China. But remedies
+for China's ills based upon ignoring history, psychology and actual
+conditions are so utopian that it is not worth while to argue whether
+or not they are theoretically desirable. The remedy of China's
+troubles by a strong, centralized government is on a par with curing
+disease by the expulsion of a devil. The evil of sectionalism is real,
+but since it is real it cannot be dealt with by trying a method which
+implies its non-existence. If the devil is really there, he will not
+be exorcized by a formula. If the trouble is internal, not due to an
+external demon, the disease can be cured only by using the factors of
+health and vigor which the patient already possesses. And in China
+while these factors of recuperation and growth are numerous, they all
+exist in connection with local organizations and voluntary
+associations. The increasing volume of the cry that the "tuchuns must
+go" comes from the provincial and local interests which have been
+insulted and violated by a nominally centralized but actually chaotic
+situation. After this negative work is completed, the constructive
+rebuilding of China can proceed only by utilizing local interests and
+abilities. In China the movement will be the opposite of that which
+occurred in Japan. It will be from the periphery to the centre.
+
+Another objection to the present tendency has force especially from
+the foreign standpoint. As already stated, the efforts of the Manchu
+dynasty in its latter days to enhance central power were due to
+international pressure. Foreign nations treated Peking as if it were a
+capital like London, Paris or Berlin, and in its efforts to meet
+foreign demands it had to try to become such a centre. The result was
+disaster. But foreign nations still want to have a single centre which
+may be held responsible. And subconsciously, if not consciously, this
+desire is responsible for much of the objection of foreign nationals
+to the local autonomy movement. They well know that it is going to
+take a long time to realize the ideal of federation, and meantime
+where and what is to be the agency responsible for diplomatic
+relations, the enforcing of indemnities and the securing of
+concessions?
+
+In one respect the secessionist tendency is dangerous to China herself
+as well as inconvenient to the powers. It will readily stimulate the
+desire and ability of foreign nations to interfere in China's domestic
+affairs. There will be many centres at which to carry on intrigues and
+from which to get concessions instead of one or two. There is also
+danger that one foreign nation may line up with one group of
+provinces, and another foreign nation with another group, so that
+international friction will increase. Even now some Japanese sources
+and even such an independent liberal paper as Robert Young's Japan
+Chronicle are starting or reporting the rumor that the Cantonese
+experiment is supported by subsidies supplied by American capitalists
+in the hope of economic concessions. The rumor was invented for a
+sinister purpose. But it illustrates the sort of situation that may
+come into existence if there are several political centres in China
+and one foreign nation backs one and another nation, another.
+
+The danger is real enough. But it cannot be dealt with by attempting
+the impossible--namely checking the movement toward local autonomy,
+even though disintegration may temporarily accompany it. The danger
+only emphasizes the fundamental fact of the whole Chinese situation;
+that its essence is time. The evils and troubles of China are real
+enough, and there is no blinking the fact that they are largely of her
+own making, due to corruption, inefficiency and absence of popular
+education. But no one who knows the common people doubts that they
+will win through if they are given time. And in the concrete this
+means that they be left politically alone to work out their own
+destiny. There will doubtless be proposals at the Pacific Conference
+to place China under some kind of international tutelage. This chapter
+and the events connected with the tendency which it reports will be
+cited as showing this need. Some of the schemes will spring from
+motives that are hostile to China. Some will be benevolently conceived
+in a desire to save China from herself and shorten her period of chaos
+and confusion. But the hope of the world's peace, as well as of
+China's freedom, lies in adhering to a policy of Hands Off. Give China
+a chance. Give her time. The danger lies in being in a hurry, in
+impatience, possibly in the desire of America to show that we are a
+power in international affairs and that we too have a positive foreign
+policy. And a benevolent policy of supporting China from without,
+instead of promoting her aspirations from within, may in the end do
+China about as much harm as a policy conceived in malevolence.
+
+July, 1921.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+A Parting of the Ways for America
+
+
+1
+
+The realities of American policy in China and toward China are going
+to be more seriously tested in the future than they ever have been in
+the past. Japanese papers have been full of protests against any
+attempt by the Pacific Conference to place Japan on trial. Would that
+American journals were full of warnings that America is on trial at
+the Conference as to the sincerity and intelligent goodwill behind her
+amiable professions. The world will not stop with the Pacific
+Conference; the latter, however important, will not arrest future
+developments, and the United States will continue to be on trial till
+she has established by her acts a permanent and definite attitude. For
+the realities of the situation cannot be exhausted in any formula or
+in any set of diplomatic agreements, even if the Conference confounds
+the fears of pessimists and results in a harmonious union of the
+powers in support of China's legitimate aspirations for free political
+and economic growth.
+
+The Conference, however, stands as a symbol of the larger situation;
+and its decisions or lack of them will be a considerable factor in the
+determination of subsequent events. Sometimes one is obliged to fall
+back on a trite phrase. We are genuinely at a parting of the ways.
+Even if we should follow in our old path, there would none the less be
+a parting of the ways, for we cannot consistently tread the old path
+unless we are animated by a much more conscious purpose and a more
+general and intelligent knowledge of affairs than have controlled our
+activities in the past.
+
+The ideas expressed by an English correspondent about the fear that
+America is soon to be an active source of danger in the Far East are
+not confined to persons on foreign shores. The prevailing attitude in
+some circles of American opinion is that called by President Hibben
+cynical pessimism. All professed radicals and many liberals believe
+that if our course has been better in the past it has been due to
+geographical accidents combined with indifference and with our
+undeveloped economic status. Consequently they believe that since we
+have now become what is called a world-power and a nation which
+exports instead of importing capital, our course will soon be as bad
+as that of any of the rest of them. In some quarters this opinion is
+clearly an emotional reaction following the disillusionments of
+Versailles. In others, it is due to adherence to a formula: nothing in
+international affairs can come out of capitalism and America is
+emphatically a capitalistic country. Whether or not these feelings are
+correct, they are not discussable; neither an emotion nor an absolute
+formula is subject to analysis.
+
+But there are specific elements in the situation which give grounds
+for apprehension as to the future. These specific elements are capable
+of detection and analysis. An adequate realization of their nature
+will be a large factor in preventing cynical apprehensions from
+becoming actual. This chapter is an attempt at a preliminary listing,
+inadequate, of course, as any preliminary examination must be. While
+an a priori argument based on a fatalistic formula as to how a
+"capitalistic nation" must conduct itself does not appeal to me, there
+are nevertheless concrete facts which are suggested by that formula.
+Part of our comparatively better course in China in the past is due to
+the fact that we have not had the continuous and close alliance
+between the State Department and big banking interests which is found
+in the case of foreign powers. No honest well-informed history of
+developments in China could be written in which the Russian Asiatic
+Bank, the Foreign Bank of Belgium, the French Indo-China Bank and
+Banque Industrielle, the Yokohama Specie Bank, the Hongkong-Shanghai
+Bank, etc., did not figure prominently. These banks work in the
+closest harmony, not only with railway and construction syndicates and
+big manufacturing interests at home, but also with their respective
+foreign offices. It is hardly too much to say that legations and banks
+have been in most important matters the right and left hands of the
+same body. American business interests have complained an the past
+that the American government does not give to American traders abroad
+the same support that the nationals of other states receive. In the
+past these complaints have centred largely about actual wrongs
+suffered or believed to have been suffered by American business
+undertakings carried on in a foreign country. With the present
+expansion of capital and of commerce, the same complaints and demands
+are going to be made not with reference to grievances suffered, but
+with reference to furthering, to pushing American commercial interests
+in connection with large banking groups. It would take a credulous
+person to deny the influence of big business in domestic politics. As
+we become more interested in commerce and banking enterprises what
+assurance have we that the alliance will not be transferred to
+international politics?
+
+It should be noted that the policy of the open door as affirmed by the
+great powers--and as frequently violated by them--even if it be
+henceforth observed in good faith, does not adequately protect us from
+this danger. The open door policy is not primarily a policy about
+China herself but rather about the policies of foreign powers toward
+one another with respect to China. It demands equality of economic
+opportunity for different nations. Were it enforced, it would prevent
+the granting of monopolies to any one nation: there is nothing in it
+to render impossible a conjoint exploitation of China by foreign
+powers, an organized monopoly in which each nation has its due share
+with respect to others. Such an organization might conceivably reduce
+friction among the great powers, and thereby reduce the danger of
+future wars--as long as China herself is impotent to go to war. The
+agreement might conceivably for a considerable time be of benefit to
+China herself. But it is clear that for the United States to become a
+partner in any such arrangement would involve a reversal of our
+historic policy in the Far East. It might be technically consistent
+with the open door policy, but it would be a violation of the larger
+sense in which the American people has understood and praised that
+ideal. He is blind who does not see that there are forces making for
+such a reversal. And since we are all more or less blind, an opening
+of our eyes to the danger is one of the conditions of its not being
+realized.
+
+One of the forces which is operative is indicated by the phrase that
+an international agreement on an economic and financial basis might be
+of value to China herself. The mere suggestion that such a thing is
+possible is abhorrent to many, especially to radicals. There seems to
+be something sinister in it. So it is worth explaining how and why it
+might be so. In the first place, it would obviously terminate the
+particularistic grabbing for "leased" territory, concessions and
+spheres of influence which has so damaged China. At the present time,
+the point of this remark lies in its implied reference to Japan, as at
+one time it might have applied to Russia. Fear of Japan's aims in
+China is not confined to China; the fear is widespread. An
+international economic arrangement may therefore be plausibly
+presented as the easiest and most direct method of relieving China of
+the Japanese menace. For Japan to stay out would be to give herself
+away; if she came in, it would subject Japanese activities to constant
+scrutiny and control. There is no doubt that part of the fear of Japan
+regarding the Pacific Conference is due to a belief that some such
+arrangement is contemplated. The case is easily capable of such
+presentation as to make it appeal to Americans who are really friendly
+to China and who haven't the remotest interest in her economic
+exploitation.
+
+The arrangement would, for example, automatically eliminate the
+Lansing-Ishii agreement with its embarrassing ambiguous recognition of
+Japan's _special_ interests in China.
+
+The other factor is domestic. The distraction and civil wars of China
+are commonplaces. So is the power exercised by the military governors
+and generals. The greater one's knowledge, the more one perceives how
+intimately the former evil is dependent upon the latter. The financial
+plight of the Chinese government, its continual foreign borrowings
+which threaten bankruptcy in the near future, depend upon militaristic
+domination and wild expenditure for unproductive purposes and squeeze.
+Without this expense, China would have no great difficulty henceforth
+in maintaining a balance in her budget. The retardation of public
+education whose advancement--especially in elementary schools--is
+China's greatest single need is due to the same cause. So is the
+growth in official corruption which is rapidly extending into business
+and private life.
+
+In fact, every one of the obstacles to the progress of China is
+connected with the rule of military factions and their struggles with
+one another for complete mastery. An economic international agreement
+among the great powers can be made which would surely reduce and
+possibly eliminate the greatest evils of "militarism." Many liberal
+Chinese say in private that they would be willing to have a temporary
+international receivership for government finance, provided they could
+be assured of its nature and the exact date and conditions of its
+termination--a proviso which they are sensible enough to recognize
+would be extremely difficult of attainment. American leadership in
+forming and executing any such scheme would, they feel, afford the
+best reassurance as to its nature and terms. Under such circumstances
+a plausible case can be made out for proposals which, under the guise
+of traditional American friendship for China, would in fact commit us
+to a reversal of our historic policy.
+
+There are radicals abroad and at home who think that our entrance into
+a Consortium already proves that we have entered upon the road of
+reversal and who naturally see in the Pacific Conference the next
+logical step. I have previously stated my own belief that our State
+Department proposed the Consortium primarily for political ends, as a
+means of checking the policy pursued by Japan of making unproductive
+loans to China in return for which she was getting an immediate grip
+on China's natural resources and preparing the way for direct
+administrative and financial control when the day of reckoning and
+foreclosure should finally come. I also said that the Consortium was
+between two stools, the financial and the political and that up to the
+present its chief value had been negative and preventive, and that
+jealousy or lack of interest by Japan and Great Britain in any
+constructive policy on the part of the Consortium was likely to
+maintain the same condition. I have seen no reason thus far to change
+my mind on this point, nor in regard to the further belief that
+probably the interests of China in the end will be best served by the
+continuation of this deterrent function. But the question is bound to
+arise: why continue the Consortium if it isn't doing anything? The
+pressure of foreign powers interested in the exploitation of China and
+of impatient American economic interests may combine to put an end to
+the present rather otiose existence led by the Consortium. The two
+stools between which the past action of the American government has
+managed to swing the Consortium may be united to form a single solid
+bench.
+
+At the risk of being charged with credulous gullibility, or something
+worse, I add that up to the present time the American phase of the
+Consortium hasn't shown perceptible signs of becoming a club exercised
+by American finance over China's economic integrity and independence.
+I believe the repeated statements of the American representative that
+he himself and the interests he represents would be glad if China
+proved her ability to finance her own public utilities without
+resorting to foreign loans. This belief is confirmed by the first
+public utterance of the new American minister to China who in his
+reference to the Consortium laid emphasis upon its deterrent function
+and upon the stimulation it has given to Chinese bankers to finance
+public utilities. And it is the merest justice to Mr. Stevens, the
+American representative, to say that he represents the conservative
+investment type of banker, not the "promotion" type, and that thus far
+his great concern has been the problem of protecting the buyer of such
+securities as are passed on by the banks to the ultimate investor--so
+much so that he has aroused criticism from American business interests
+impatient for speedy action. But there is a larger phase of the
+Consortium concerning which I think apprehensions may reasonably be
+entertained.
+
+Suppose, if merely by way of hypothesis, that the American government
+is genuinely interested in China and in making the policy of the open
+door and Chinese territorial and administrative integrity a reality,
+not merely a name, and suppose that it is interested in doing so from
+an American self-interest sufficiently enlightened to perceive that
+the political and economic advancement of the United States is best
+furthered by a policy which is identical with China's ability to
+develop herself freely and independently: what then would be the wise
+American course? In short, it would be to view our existing European
+interests and issues (due to the war) and our Far Eastern interests
+and issues as parts of one and the same problem. If we are actuated by
+the motive hypothetically imputed to our government and we fail in its
+realization, the chief reason will be that we regard the European
+question and the Asiatic problem as two different questions, or
+because we identify them from the wrong end.
+
+Our present financial interest in Europe is enormous. It involves not
+merely foreign governmental loans but a multitude of private advances
+and commitments. These financial entanglements affect not merely our
+industry and commerce but our politics. They involve much more
+immediately pressing concerns than to our Asiatic relations, and they
+involve billions where the latter involve millions. The danger under
+such conditions that our Asiatic relations will be sacrificed to our
+European is hardly fanciful.
+
+To make this abstract statement concrete, the firm of bankers, J. P.
+Morgan & Co., which is most heavily involved in European indebtedness
+to the United States, is the firm which is the leading spirit in the
+Consortium for China. It seems almost inevitable that the Asiatic
+problem should look like small potatoes in comparison with the
+European one, especially as our own industrial recuperation is so
+closely connected with European relations, while the Far East cuts a
+negligible figure. To my mind the real danger to set out upon selfish
+exploitation of China: intelligent self-interest, tradition and the
+fact that our chief asset in China is our past freedom from a
+predatory course, dictate a course of cooperation with China. The
+danger is that China will be subordinated and sacrificed because of
+primary preoccupation with the high finance and politics of Europe,
+that she will be lost in the shuffle.
+
+The European aspect of the problem can be made more concrete by
+reference to Great Britain in particular. That country suffers from
+the embarrassment of the Japanese alliance. She has already made it
+sufficiently clear that she would like to draw America into the
+alliance, making it tripartite, since that would be the easiest way of
+maintaining good relations with both Japan and the United States.
+There is no likelihood that any such step will be consummated. But
+British diplomacy is experienced and astute. And by force of
+circumstances our high finance has contracted a sort of economic
+alliance with Great Britain. There is no wish to claim superior virtue
+for America or to appeal to the strong current of anti-British
+sentiment. But the British foreign office exists and operates apart
+from the tradition of liberalism which has mainly actuated English
+domestic politics. It stands peculiarly for the _Empire_ side of the
+British Empire, no matter what party is in the saddle in domestic
+affairs. Every resource will be employed to bring about a settlement
+at the Pacific Conference which, even though it includes some degree
+of compromise on the part of Great Britain, will bend the Asiatic
+policy of the United States to the British traditions in the Far East,
+instead of committing Great Britain to combining with the United
+States in making a reality of the integrity of China to which both
+countries are nominally committed. It does not seem an extreme
+statement to say that the immediate issues of the Conference depend
+upon the way in which our financial commitments in Europe are treated,
+either as reasons for our making concessions to European policy or on
+the other hand as a means of securing an adherence of the European
+powers to the traditional American policy.
+
+A publicist in China who is of British origin and a sincere friend of
+China remarked in private conversation that if the United States could
+not secure the adherence of Great Britain to her Asiatic policy by
+persuasion (he was deploring the Japanese alliance) she might do so by
+buying it--through remission of her national debt to us. It is not
+necessary to resort to the measure so baldly suggested. But the remark
+at least suggests that our involvement in European, especially
+British, finance and politics may be treated in either of two ways for
+either of two results.
+
+
+2
+
+That the Chinese people generally speaking has a less antagonistic
+feeling toward the United States than towards other powers seems to me
+an undoubted fact. The feeling has been disturbed at divers times by
+the treatment of the Chinese upon the Pacific coast, by the exclusion
+act, by the turning over of our interest in the building of the
+Peking-Canton (or Hankow) railway to a European group, by the
+Lansing-Ishii agreement, and finally by the part played by President
+Wilson in the Versailles decision regarding Shantung. Those
+disturbances in the main, however, have made them dubious as to our
+skill, energy and intelligence rather than as to our good-will.
+Americans, taken individually and collectively, are to the Chinese--at
+least such was my impression--a rather simple folk, taking the word in
+its good and its deprecatory sense. In noting the Chinese reaction to
+the proposed Pacific Conference, it was interesting to see the
+combination of an almost unlimited hope that the United States was to
+lead in protecting them from further aggressions and in rectifying
+existing evils, with a lack of confidence, a fear that the United
+States would have something put over on it.
+
+Friendly feeling is of course mainly based upon a negative fact, the
+fact that the United States has taken no part in "leasing"
+territories, establishing spheres and setting up extra-national
+post-offices. On the positive side stands the contribution made by
+Americans to education, especially medical, and that of girls and
+women, and to philanthropy and relief. Politically, there are the
+early service of Burlinghame, the open door policy of John Hay (though
+failure to maintain it in fact while securing signatures to it on
+paper is a considerable part of the Chinese belief in our defective
+energy) and the part played by the United States in moderating the
+terms of the settlement of the Boxer outbreak, in addition to a
+considerable number of minor helpful acts. China also remembers that
+we were the only nation to take exception to the treaties embodying
+the Twenty-one Demands. While our exception was chiefly made on the
+basis of our own interests which these treaties might injuriously
+affect, a sentiment exists that the protest was a pledge of assistance
+to China when the time should be opportune for raising the whole
+question. And without doubt the reservation made on May 16, 1915, by
+our State Department is a strong card at the forthcoming Conference if
+the Department wishes to play it.
+
+From an American standpoint, the open door principle represents one of
+the only two established principles of American diplomacy, the other
+being, of course, the Monroe Doctrine. In connection with sentimental
+or idealistic associations which have clustered about it, it
+constitutes us in some vague fashion in both the Chinese and American
+public opinion a sort of guardian or at least spokesman of the
+interests of China in relation to foreign powers. Although, as was
+pointed out in a former chapter, the open door policy directly
+concerns other nations in their relation to China rather than China
+herself, yet the violation of the policy by other powers has been so
+frequent and so much to the detriment of China, that American
+interest, prestige and moral sentiment are now implicated in such an
+enforcement of it as will redound to the advantage of China.
+
+Citizens of other countries are often irritated by a suggestion of
+such a relationship between the United States and China. It presents
+itself as a proclamation of superior national virtue under cover of
+which the United States aims to establish its influence in China at
+the expense of other countries. The irritation is exasperated by the
+fact that the situation as it stands is an undoubted economic and
+political asset of the United States in China. We may concede without
+argument any contention that the situation is not due to any superior
+virtue but rather to contingencies of history and geography--in which
+respect it is not unlike many things that pass for virtues with
+individuals. The contention may be admitted without controversy
+because it is not pertinent to the main issue. The question is not so
+much how the state of affairs came about as what it now is, how it is
+to be treated and what consequences are in flow from it. It is a fact
+that up to the present an intelligent self-interest of America has
+coincided with the interests of a stable, independent and progressive
+China. It is also a fact that American traditions and sentiments have
+gathered about this consideration so that now there is widespread
+conviction in the American people of moral obligations of assistance
+and friendly protection owed by us to China. At present, no policy can
+be entered upon that does not bear the semblance of fairness and
+goodwill. We have at least so much protection against the dangers
+discussed in the prior chapter.
+
+Among Americans in China and presumably at home there is a strong
+feeling that we should adopt for the future stronger and more positive
+policies than we have maintained in the past. This feeling seems to me
+fraught with dangers unless we make very clear to ourselves in just
+what respects we are to continue and make good in a more positive
+manner our traditional policy. To some extent our past policy has been
+one of drifting. Radical change in this respect may go further than
+appears upon the surface in altering other fundamental aspects of our
+policy. What is condemned as drifting is in effect largely the same
+thing that is also praised as non-interference. A detailed settled
+policy, no matter how "constructive" it may appear to be, can hardly
+help involving us in the domestic policies of China, an affair of
+factions and a game which the Chinese understand and play much better
+than any foreigners. Such an involvement would at once lessen a
+present large asset in China, aloofness from internal intrigues and
+struggles.
+
+The specific protests of Chinese in this country--mainly
+Cantonese--against the Consortium seem to me mainly based on
+misapprehension. But their _general_ attitude of opposition
+nevertheless conveys an important lesson. It is based on a belief that
+the effect of the Consortium will be to give the Peking government a
+factitious advantage in the internal conflict which is waging in
+China, so that to all intents and purposes it will mark a taking of
+sides on our part. It is well remembered that the effect of the
+"reorganization" loan of the prior Consortium--in which the United
+States was _not_ a partner--was to give Yuan Shi Kai the funds which
+seated him and the militarist faction after him, firmly in the
+governmental saddle. Viewing the matter from a larger point of view
+than that of Canton vs. Peking, the most fundamental objection I heard
+brought by Chinese against the Consortium was in effect as follows:
+The republican revolution in China has still to be wrought out; the
+beginning of ten years ago has been arrested. It remains to fight it
+out. The inevitable effect of increased foreign financial and economic
+interest in China, even admitting that its industrial effect was
+advantageous to China, would be to create an interest in _stabilizing_
+China politically, which in effect would mean to sanctify the status
+quo, and prevent the development of a revolution which cannot be
+accomplished without internal disorders that would affect foreign
+investments unfavorably. These considerations are not mentioned for
+the sake of throwing light on the Consortium: they are cited as an
+illustration of the probability that a too positive and constructive
+development of our tradition of goodwill to China would involve us in
+an interference with Chinese domestic affairs injurious to China's
+welfare, to that free and independent development in which we profess
+such interest.
+
+But how, it will be asked, are we to protect China from foreign
+depredations, particularly those of Japan, how are we to change our
+nominal goodwill into a reality, if we do not enter much more positive
+and detailed policies? If there was in existence at the present time
+any such thing as a diplomacy of peoples as distinct from a diplomacy
+of governments, the question would mean something quite different from
+what it now means. As things now stand the people should profoundly
+distrust the _politicians'_ love for China. It is too frequently the
+reverse side of fear and incipient hatred of Japan, colored perhaps by
+anti-British feeling.
+
+There should be no disguising of the situation. The aggressive
+activities of other nations in China, centering but not exhausted at
+this time in Japan, are not merely sources of trouble to China but
+they are potential causes of trouble in our own international
+relationships. We are committed by our tradition and by the present
+actualities of the situation to attempting something positive for
+China as respects her international status, to live up to our
+responsibility is a most difficult and delicate matter. We have on the
+one side to avoid getting entangled in quasi-imperialistic European
+policies in Asia, whether under the guise of altruism, of putting
+ourselves in a position where we can exercise a more effective
+supervision of their behavior, or by means of economic expansion. On
+the other side, we have to avoid drifting into that kind of covert or
+avowed antagonism to European and Japanese imperialism which will only
+increase friction, encourage a combination especially of Great Britain
+and Japan---or of France and Japan--against us, and bring war
+appreciably nearer.
+
+We need to bear in mind that China will not be saved from outside
+herself. Even if by a successful war we should relieve China from
+Japanese encroachments, from all encroachments, China would not of
+necessity be brought nearer her legitimate goal of orderly and
+prosperous internal development. Apart from the question of how far
+war can now settle any fundamental issues without begetting others as
+dangerous, China of all countries is the one where settlement by
+force, especially by outside force, is least applicable, and most
+likely to be enormously disserviceable. China is used to taking time
+to deal with her problems: she can neither understand not profit by
+impatient methods of the western world which are profoundly alien to
+her genius. Moreover a civilization which is on a continental scale,
+which is so old that the rest of us are parvenus in comparison, which
+is thick and closely woven, cannot be hurried in its development
+without disaster. Transformation from within is its sole way out, and
+we can best help China by trying to see to it that she gets the time
+she needs in order to effect this transformation, whether or not we
+like the particular form it assumes at any particular time.
+
+A successful war in behalf of China would leave untouched her problems
+of education, of factional and sectional forces, of political
+immaturity showing itself in present incapacity for organization. It
+would affect her industrial growth undoubtedly, but in all human
+probability for the worse, increasing the likelihood that she would
+enter upon an industrialization which would repeat the worst evils of
+western industrial life, without the immunities, resistances and
+remedial measures which the West has evolved. The imagination cannot
+conceive a worse crime than fastening western industrialism upon China
+before she has developed within herself the meaning of coping with the
+forces which it would release. The danger is great enough as it is.
+War waged in China's behalf by western powers and western methods
+would make the danger practically irresistible. In addition we should
+gain a permanent interest in China which is likely to be of the most
+dangerous character to ourselves. If we were not committed by it to
+future imperialism, we should be luckier than we have any right to
+hope to be. These things are said against a mental protest to
+admitting even by implication the prospect of war with Japan, but it
+seems necessary to say them.
+
+These remarks are negative and vague as to our future course. They
+imply a confession of lack of such wisdom as would enable me to make
+positive definite proposals. But at least I have confidence in the
+wisdom and goodwill of the American and other peoples to deal with the
+problem, if they are only called into action. And the first condition
+of calling wisdom and goodwill into effective existence is to
+recognize the seriousness of the problem and the utter futility of
+trying to force its solution by impatient and hurried methods.
+Pro-Japanese apologetics is dangerous; it obscures the realities of
+the situation. An irritated anti-Japanism that would hasten the
+solution of the Chinese problem merely by attacking Japan is equally
+fatal to discovering and applying a proper method.
+
+More specifically and also more generically, proper publicity is the
+greatest need. If, as Secretary Hughes has intimated, a settlement of
+the problems of the Pacific is made a condition of arriving at an
+agreement regarding reduction and limitation of armaments, it is
+likely that the Conference might better never be held. In eagerness to
+do something which will pass as a settlement, either China's--and
+Siberia's--interests will be sacrificed in some unfair compromise, or
+irritation and friction will be increased--and in the end so will
+armaments. In any literal sense, it is ridiculous to suppose that the
+problems of the Pacific can be settled in a few weeks, or months--or
+years. Yet the discussion of the problems, in separation from the
+question of armament, may be of great use. For it may further that
+publicity which is a pre-condition of any genuine settlement. This
+involves the public in diplomacy. But it also involves a wider
+publicity, one which will enlighten the world about the facts of Asia,
+internal and international.
+
+Scepticism about Foreign Offices, as they are at present conducted, is
+justified. But scepticism about the power of public opinion, if it can
+be aroused and instructed, to reshape Foreign Office policies means
+hopelessness about the future of the world. Let everything possible be
+done to reduce armament, if only to secure a naval holiday on the part
+of the three great naval powers, and if only for the sake of lessening
+taxation. Let the Conference on Problems devote itself to discussing
+and making known as fully and widely as possible the element and scope
+of those problems, and the fears--or should one call them hopes?--of
+the cynics will be frustrated. It is not so important that a decision
+in the American sense of the Yap question be finally and forever
+arrived at, as it is that the need of China and the Orient in general
+for freer and fuller communications with the rest of the world be made
+clear--and so on, down or up the list of agenda. The commercial open
+door is needed. But the need is greater that the door be opened to
+light, to knowledge and understanding. If these forces will not create
+a public opinion which will in time secure a lasting and just
+settlement of other problems, there is no recourse save despair of
+civilization. Liberals can do something better than predicting failure
+and impugning motives. They can work for the opened door of open
+diplomacy, of continuous and intelligent inquiry, of discussion free
+from propaganda. To shirk this responsibility on the alleged ground
+that economic imperialism and organized greed will surely bring the
+Conference to failure is supine and snobbish. It is one of the factors
+that may lead the United States to take the wrong course in the
+parting of the ways.
+
+October, 1921.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's China, Japan and the U.S.A., by John Dewey
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diff --git a/28393-0.zip b/28393-0.zip
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of China, Japan and the U.S.A., by John Dewey
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: China, Japan and the U.S.A.
+       Present-Day Conditions in the Far East and Their Bearing
+       on the Washington Conference
+
+Author: John Dewey
+
+Release Date: October 25, 2009 [EBook #28393]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHINA, JAPAN AND THE U.S.A. ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Barbara Tozier, Bill Tozier and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+                    CHINA, JAPAN AND THE U. S. A.
+
+                        Present-day Conditions
+                           in the Far East
+                         and Their Bearing on
+                            the Washington
+                              Conference
+
+
+                                 _by_
+
+
+                              JOHN DEWEY
+
+                      Professor of Philosophy at
+                         Columbia University
+
+
+                     _New Republic Pamphlet No. 1_
+
+                           Published by the
+                    REPUBLIC PUBLISHING CO., INC.
+                     421 West Twenty-first Street
+                           _New York City_
+                                 1921
+
+
+
+
+                            Copyright 1921
+                     REPUBLIC PUBLISHING CO. INC.
+
+
+
+
+_Introductory Note_
+
+
+_The articles following are reprinted as they were written in spite of
+the fact that any picture of contemporary events is modified by
+subsequent increase of knowledge and by later events. In the main,
+however, the writer would still stand by what was said at the time. A
+few foot notes have been inserted where the text is likely to give
+rise to misapprehensions. The date of writing has been retained as a
+guide to the reader._
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+On Two Sides of the Eastern Seas
+
+
+It is three days' easy journey from Japan to China. It is doubtful
+whether anywhere in the world another journey of the same length
+brings with it such a complete change of political temper and belief.
+Certainly it is greater than the alteration perceived in journeying
+directly from San Francisco to Shanghai. The difference is not one in
+customs and modes of life; that goes without saying. It concerns the
+ideas, beliefs and alleged information current about one and the same
+fact: the status of Japan in the international world and especially
+its attitude toward China. One finds everywhere in Japan a feeling of
+uncertainty, hesitation, even of weakness. There is a subtle nervous
+tension in the atmosphere as of a country on the verge of change but
+not knowing where the change will take it. Liberalism is in the air,
+but genuine liberals are encompassed with all sorts of difficulties
+especially in combining their liberalism with the devotion to
+theocratic robes which the imperialist militarists who rule Japan have
+so skilfully thrown about the Throne and the Government. But what one
+senses in China from the first moment is the feeling of the
+all-pervading power of Japan which is working as surely as fate to its
+unhesitating conclusion--the domination of Chinese politics and
+industry by Japan with a view to its final absorption. It is not my
+object to analyze the realities of the situation or to inquire whether
+the universal feeling in China is a collective hallucination or is
+grounded in fact. The phenomenon is worthy of record on its own
+account. Even if it be merely psychological, it is a fact which must
+be reckoned with in both its Chinese and its Japanese aspects. In the
+first place, as to the differences in psychological atmosphere.
+Everybody who knows anything about Japan knows that it is the land of
+reserves and reticences. The half-informed American will tell you that
+this is put on for the misleading of foreigners. The informed know
+that it is an attitude shown to foreigners only because it is deeply
+engrained in the moral and social tradition of Japan; and that, if
+anything, the Japanese are more likely to be communicative--about many
+things at least--to a sympathetic foreigner, than to one another. The
+habit of reserve is so deeply embedded in all the etiquette,
+convention and daily ceremony of living, as well as in the ideals of
+strength of character, that only the Japanese who have subjected
+themselves to foreign influences escape it--and many of them revert.
+To put it mildly, the Japanese are not a loquacious people; they have
+the gift of doing rather than of gab.
+
+When accordingly a Japanese statesman or visiting diplomatist engages
+in unusually prolonged and frank discourse setting forth the aims and
+procedures of Japan, the student of politics who has been long in the
+East at once becomes alert, not to say suspicious. A recent
+illustration is so extreme that it will doubtless seem fantastic
+beyond belief. But the student at home will have to take these seeming
+fantasies seriously if he wishes to appreciate the present atmosphere
+of China. Cables have brought fragmentary reports of some addresses of
+Baron Goto in America. Doubtless in the American atmosphere these have
+the effect of reassuring America as to any improper ambitions on the
+part of Japan. In China, they were taken as announcements that Japan
+has about completed its plans for the absorption of China, and that
+the lucubration preliminary to operations of swallowing are about to
+begin. The reader is forgiven in advance any scepticism he feels about
+both the fact itself and the correctness of my report of the belief in
+the alleged fact. His scepticism will not surpass what I should feel
+in his place. But the suspicion aroused by such statements as this and
+the recent interview of Foreign Minister Uchida and Baron Ishii must
+be noted as evidences of the universal belief in China that Japan has
+one mode of diplomacy for the East and another for the West, and that
+what is said in the West must be read in reverse in the East.
+
+China, whatever else it is, is not the land of privacies. It is a
+proverb that nothing long remains secret in China. The Chinese talk
+more easily than they act--especially in politics. They are adepts in
+revealing their own shortcomings. They dissect their own weaknesses
+and failures with the most extraordinary reasonableness. One of the
+defects upon which they dwell is the love of finding substitutes for
+positive action, of avoiding entering upon a course of action which
+might be irrevocable. One almost wonders whether their power of
+self-criticism is not itself another of these substitutes. At all
+events, they are frank to the point of loquacity. Between the opposite
+camps there are always communications flowing. Among official enemies
+there are "sworn friends." In a land of perpetual compromise,
+etiquette as well as necessity demands that the ways for later
+accommodations be kept open. Consequently things which are spoken of
+only under the breath in Japan are shouted from the housetops in
+China. It would hardly be good taste in Japan to allude to the report
+that influential Chinese ministers are in constant receipt of Japanese
+funds and these corrupt officials are the agencies by which political
+and economic concessions were wrung from China while Europe and
+America were busy with the war. But in China nobody even takes the
+trouble to deny it or even to discuss it. What is psychologically most
+impressive is the fact that it is merely taken for granted. When it is
+spoken of, it is as one mentions the heat on an unusually hot day.
+
+In speaking of the feeling of weakness current in Japan about Japan
+itself, one must refer to the economic situation because of its
+obvious connection with the international situation. In the first
+place, there is the strong impression that Japan is over-extended.
+Even in normal times, Japan relies more upon production for foreign
+markets than is regarded in most countries as safe policy. And there
+is the belief that Japan _must_ do so, because only by large foreign
+sellings--large in comparison with the purchasing power of a people
+still having a low standard of life--can it purchase the raw
+materials--and even food--it has to have. But during the war, the
+dependence of manufacturing and trade at home upon the foreign market
+was greatly increased. The domestic increase of wealth, though very
+great, is still too much in the hands of the few to affect seriously
+the internal demand for goods. Item one, which awakens sympathy for
+Japan as being in a somewhat precarious situation.
+
+Another item concerns the labor situation. Japan seems to feel itself
+in a dilemma. If she passes even reasonably decent factory laws (or
+rather attempts their enforcement) and regulates child and women's
+labor, she will lose that advantage of cheap labor which she now
+counts on to offset her many disadvantages. On the other hand,
+strikes, labor difficulties, agitation for unions, etc., are
+constantly increasing, and the tension in the atmosphere is
+unmistakable. The rice riots are not often spoken of, but their memory
+persists, and the fact that they came very near to assuming a directly
+political aspect. Is there a race between fulfillment of the
+aspirations of the military clans who still hold the reins, and the
+growth of genuinely democratic forces which will forever terminate
+those aspirations? Certainly the defeat of Germany gave a blow to
+bureaucratic militarism in Japan which in time will go far. Will it
+have the time required to take effect on foreign policy? The hope that
+it will is a large factor in stimulating liberal sympathy for a Japan
+which is beginning to undergo the throes of transition.
+
+As for the direct international situation of Japan, the feeling in
+Japan is that of the threatening danger of isolation. Germany is gone;
+Russia is gone. While those facts simplify matters for Japan somewhat,
+there is also the belief that in taking away potential allies, they
+have weakened Japan in the general game of balance and counter-balance
+of power. Particularly does the removal of imperialistic Russia
+relieve the threat on India which was such a factor in the willingness
+of Great Britain to make the offensive-defensive alliance. The
+revelation of the militaristic possibilities of America is another
+serious factor. Certainly the new triple entente cordiale of Japan,
+Italy and France is no adequate substitute for a realignment of
+international forces in which a common understanding between Great
+Britain and America is a dominant factor. This factor explains, if it
+does not excuse, some of the querulousness and studied discourtesies
+with which the Japanese press for some months treated President
+Wilson, the United States in general and its relation to the League of
+Nations in particular, while it also throws light on the ardor with
+which the opportune question of racial discrimination was discussed.
+(The Chinese have an unfailing refuge in a sense of humor. It was
+interesting to note the delight with which they received the utterance
+of the Japanese Foreign Minister, after Japanese success at Paris,
+that "his attention had recently been called" to various press attacks
+on America which he much deprecated). In any case there is no
+mistaking the air of tension and nervous overstrain which now attends
+all discussion of Japanese foreign relations. In all directions, there
+are characteristic signs of hesitation, shaking of old beliefs and
+movement along new lines. Japan seems to be much in the same mood as
+that which it experienced in the early eighties before, toward the
+close of that decade, it crystallized its institutions through
+acceptance of the German constitution, militarism, educational system,
+and diplomatic methods. So that, once more, the observer gets the
+impression that substantially all of Japan's energy, abundant as that
+is, must be devoted to her urgent problems of readjustment.
+
+Come to China, and the difference is incredible. It almost seems as if
+one were living in a dream; or as if some new Alice had ventured
+behind an international looking-glass wherein everything is reversed.
+That we in America should have little idea of the state of things and
+the frame of mind in China is not astonishing--especially in view of
+the censorship and the distraction of attention of the last few years.
+But that Japan and China should be so geographically near, and yet
+every fact that concerns them appear in precisely opposite
+perspective, is an experience of a life time. Japanese liberalism?
+Yes, it is heard of, but only in connection with one form which the
+longing for the miraculous _deus ex machina_ takes. Perhaps a
+revolution in Japan may intervene to save China from the fate which
+now hangs over her. But there is no suggestion that anything less than
+a complete revolution will alter or even retard the course which is
+attributed to Japanese diplomacy working hand in hand with Japanese
+business interests and militarism. The collapse of Russia and Germany?
+These things only mean that Japan has in a few years fallen complete
+heir to Russian hopes, achievements and possessions in Manchuria and
+Outer Mongolia, and has had opportunities in Siberia thrown into her
+hands which she could hardly have hoped for in her most optimistic
+moments. And now Japan has, with the blessing of the great Powers at
+Paris, become also the heir of German concessions, intrigues and
+ambitions, with added concessions, wrung (or bought) from incompetent
+and corrupt officials by secret agreements when the world was busy
+with war. If all the great Powers are so afraid of Japan that they
+give way to her every wish, what is China that she can escape the doom
+prepared for her? That is the cry of helplessness going up all over
+China. And Japanese propagandists take advantage of the situation,
+pointing to the action of the Peace Conference as proof that the
+Allies care nothing for China, and that China must throw herself into
+the arms of Japan if she is to have any protection at all. In short,
+Japan stands ready as she stood ready in Korea to guarantee the
+integrity and independence of China. And the fear that the latter
+must, in spite of her animosity toward Japan, accept this fate in
+order to escape something worse swims in the sinister air. It is the
+exact counterpart of the feeling current among the liberals in Japan
+that Japan has alienated China permanently when a considerate and
+slower course might have united the two countries. If the economic
+straits of Japan are alluded to, it is only as a reason why Japan has
+hurried her diplomatic coercion, her corrupt and secret bargainings
+with Chinese traitors and her industrial invasion. While the western
+world supposes that the military and the industrial party in Japan
+have opposite ideas as to best methods of securing Japanese supremacy
+in the East, it is the universal opinion in China that they two are
+working in complete understanding with one another, and the
+differences that sometimes occur between the Foreign Office in Tokyo
+and the Ministry of War (which is extra-constitutional in its status)
+are staged for effect.
+
+These are some of the aspects of the most complete transformation
+scene that it has ever been the lot of the writer to experience. May
+it turn out to be only an extraordinary psychological experience! But
+in the interests of truth it must be recorded that every resident of
+China, Chinese or American, with whom I have talked in the last four
+weeks has volunteered the belief that all the seeds of a future great
+war are now deeply implanted in China. To avert such a calamity they
+look to the League of Nations or to some other force outside the
+immediate scene. Unfortunately the press of Japan treats every attempt
+to discuss the state of opinion in China or the state of facts as
+evidence that America, having tasted blood in the war, now has its
+eyes on Asia with the expectation later on of getting its hands on
+Asia. Consequently America is interested in trying to foster ill-will
+between China and Japan. If the pro-American Japanese do not enlighten
+their fellow-countrymen as to the facts, then America ought to return
+some of the propaganda that visits its shores. But every American who
+goes to Japan ought also to visit China--if only to complete his
+education.
+
+May, 1919.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+Shantung, As Seen From Within
+
+
+1.
+
+American apologists for that part of the Peace Treaty which relates to
+China have the advantage of the illusions of distance. Most of the
+arguments seem strange to anyone who lives in China even for a few
+months. He finds the Japanese on the spot using the old saying about
+territory consecrated by treasure spent and blood shed. He reads in
+Japanese papers and hears from moderately liberal Japanese that Japan
+must protect China, as well as Japan, against herself, against her own
+weak or corrupt government, by keeping control of Shantung to prevent
+China from again alienating that territory to some other power.
+
+The history of European aggression in China gives this argument great
+force among the Japanese, who for the most part know nothing more
+about what actually goes on in China than they used to know about
+Korean conditions. These considerations, together with the immense
+expectations raised among the Japanese during the war concerning their
+coming domination of the Far East and the unswerving demand of excited
+public opinion in Japan during the Versailles Conference for the
+settlement that actually resulted, give an ironic turn to the
+statement so often made that Japan may be trusted to carry out her
+promises. Yes, one is often tempted to say, that is precisely what
+China fears, that Japan will carry out her promises, for then China is
+doomed. To one who knows the history of foreign aggression in China,
+especially the technique of conquest by railway and finance, the irony
+of promising to keep economic rights while returning sovereignty lies
+so on the surface that it is hardly irony. China might as well be
+offered Kant's Critique of Pure Reason on a silver platter as be
+offered sovereignty under such conditions. The latter is equally
+metaphysical.
+
+A visit to Shantung and a short residence in its capital city, Tsinan,
+made the conclusions, which so far as I know every foreigner in China
+has arrived at, a living thing. It gave a vivid picture of the many
+and intimate ways in which economic and political rights are
+inextricably entangled together. It made one realize afresh that only
+a President who kept himself innocent of any knowledge of secret
+treaties during the war, could be na�ve enough to believe that the
+promise to return complete sovereignty retaining _only_ economic
+rights is a satisfactory solution. It threw fresh light upon the
+contention that at most and at worst Japan had only taken over German
+rights, and that since we had acquiesced in the latter's arrogations
+we had no call to make a fuss about Japan. It revealed the hollowness
+of the claim that pro-Chinese propaganda had wilfully misled Americans
+into confusing the few hundred square miles around the port of
+Tsing-tao with the Province of Shantung with its thirty millions of
+Chinese population.
+
+As for the comparison of Germany and Japan one might suppose that the
+objects for which America nominally entered the war had made, in any
+case, a difference. But aside from this consideration, the Germans
+exclusively employed Chinese in the railway shops and for all the
+minor positions on the railway itself. The railway guards (the
+difference between police and soldiers is nominal in China) were all
+Chinese, the Germans merely training them. As soon as Japan invaded
+Shantung and took over the railway, Chinese workmen and Chinese
+military guards were at once dismissed and Japanese imported to take
+their places. Tsinan-fu, the inland terminus of the ex-German railway,
+is over two hundred miles from Tsing-tao. When the Japanese took over
+the German railway business office, they at once built barracks, and
+today there are several hundred soldiers still there--where Germany
+kept none. Since the armistice even, Japan has erected a powerful
+military wireless within the grounds of the garrison, against of
+course the unavailing protest of Chinese authorities. No foreigner can
+be found who will state that Germany used her ownership of port and
+railway to discriminate against other nations. No Chinese can be found
+who will claim that this ownership was used to force the Chinese out
+of business, or to extend German economic rights beyond those
+definitely assigned her by treaty. Common sense should also teach even
+the highest paid propagandist in America that there is, from the
+standpoint of China, an immense distinction between a national menace
+located half way around the globe, and one within two days' sail over
+an inland sea absolutely controlled by a foreign navy, especially as
+the remote nation has no other foothold and the nearby one already
+dominates additional territory of enormous strategic and economic
+value--namely, Manchuria.
+
+These facts bear upon the shadowy distinction between the Tsing-tao
+and the Shantung claim, as well as upon the solid distinction between
+German and Japanese occupancy. If there still seemed to be a thin wall
+between Japanese possession of the port of Tsing-tao and usurpation of
+Shantung, it was enough to stop off the train in Tsinan-fu to see the
+wall crumble. For the Japanese wireless and the barracks of the army
+of occupation are the first things that greet your eyes. Within a few
+hundred feet of the railway that connects Shanghai, via the important
+center of Tientsin, with the capital, Peking, you see Japanese
+soldiers on the nominally Chinese street, guarding their barracks.
+Then you learn that if you travel upon the ex-German railway towards
+Tsing-tao, you are ordered to show your passport as if you were
+entering a foreign country. And as you travel along the road
+(remembering that you are over two hundred miles from Tsing-tao) you
+find Japanese soldiers at every station, and several garrisons and
+barracks at important towns on the line. Then you realize that at the
+shortest possible notice, Japan could cut all communications between
+southern China (together with the rich Yangste region) and the
+capital, and with the aid of the Southern Manchurian Railway at the
+north of the capital, hold the entire coast and descend at its good
+pleasure upon Peking.
+
+You are then prepared to learn from eye-witnesses that when Japan made
+its Twenty-one Demands upon China, machine guns were actually in
+position at strategic points throughout Shantung, with trenches dug
+and sandbags placed. You know that the Japanese liberal spoke the
+truth, who told you, after a visit to China and his return to protest
+against the action of his government, that the Japanese already had
+such a military hold upon China that they could control the country
+within a week, after a minimum of fighting, if war should arise. You
+also realize the efficiency of official control of information and
+domestic propaganda as you recall that he also told you that these
+things were true at the time of his visit, under the Terauchi cabinet,
+but had been completely reversed by the present Hara ministry. For I
+have yet to find a single foreigner or Chinese who is conscious of any
+difference of policy, save as the end of the war has forced the
+necessity of caution, since other nations can now look China-wards as
+they could not during the war.
+
+An American can get an idea of the realities of the present situation
+if he imagines a foreign garrison and military wireless in Wilmington,
+with a railway from that point to a fortified sea-port controlled by
+the foreign power, at which the foreign nation can land, without
+resistance, troops as fast as they can be transported, and with bases
+of supply, munitions, food, uniforms, etc., already located at
+Wilmington, at the sea-port and several places along the line. Reverse
+the directions from south to north, and Wilmington will stand for
+Tsinan-fu, Shanghai for New York, Nanking for Philadelphia with Peking
+standing for the seat of government at Washington, and Tientsin for
+Baltimore. Suppose in addition that the Pennsylvania road is the sole
+means of communication between Washington and the chief commercial and
+industrial centers, and you have the framework of the Shantung picture
+as it presents itself daily to the inhabitants of China. Upon second
+thought, however, the parallel is not quite accurate. You have to add
+that the same foreign nation controls also all coast communications
+from, say, Raleigh southwards, with railway lines both to the nearby
+coast and to New Orleans. For (still reversing directions) this
+corresponds to the position of Imperial Japan in Manchuria with its
+railways to Dairen and through Korea to a port twelve hours sail from
+a great military center in Japan proper. These are not remote
+possibilities nor vague prognostications. They are accomplished facts.
+
+Yet the facts give _only_ the framework of the picture. What is
+actually going on within Shantung? One of the demands of the
+"postponed" group of the Twenty-one Demands was that Japan should
+supply military and police advisers to China. They are not so much
+postponed but that Japan enforced specific concessions from China
+during the war by diplomatic threats to reintroduce their discussion,
+or so postponed that Japanese advisers are not already installed in
+the police headquarters of the city of Tsinan, the capital city of
+Shantung of three hundred thousand population where the Provincial
+Assembly meets and all the Provincial officials reside. Within recent
+months the Japanese consul has taken a company of armed soldiers with
+him when he visited the Provincial Governor to make certain demands
+upon him, the visit being punctuated by an ostentatious surrounding of
+the Governor's yamen by these troops. Within the past few weeks, two
+hundred cavalry came to Tsinan and remained there while Japanese
+officials demanded of the Governor drastic measures to suppress the
+boycott, while it was threatened to send Japanese troops to police the
+foreign settlement if the demand was not heeded.
+
+A former consul was indiscreet enough to put into writing that if the
+Chinese Governor did not stop the boycott and the students' movement
+by force if need be, he would take matters into his own hands. The
+chief tangible charge he brought against the Chinese as a basis of his
+demand for "protection" was that Chinese store-keepers actually
+refused to accept Japanese money in payment for goods, not ordinary
+Japanese money at that, but the military notes with which, so as to
+save drain upon the bullion reserves, the army of occupation is paid.
+And all this, be it remembered, is more than two hundred miles from
+Tsing-tao and from eight to twelve months after the armistice. Today's
+paper reports a visit of Japanese to the Governor to inform him that
+unless he should prevent a private theatrical performance from being
+given in Tsinan by the students, they would send their own forces into
+the settlement to protect themselves. And the utmost they might need
+protection from, was that the students were to give some plays
+designed to foster the boycott!
+
+Japanese troops overran the Province before they made any serious
+attempt to capture Tsing-tao. It is only a slight exaggeration to say
+that they "took" the Chinese Tsinan before they took the German
+Tsing-tao. Propaganda in America has justified this act on the ground
+that a German railway to the rear of Japanese forces would have been a
+menace. As there were no troops but only legal and diplomatic papers
+with which to attack the Japanese, it is a fair inference that the
+"menace" was located in Versailles rather than in Shantung, and
+concerned the danger of Chinese control of their own territory.
+Chinese have been arrested by Japanese gendarmes in Tsinan and
+subjected to a torturing third degree of the kind that Korea has made
+sickeningly familiar. The Japanese claim that the injuries were
+received while the men were resisting arrest. Considering that there
+was no more legal ground for arrest than there would be if Japanese
+police arrested Americans in New York, almost anybody but the pacifist
+Chinese certainly would have resisted. But official hospital reports
+testify to bayonet wounds and the marks of flogging. In the interior
+where the Japanese had been disconcerted by the student propaganda
+they raided a High School, seized a school boy at random, and took him
+to a distant point and kept him locked up several days. When the
+Japanese consul at Tsinan was visited by Chinese officials in protest
+against these illegal arrests, the consul disclaimed all jurisdiction.
+The matter, he said, was wholly in the hands of the military
+authorities in Tsing-tao. His disclaimer was emphasized by the fact
+that some of the kidnapped Chinese were taken to Tsing-tao for
+"trial."
+
+The matter of economic rights in relation to political domination will
+be discussed later in this article. It is no pleasure for one with
+many warm friends in Japan, who has a great admiration for the
+Japanese people as distinct from the ruling military and bureaucratic
+class, to report such facts as have been stated. One might almost say,
+one might positively say from the standpoint of Japan itself, that the
+worst thing that can be charged against the policy of Japan in China
+for the last six years is its immeasurable stupidity. No nation has
+ever misjudged the national psychology of another people as Japan has
+that of China. The alienation of China is widespread, deep, bitter.
+Even the most pessimistic of the Chinese who think that China is to
+undergo a complete economic and political domination by Japan do not
+think it can last, even without outside intervention, more than half a
+century.
+
+Today, at the beginning of a new year, (1920) the boycott is much more
+complete and efficient than in the most tense days of last summer.
+Unfortunately, the Japanese policy seems to be under a truly Greek
+fate which drives it on. Concessions that would have produced a
+revulsion of feeling in favor of Japan a year ago will now merely
+salve the surface of the wound. What would have been welcomed even
+eight months ago would now be received with contempt. There is but one
+way in which Japan can now restore herself. It is nothing less than
+complete withdrawal from Shantung, with possibly a strictly commercial
+concession at Tsing-tao and a real, not a Manchurian, Open Door.
+
+According to the Japanese-owned newspapers published in Tsinan, the
+Japanese military commander in Tsing-tao recently made a speech to
+visiting journalists from Tokyo in which he said: "The suspicions of
+China cannot now be allayed merely by repeating that we have no
+territorial ambitions in China. We must attain complete economic
+domination of the Far East. But if Chino-Japanese relations do not
+improve, some third party will reap the benefit. Japanese residing in
+China incur the hatred of the Chinese. For they regard themselves as
+the proud citizens of a conquering country. When the Japanese go into
+partnership with the Chinese they manage in the greater number of
+cases to have the profits accrue to themselves. If friendship between
+China and Japan is to depend wholly upon the government it will come
+to nothing. Diplomatists, soldiers, merchants, journalists should
+repent the past. The change must be complete." But it will not be
+complete until the Japanese withdraw from Shantung leaving their
+nationals there upon the footing of other foreigners in China.
+
+
+2.
+
+In discussing the return to China by Japan of a metaphysical
+sovereignty while economic rights are retained, I shall not repeat the
+details of German treaty rights as to the railway and the mines. The
+reader is assumed to be familiar with those facts. The German seizure
+was outrageous. It was a flagrant case of Might making Right. As von
+Buelow cynically but frankly told the Reichstag, while Germany did not
+intend to partition China, she also did not intend to be the passenger
+left behind in the station when the train started. Germany had the
+excuse of prior European aggressions, and in turn her usurpation was
+the precedent for further foreign rape. If judgments are made on a
+comparative basis, Japan is entitled to all of the white-washing that
+can be derived from the provocations of European imperialistic powers,
+including those countries that in domestic policy are democratic. And
+every fairminded person will recognize that, leaving China out of the
+reckoning, Japan's proximity to China gives her aggressions the color
+of self-defence in a way that cannot be urged in behalf of any
+European power.
+
+It is possible to look at European aggressions in, say, Africa as
+incidents of a colonization movement. But no foreign policy in Asia
+can shelter itself behind any colonization plea. For continental Asia
+is, for practical purposes, India and China, representing two of the
+oldest civilizations of the globe and presenting two of its densest
+populations. If there is any such thing in truth as a philosophy of
+history with its own inner and inevitable logic, one may well shudder
+to think of what the closing acts of the drama of the intercourse of
+the West and East are to be. In any case, and with whatever comfort
+may be derived from the fact that the American continents have not
+taken part in the aggression and hence may act as a mediator to avert
+the final tragedy, residence in China forces upon one the realization
+that Asia is, after all, a large figure in the future reckoning of
+history. Asia is really here after all. It is not simply a symbol in
+western algebraic balances of trade. And in the future, so to speak,
+it is going to be even more here, with its awakened national
+consciousness of about half the population of the whole globe.
+
+Let the agreements of France and Great Britain made with Japan during
+the war stand for the measure of western consciousness of the reality
+of only a small part of Asia, a consciousness generated by the
+patriotism of Japan backed by its powerful army and navy. The same
+agreement measures western unconsciousness of the reality of that part
+of Asia which lies within the confines of China. An even better
+measure of western unconsciousness may be found perhaps in such a
+trifling incident as this:--An English friend long resident in
+Shantung told me of writing indignantly home concerning the British
+part in the Shantung settlement. The reply came, complacently stating
+that Japanese ships did so much in the war that the Allies could not
+properly refuse to recognize Japan's claims. The secret agreements
+themselves hardly speak as eloquently for the absence of China from
+the average western consciousness. In saying that China and Asia are
+to be enormously significant figures in future reckonings, the spectre
+of a military Yellow Peril is not meant nor even the more credible
+spectre of an industrial Yellow Peril. But Asia has come to
+consciousness, and her consciousness of herself will soon be such a
+massive and persistent thing that it will force itself upon the
+reluctant consciousness of the west, and lie heavily upon its
+conscience. And for this fact, China and the western world are
+indebted to Japan.
+
+These remarks are more relevant to a consideration of the relationship
+of economic and political rights in Shantung than they perhaps seem.
+For a moment's reflection will call to mind that all political foreign
+aggression in China has been carried out for commercial and financial
+ends, and usually upon some economic pretext. As to the immediate part
+played by Japan in bringing about a consciousness which will from the
+present time completely change the relations of the western powers to
+China, let one little story testify. Some representatives of an
+English missionary board were making a tour of inspection through
+China. They went into an interior town in Shantung. They were received
+with extraordinary cordiality by the entire population. Some time
+afterwards some of their accompanying friends returned to the village
+and were received with equally surprising coldness. It came out upon
+inquiry that the inhabitants had first been moved by the rumor that
+these people were sent by the British government to secure the removal
+of the Japanese. Later they were moved by indignation that they had
+been disappointed.
+
+It takes no forcing to see a symbol in this incident. Part of it
+stands for the almost incredible ignorance which has rendered China so
+impotent nationally speaking. The other part of it stands for the new
+spirit which has been aroused even among the common people in remote
+districts. Those who fear, or who pretend to fear, a new Boxer
+movement, or a definite general anti-foreign movement, are, I think,
+mistaken. The new consciousness goes much deeper. Foreign policies
+that fail to take it into account and that think that relations with
+China can be conducted upon the old basis will find this new
+consciousness obtruding in the most unexpected and perplexing ways.
+
+One might fairly say, still speaking comparatively, that it is part of
+the bad luck of Japan that her proximity to China, and the opportunity
+the war gave her to outdo the aggressions of European powers, have
+made her the first victim of this disconcerting change. Whatever the
+motives of the American Senators in completely disassociating the
+United States from the peace settlement as regards China, their action
+is a permanent asset to China, not only in respect to Japan but with
+respect to all Chinese foreign relations. Just before our visit to
+Tsinan, the Shantung Provincial Assembly had passed a resolution of
+thanks to the American Senate. More significant is the fact that they
+passed another resolution to be cabled to the English Parliament,
+calling attention to the action of the American Senate and inviting
+similar action. China in general and Shantung in particular feels the
+reinforcement of an external approval. With this duplication, its
+national consciousness has as it were solidified. Japan is simply the
+first object to be affected.
+
+The concrete working out of economic rights in Shantung will be
+illustrated by a single case which will have to stand as typical.
+Po-shan is an interior mining village. The mines were not part of the
+German booty; they were Chinese owned. The Germans, whatever their
+ulterior aims, had made no attempt at dispossessing the Chinese. The
+mines, however, are at the end of a branch line of the new Japanese
+owned railway--owned by the government, not by a private corporation,
+and guarded by Japanese soldiers. Of the forty mines, the Japanese
+have worked their way, in only four years, into all but four.
+Different methods are used. The simplest is, of course, discrimination
+in the use of the railway for shipping. Downright refusal to furnish
+cars while competitors who accepted Japanese partners got them, is one
+method. Another more elaborate method is to send but one car when a
+large number is asked for, and then when it is too late to use cars,
+send the whole number asked for or even more, and then charge a large
+sum for demurrage in spite of the fact the mine no longer wants them
+or has cancelled the order. Redress there is none.
+
+Tsinan has no special foreign concessions. It is, however, a "treaty
+port" where nationals of all friendly powers can do business. But
+Po-shan is not even a treaty port. Legally speaking no foreigners can
+lease land or carry on any business there. Yet the Japanese have
+forced a settlement as large in area as the entire foreign settlement
+in the much larger town of Tsinan. A Chinese refused to lease land
+where the Japanese wished to relocate their railway station. Nothing
+happened to him directly. But merchants could not get shipping space,
+or receive goods by rail. Some of them were beaten up by thugs. After
+a time, they used their influence with their compatriot to lease his
+land. Immediately the persecutions ceased. Not all the land has been
+secured by threats or coercion; some has been leased directly by
+Chinese moved by high prices, in spite of the absence of any legal
+sanction. In addition, the Japanese have obtained control of the
+electric light works and some pottery factories, etc.
+
+Now even admitting that this is typical of the methods by which the
+Japanese plant themselves, a natural American reaction would be to say
+that, after all, the country is built up industrially by these
+enterprises, and that though the rights of some individuals may have
+been violated, there is nothing to make a national, much less an
+international fuss about. More or less unconsciously we translate
+foreign incidents into terms of our own experience and environment,
+and thus miss the entire point. Since America was largely developed by
+foreign capital to our own economic benefit and without political
+encroachments, we lazily suppose some such separation of the economic
+and political to be possible in China. But it must be remembered that
+China is not an open country. Foreigners can lease land, carry on
+business, and manufacture only in accord with express treaty
+agreements. There are no such agreements in the cases typified by the
+Po-shan incident. We may profoundly disagree with the closed economic
+policy of China, or we may believe that under existing circumstances
+it represents the part of prudence for her. That makes no difference.
+_Given the frequent occurrence of such economic invasions, with the
+backing of soldiers of the Imperial Army, with the overt aid of the
+Imperial Railway, and with the refusal of Imperial officials to
+intervene, there is clear evidence of the attitude and intention of
+the Japanese government in Shantung._
+
+Because the population of Shantung is directly confronted with an
+immense amount of just such evidence, it cannot take seriously the
+professions of vague diplomatic utterances. What foreign nation is
+going to intervene to enforce Chinese rights in such a case as
+Po-shan? Which one is going effectively to call the attention of Japan
+to such evidences of its failure to carry out its promise? Yet the
+accumulation of precisely such seemingly petty incidents, and not any
+single dramatic great wrong, will secure Japan's economic and
+political domination of Shantung. It is for this reason that
+foreigners resident in Shantung, no matter in what part, say that they
+see no sign whatever that Japan is going to get out; that, on the
+contrary, everything points to a determination to consolidate her
+position. How long ago was the Portsmouth treaty signed, and what were
+its nominal pledges about evacuation of Manchurian territory?
+
+Not a month will pass without something happening which will give a
+pretext for delay, and for making the surrender of Shantung
+conditional upon this, that and the other thing. Meantime the
+penetration of Shantung by means of railway discrimination, railway
+military guards, continual nibblings here and there, will be going on.
+It would make the chapter too long to speak of the part played by
+manipulation of finance in achieving this process of attrition of
+sovereignty. Two incidents must suffice. During the war, Japanese
+traders with the connivance of their government gathered up immense
+amounts of copper cash from Shantung and shipped it to Japan against
+the protests of the Chinese government. What does sovereignty amount
+to when a country cannot control even its own currency system? In
+Manchuria the Japanese have forced the introduction of several hundred
+million dollars of paper currency, nominally, of course, based on a
+gold reserve. These notes are redeemable, however, only in Japan
+proper. And there is a law in Japan forbidding the exportation of
+gold. And there you are.
+
+Japan itself has recently afforded an object lesson in the actual
+connection of economic and political rights in China. It is so
+beautifully complete a demonstration that it was surely unconscious.
+Within the last two weeks, Mr. Obata, the Japanese minister in Peking,
+has waited upon the government with a memorandum saying that the
+Foochow incident was the culminating result of the boycott; that if
+the boycott continues, a series of such incidents is to be
+apprehended, saying that the situation has become "intolerable" for
+Japan, and disavowing all responsibility for further consequences
+unless the government makes a serious effort to stop the boycott.
+Japan then immediately makes certain specific demands. China must stop
+the circulation of handbills, the holding of meetings to urge the
+boycott, the destruction of Japanese goods that have become Chinese
+property--none have been destroyed that are Japanese owned. Volumes
+could not say more as to the real conception of Japan of the
+connection between the economic and the political relations of the two
+countries. Surely the pale ghost of "Sovereignty" smiled ironically as
+he read this official note. President Wilson after having made in the
+case of Shantung a sharp and complete separation of economic and
+political rights, also said that a nation boycotted is within sight of
+surrender. Disassociation of words from acts has gone so far in his
+case that he will hardly be able to see the meaning of Mr. Obata's
+communication. The American sense of humor and fair-play may however
+be counted upon to get its point.
+
+January, 1920.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+Hinterlands in China
+
+
+One of the two Presidents of China--it is unnecessary to specify
+which--recently stated that a renewal of the Anglo-Japanese alliance
+meant a partition of China. In this division, Japan would take the
+north and Great Britain the south. Probably the remark was not meant
+to be taken literally in the sense of formal conquest or annexation,
+but rather symbolically with reference to the tendency of policies and
+events. Even so, the statement will appear exaggerated or wild to
+persons outside of China, who either believe that the Open Door policy
+is now irrevocably established or that Japan is the only foreign Power
+which China has to fear. But a recent visit to the south revealed that
+in that section, especially in Canton, the British occupy much the
+same position of suspicion and dread which is held by the Japanese in
+the north.
+
+Upon the negative side, the Japanese menace is negligible in the
+province of Kwantung, in which Canton is situated. There are said to
+be more Americans in Canton than Japanese, and the American colony is
+not extensive. Upon the positive side the history of the Cassell
+collieries contract is instructive. It illustrates the cause of the
+popular attitude toward the British, and quite possibly explains the
+bitterness in the remark quoted. The contract is noteworthy from
+whatever standpoint it is viewed, whether that of time, of the
+conditions it contains or of the circumstances which accompany it.
+
+Premising that the contract delivers to a British company a monopoly
+of the rich coal deposits of the province for a period of ninety years
+and--quite incidentally of course--the right to use all means of
+transportation, water or rail, wharves and ports now in existence, and
+also to "construct, manage, superintend and work other roads, railways
+waterways as may be deemed advisable"--which reads like a monopoly of
+all further transportation facilities of the province--first take up
+the time of the making of the contract. It was drawn in April, 1920
+and confirmed a few months later. It was made, of course, with the
+authorities of the Kwantung province, subject to confirmation at
+Peking. During this period, Kwantung province was governed by military
+carpet-baggers from the neighboring province of Kwangsei, which was
+practically alone of the southern provinces allied with the northern
+government, then under the control of the Anfu party. It was matter of
+common knowledge that the people of Canton and of the province were
+bitterly hostile to this outside control and submitted to it only
+because of military coercion. Civil strife for the expulsion of the
+outsiders was already going on, continually gaining headway, and a few
+months later the Kwangsei troops were defeated and expelled from the
+province by the forces of General Chen, now the civil governor of
+Kwantung, who received a triumphal ovation upon his entrance into
+Canton. At this time the present native government was established, a
+change which made possible the return of Sun Yat Sen and his followers
+from their exile in Shanghai. It is evident, then, that the collieries
+contract giving away the natural resources of the people of the
+province, was knowingly made by a British company with a government
+which no more represented the people of the province than the military
+government of Germany represented the people of Belgium during the
+war.
+
+As to the terms of the contract, the statement that it gave the
+British company a monopoly of all the coal mines in the province, was
+not literally accurate. Verbally, twenty-two districts are enumerated.
+But these are the districts along the lines of the only railways in
+the province and the only ones soon to be built, including the as yet
+uncompleted Hankow-Canton railway. Possibly this fact accounts for the
+anxiety of the British partners in the Consortium that the completion
+of this line be the first undertaking financed by the Consortium. The
+document also includes what is perhaps a novelty in legal documents
+having such a momentous economic importance, namely, the words "etc."
+after the districts enumerated by name.
+
+For this concession, the British syndicate agreed to pay the
+provincial government the sum of $1,000,000 (silver of course). This
+million dollars is to bear six per cent interest to the company, and
+capital and interest are to be paid back to the company by the
+provincial government out of the dividends (if any) it is to receive.
+The nature of these "dividends" is set forth in an article which
+should receive the careful attention of promoters elsewhere as a model
+of the possibilities of exploiting contracts. The ten million capital
+is divided equally into "A" shares and "B" shares. The "A" shares go
+unreservedly to the directors of the company, and three millions of
+the "B" shares are to be allotted by the directors of the company at
+their discretion. The other two million are again divided into equal
+portions, one portion representing the sum advanced by the company to
+the province and to be paid back as just specified, while the other
+million--one-tenth of the capitalization--is to be a trust fund the
+dividends of which are to go for the "benefit of the poor people of
+the province" and for an educational fund for the province. But before
+any dividends are paid upon the "B" shares, eight per cent dividends
+are to be paid upon the "A" shares and a _dollar a ton royalty_ upon
+all coal mined. Those having any familiarity with the coal business
+with its usual royalty of about ten cents a ton can easily calculate
+the splendid prospects of the "poor people" and the schools, prospects
+which represent the total return to the provinces of a concession of
+untold worth. The contract also guarantees to the company the
+assistance of the provincial government in expropriating the owners of
+all coal mines which have been granted to other companies but not yet
+worked. These technical details make dry reading, but they throw light
+upon the spirit with which the British company undertook its predatory
+negotiations with a government renounced by the people it professed to
+govern. In comparison with the relatively crude methods of Japan in
+Shantung, they show the advantages of wide business experience.
+
+As for the circumstances and context which give added menace to the
+contract, the following facts are significant. Hong Kong, a British
+crown colony, lies directly opposite the river upon which Canton is
+situated. It is the port of export and import for the vast districts
+served by the mines and railways of the province. It is unnecessary to
+point out the hold upon all economic development which is given
+through a monopolistic control of coal. It is hardly too much to say
+that the enforcement of the contract would enable British interests in
+Hong Kong to control the entire industrial development of the most
+flourishing of the provinces of China. It would be a comparatively
+easy and inexpensive matter to provide the main land with a first
+class modern harbor and port near Canton. But such a port would tend
+to reduce the assets of Hong Kong to the possession of the most
+beautiful scenery in the world. There is already fear that a new
+harbor will be built. Many persons think that the concession of
+building such railways etc., "as are deemed advisable for the purpose
+of the business of the company and to improve those now existing" is
+the object of the contract, even more than the coal monopoly. For the
+British already own a considerable part of the mainland, including
+part of the railway connecting the littoral with Canton. By building a
+cross-cut from the British owned portion of this railway to the
+Hankow-Canton line, the latter would become virtually the Hankow-Hong
+Kong line, and Canton would be a way-station. With the advantages thus
+secured, the project for building a new port could be indefinitely
+blocked.
+
+During the period in which the contract was being secured, a congress
+of British Chambers of Commerce was held in Shanghai. Resolutions were
+passed in favor of abolishing henceforth the whole principle of
+special nationalistic concessions, and of cooperating with the Chinese
+for the upbuilding of China. At the close of the meeting the Chairman
+announced that a new era for China had finally dawned. All of the
+British newspapers in China lauded the wise action of the Chambers. At
+the same time, Mr. Lamont was in Peking, and was setting forth that
+the object of the Consortium was the abolition of further concessions,
+and the uniting of the financial resources of the banks in the
+Consortium for the economic development of China itself. By an
+ironical coincidence, the Hong Kong-Shanghai Bank, which is the
+financial power behind the contract and the new company, is the
+leading British partner in the Consortium. It is difficult to see how
+the British can henceforth accuse the Japanese of bad faith if any of
+the banking interests of that country should enter upon independent
+negotiations with any government in China.
+
+By the time the scene of action was transferred to Peking in order to
+secure the confirmation of the central government, the Anfu regime was
+no more, and as yet no confirmation has been secured. The new
+government at Canton has declined to recognize the contract as having
+any validity. An official of the Hong Kong government has told an
+official of the Canton government that the Hong Kong government stands
+behind the enforcement of the contract, and that Kwantung province is
+a British Hinterland. Within the last few weeks the Governor of Hong
+Kong and a leading Chinese banker of Hong Kong who is a British
+subject have visited Peking. Rumors were rife in the south as to the
+object of the visit. British sources published the report that one
+object was to return Weihaiwei to China--in case Peking agreed to turn
+over more of the Kwantung mainland to Hong Kong as a quid pro quo.
+Chinese opinion in the south was that one main object was to secure
+the Peking confirmation of the Cassell contract, in which case
+$900,000 more would be forthcoming, $100,000 having been paid down
+when the contract was signed with the provincial government. Peking
+does not recognize the present Canton government but regards it as an
+outlaw. The crowd that signed the contract is still in control of the
+neighboring province of Kwangsei and they are relied upon by the north
+to effect the military subjugation of the seceded province. Fighting
+has already, indeed, begun, but the Kwangsei militarists are badly in
+need of money; if Peking ratifies the contract, a large part of the
+funds will be paid over to them--all that isn't lost by the wayside to
+the northern militarists.[1] Meantime British news agencies keep up a
+constant circulation of reports tending to discredit the Kwantung
+government, although all impartial observers on the spot regard it as
+altogether the most promising one in China.
+
+    [1] Since the text was written, the newspapers have stated
+        that the Peking Government has officially refused to
+        validate the agreement.
+
+These considerations not only throw light on some of the difficulties
+of the functioning of the Consortium, but they give an indispensable
+background for judging the actual effect of the renewal of the
+Anglo-Japanese alliance. By force of circumstances each government,
+even against its own wish, will be compelled to wink at the predatory
+policies of the other; and the tendency will be to create a division
+of spheres of influence between the north and south in order to avoid
+more direct conflicts. The English liberals who stand for the renewal
+of the alliance on the ground that it will enable England to exercise
+a check on Japanese policies, are more na�ve than was Mr. Wilson with
+his belief in the separation of the economic and political control of
+Shantung.
+
+It cannot be too often repeated that the real point of friction
+between the United States and Japan is not in California but in China.
+It is silly--unless it is calculated--for English authorities to keep
+repeating that under no circumstances does the alliance mean that
+Great Britain would support Japan in a war with the United States. The
+day the alliance is renewed, the hands of the militarists in Japan
+will be strengthened and the hands of the liberals--already weak
+enough--be still further weakened. In consequence, all the sources of
+friction in China between the United States and Japan will be
+intensified. I do not believe in the predicted war. But should it
+come, the first act of Japan--so everyone in China believes--will be
+to seize the ports of northern China and its railways in order to make
+sure of an uninterrupted supply of food and raw materials. The act
+would be justified as necessary to national existence. Great Britain
+in alliance with Japan would be in no position to protest in anything
+but the most perfunctory way. The guarantee of such abstinence would
+be for Japan the next best thing to open naval and financial support.
+Without the guarantee they would not dare the seizure of Chinese
+ports. In recent years diplomatists have shown themselves capable of
+unlimited stupidity. But it is not possible that the men in the
+British Foreign Office are not aware of these elementary facts. If
+they renew the alliance they knowingly take the responsibility for the
+consequences.
+
+May 24, 1921.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+A Political Upheaval in China
+
+
+Even in America we have heard of one Chinese revolution, that which
+thrust the Manchu dynasty from the throne. The visitor in China gets
+used to casual references to the second revolution, that which
+frustrated Yuan Shi Kai's aspirations to be emperor, and the third,
+the defeat in 1917 of the abortive attempt to put the Manchu boy
+emperor back into power. And within the last few weeks the (September
+1920) fourth upheaval has taken place. It may not be dignified by the
+name of the fourth revolution, for the head of the state has not been
+changed by it. But as a manifestation of the forces that shape Chinese
+political events, for evil and for good, perhaps this last disturbance
+surpasses the last two "revolutions" in significance.
+
+Chinese politics in detail are highly complicated, a mess of
+personalities and factions whose oscillations no one can follow who
+does not know a multitude of personal, family and provincial
+histories. But occasionally something happens which simplifies the
+tangle. Definite outlines frame themselves out of the swirling
+criss-cross of strife, intrigue and ambition. So, at present, the
+complete collapse of the Anfu clique which owned the central
+government for two years marks the end of that union of internal
+militarism and Japanese foreign influence which was, for China, the
+most marked fruit of the war. When China entered the war a "War
+Participation" army was formed. It never participated; probably it was
+never meant to. But its formation threw power wholly into the hands of
+the military clique, as against the civilian constitutionalists. And
+in return for concessions, secret agreements relating to Manchuria,
+Shantung, new railways, etc., Japan supplied money, munitions,
+instructors for the army and a benevolent supervision of foreign and
+domestic politics. The war came to an unexpected and untimely end, but
+by this time the offspring of the marriage of the militarism of Yuan
+Shi Kai and Japanese money and influence was a lusty youth. Bolshevism
+was induced to take the place of Germany as a menace requiring the
+keeping up of the army, and loans and teachers. Mongolia was persuaded
+to cut her strenuous ties with Russia, to renounce her independence
+and come again under Chinese sovereignty.
+
+The army and its Japanese support and instruction was, accordingly,
+continued. In place of the "War Participation" army appeared the
+"Frontier Defense" army. Marshal Tuan, the head of the military party,
+remained the nominal political power behind the presidential chair,
+and General Hsu (commonly known as little Hsu, in distinction from old
+Hsu, the president) was the energetic manager of the Mongolian
+adventure which, by a happy coincidence, required a bank, land
+development companies and railway schemes, as well as an army. About
+this military centre as a nucleus gathered the vultures who fed on the
+carrion. This flock took the name of the Anfu Club. It did not control
+the entire cabinet, but to it belonged the Minister of Justice, who
+manipulated the police and the courts, persecuted the students,
+suppressed liberal journals and imprisoned inconvenient critics. And
+the Club owned the ministers of finance and communications, the two
+cabinet places that dispense revenues, give out jobs and make loans.
+It also regulated the distribution of intelligence by mail and
+telegraph. The reign of corruption and despotic inefficiency, tempered
+only by the student revolt, set in. In two years the Anfu Club got
+away with two hundred millions of public funds directly, to say
+nothing of what was wasted by incompetency and upon the army. The
+Allies had set out to get China into the war. They succeeded in
+getting Japan into control of Peking and getting China, politically
+speaking, into a seemingly hopeless state of corruption and confusion.
+
+The militaristic or Pei-Yang party was, however, divided into two
+factions, each called after a province. The Anwhei party gathered
+about little Hsu and was almost identical with the Anfus. The Chili
+faction had been obliged, so far as Peking was concerned, to content
+itself with such leavings as the Anfu Club tossed to it. Apparently it
+was hopelessly weaker than its rival, although Tuan, who was
+personally honest and above financial scandal, was supported by both
+factions and was the head of both. About three months ago there were a
+few signs that, while the Anfu Club had been entrenching itself in
+Peking, the rival faction had been quietly establishing itself in the
+provinces. A league of Eight Tuchuns (military governors of the
+provinces) came to the assistance of the president against some
+unusually strong pressure from the Anfu Club. In spite of the fact
+that the military governor of the three Manchurian provinces, Chang
+Tso Lin, popularly known as the Emperor of Manchuria, lined up with
+this league, practically nobody expected anything except some
+manoeuvering to get a larger share of the spoils.
+
+But late in June the president invited Chang Tso Lin to Peking. The
+latter saw Tuan, told him that he was surrounded by evil advisers,
+demanded that he cut loose from little Hsu and the Anfu Club, and
+declared open war upon little Hsu--the two had long and notoriously
+been bitter enemies. Even then people had great difficulty in
+believing that anything would happen except another Chinese
+compromise. The president was known to be sympathetic upon the whole
+with the Chili faction, but the president, if not a typical Chinese,
+is at least typical of a certain kind of Chinese mandarin,
+non-resistant, compromising, conciliating, procrastinating, covering
+up, evading issues, face-saving. But finally something happened. A
+mandate was issued dismissing little Hsu from office, military and
+civil, dissolving the frontier defense corps as such, and bringing it
+under the control of the Ministry of War (usually armies in China
+belong to some general or Tuchun, not to the country). For almost
+forty-eight hours it was thought that Tuan had consented to sacrifice
+little Hsu and that the latter would submit at least temporarily. Then
+with equally sensational abruptness Tuan brought pressure to bear on
+the president. The latter was appointed head of a national defense
+army, and rewards were issued for the heads of the chiefs of the Chili
+faction, nothing, however, being said about Chang Tso Lin, who had
+meanwhile returned to Mukden and who still professed allegiance to
+Tuan. Troops were mobilized; there was a rush of officials and of the
+wealthy to the concessions of Tientsin and to the hotels of the
+legation quarter.
+
+This sketch is not meant as history, but simply as an indication of
+the forces at work. Hence it is enough to say that two weeks after
+Tuan and little Hsu had intimidated the president and proclaimed
+themselves the saviors of the Republic, they were in hiding, their
+enemies of the Chili party were in complete control of Peking, and
+rewards from fifty thousand dollars down were offered for the arrest
+of little Hsu, the ex-ministers of justice, finance and
+communications, and other leaders of the Anfu Club. The political
+turnover was as complete as it was sensational. The seemingly
+impregnable masters of China were impotent fugitives. The carefully
+built up Anfu Club, with its military, financial and foreign support,
+had crumbled and fallen. No country at any time has ever seen a
+political upheaval more sudden and more thoroughgoing. It was not so
+much a defeat as a dissolution like that of death, a total
+disappearance, an evaporation.
+
+Corruption had worked inward, as it has a way of doing.
+Japanese-bought munitions would not explode; quartermasters vanished
+with the funds with which stores were to be bought; troops went
+without anything to eat for two or three days; large numbers,
+including the larger part of one division, went over to the enemy en
+masse; those who did not desert had no heart for fighting and ran away
+or surrendered on the slightest provocation, saying they were willing
+to fight for their country but saw no reason why they should fight for
+a faction, especially a faction that had been selling the country to a
+foreign nation. In the manner of the defeat of the Anfu clique at the
+height of its supremacy, rather than in the mere fact of its defeat,
+lies the credit side of the Chinese political balance sheet. It is a
+striking exhibition of the oldest and best faith of the Chinese--the
+power of moral considerations. Public opinion, even that of the coolie
+on the street, was wholly against the Anfu party. It went down not so
+much because of the strength of the other side as because of its own
+rottenness.
+
+So far the results are to all appearances negative. The most marked is
+the disappearance of Japanese prestige. As one of the leading men in
+the War Office said: "For over a year now the people have been
+strongly opposed to the Japanese government on account of Shantung.
+But now even the generals do not care for Japan any more." It is
+hardly logical to take the easy collapse of the Japanese-supported
+Anfu party as a proof of the weakness of Japan, but prestige is always
+a matter of feeling rather than of logic. Many who were intimidated to
+the point of hypnotism by the idea of the irresistible power of Japan
+are now freely laughing at the inefficiency of Japanese leadership. It
+would not be safe to predict that Japan will not come back as a force
+to be reckoned with in the internal as well as external politics of
+China, but it is safe to say that never again will Japan figure as
+superman to China. And such a negation is after all a positive result.
+
+And so in its way is the overthrow of the Anwhei faction of the
+militarist party. The Chinese liberals do not feel very optimistic
+about the immediate outcome. They have mostly given up the idea that
+the country can be reformed by political means. They are sceptical
+about the possibility of reforming even politics until a new
+generation comes on the scene. They are now putting their faith in
+education and in social changes which will take some years to
+consummate themselves visibly. The self-styled southern republican
+constitutional party has not shown itself in much better light than
+the northern militarist party. In fact, its old leader Sun Yat Sen now
+cuts one of the most ridiculous figures in China, as shortly before
+this upheaval he had definitely aligned himself with Tuan and little
+Hsu.[2]
+
+    [2] This was written of course several months before Sun Yat
+        Sen was reinstated in control of Canton by the successful
+        revolt of his local adherents against the southern
+        militarists who had usurped power and driven out Sun Yat Sen
+        and his followers. But up to the time when I left China, in
+        July of this year, it was true that the liberals of northern
+        and central China who were bitterly opposed to the Peking
+        Government, did not look to the Southern Government with
+        much hope. The common attitude was a "plague upon both of
+        your houses" and a desire for a new start. The conflict
+        between North and South looms much larger in the United
+        States than it did in China.
+
+This does not mean, however, that democratic opinion thinks nothing
+has been gained. The demonstration of the inherent weakness of corrupt
+militarism will itself prevent the development of any militarism as
+complete as that of the Anfus. As one Chinese gentleman said to me:
+"When Yuan Shi Kai was overthrown, the tiger killed the lion. Now a
+snake has killed the tiger. No matter how vicious the snake may
+become, some smaller animal will be able to kill him, and his life
+will be shorter than that of either lion or tiger." In short, each
+successive upheaval brings nearer the day when civilian supremacy will
+be established. This result will be achieved partly because of the
+repeated demonstrations of the uncongeniality of military despotism to
+the Chinese spirit, and partly because with every passing year
+education will have done its work. Suppressed liberal papers are
+coming to life, while over twenty Anfu subsidized newspapers and two
+subsidized news agencies have gone out of being. The soldiers,
+including many officers in the Anwhei army, clearly show the effects
+of student propaganda. And it is worth while to note down the name of
+one of the leaders on the victorious side, the only one whose troops
+did any particular fighting, and that against great odds in numbers.
+The name is Wu Pei Fu. He at least has not fought for the Chili
+faction against the Anwhei faction. He has proclaimed from the first
+that he was fighting to rid the country of military control of civil
+government, and against traitors who would sell their country to
+foreigners. He has come out strongly for a new popular assembly, to
+form a new constitution and to unite the country. And although Chang
+Tso Lin has remarked that Wu Pei Fu as a military subordinate could
+not be expected to intervene in politics, he has not as yet found it
+convenient to oppose the demand for a popular assembly. Meanwhile the
+liberals are organizing their forces, hardly expecting to win a
+victory, but resolved, win or lose, to take advantage of the
+opportunity to carry further the education of the Chinese people in
+the meaning of democracy.
+
+August, 1920.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+Divided China
+
+
+1.
+
+In January 1920 the Peking government issued an edict proclaiming the
+unification of China. On May 5th Sun Yat Sen was formally inaugurated
+in Canton as president of all China. Thus China has within six months
+been twice unified, once from the northern standpoint and once from
+the southern. Each act of "unification" is in fact a symbol of the
+division of China, a division expressing differences of language,
+temperament, history, and political policy as well as of geography,
+persons and factions. This division has been one of the outstanding
+facts of Chinese history since the overthrow of the Manchus ten years
+ago and it has manifested itself in intermittent civil war. Yet there
+are two other statements which are equally true, although they flatly
+contradict each other and the one just made. One statement is that so
+far as the people of China are concerned there is no real division on
+geographical lines, but only the common division occurring everywhere
+between conservatives and progressives. The other is that instead of
+two divisions in China, there are at least five, two parties in both
+the north and south, and another in the central or Yangtse region,[3]
+each one of the five splitting up again more or less on factional and
+provincial lines. And so far as the future is concerned, probably this
+last statement is the most significant of the three. That all three
+statements are true is what makes Chinese politics so difficult to
+understand even in their larger features.
+
+    [3] Since the writing of this and the former chapter there
+        are some signs that Wu Pei Fu wants to set up in control of
+        the middle districts.
+
+By the good fortune of circumstances we were in Canton when the
+inauguration occurred. Peking and Canton are a long way apart in more
+than distance. There is little exchange of actual news between the two
+places; what filters through into either city and gets published
+consists mostly of rumors tending to discredit the other city. In
+Canton, the monarchy is constantly being restored in Peking; and in
+Peking, Canton is Bolshevized at least once a week, while every other
+week open war breaks out between the adherents of Sun Yat Sen, and
+General Chen Kwang Ming, the civil governor of the province. There is
+nothing to give the impression--even in circles which accept the
+Peking government only as an evil necessity--that the pretensions of
+Sun Yat Sen represent anything more than the desires of a small and
+discredited group to get some slight power for themselves at the
+expense of national unity. Even in Fukien, the province next north of
+Kwantung, one found little but gossip whose effect was to minimize the
+importance of the southern government. In foreign circles in the north
+as well as in liberal Chinese circles upon the whole, the feeling is
+general that bad as the de facto Peking government may be, it
+represents the cause of national unity, while the southern government
+represents a perpetuation of that division of China which makes her
+weak and which offers the standing invitation to foreign intrigue and
+aggression. Only occasionally during the last few months has some
+returned traveller timidly advanced the opinion that we had the "wrong
+dope" on the south, and that they were really trying "to do something
+down there."
+
+Consequently there was little preparation on my part for the spectacle
+afforded in Canton during the week of May 5th. This was the only
+demonstration I have seen in China during the last two years which
+gave any evidence of being a spontaneous popular movement. New Yorkers
+are accustomed to crowds, processions, street decorations and
+accompanying enthusiasm. I doubt if New York has ever seen a
+demonstration which surpassed that of Canton in size, noise, color or
+spontaneity--in spite of tropical rains. The country people flocked in
+in such masses, that, being unable to find accommodation even in the
+river boats, they kept up a parade all night. Guilds and localities
+which were not able to get a place in the regular procession organized
+minor ones on their own account on the day before and after the
+official demonstration. Making all possible allowance for the
+intensity of Cantonese local loyalty and the fact that they might be
+celebrating a Cantonese affair rather than a principle, the scene was
+sufficiently impressive to revise one's preconceived ideas and to make
+one try to find out what it is that gives the southern movement its
+vitality.
+
+A demonstration may be popular and still be superficial in
+significance. However one found foreigners on the ground--at least
+Americans--saying that in the last few months the men in power in
+Canton were the only officials in China who were actually doing
+something for the people instead of filling their own pockets and
+magnifying their personal power. Even the northern newspapers had not
+entirely omitted reference to the suppression of licensed gambling. On
+the spot one learned that this suppression was not only genuine and
+thorough, but that it meant a renunciation of an annual revenue of
+nearly ten million dollars on the part of a government whose chief
+difficulty is financial, and where--apart from motives of personal
+squeeze--it would have been easy to argue that at least temporarily
+the end justified the means in retaining this source of revenue.
+English papers throughout China have given much praise to the
+government of Hong Kong because it has cut down its opium revenue from
+eight to four millions annually with the plan for ultimate extinction.
+Yet Hong Kong is prosperous, it has not been touched by civil war, and
+it only needs revenue for ordinary civil purposes, not as a means of
+maintaining its existence in a crisis.
+
+Under the circumstances, the action of the southern government was
+hardly less than heroic. This renunciation is the most sensational act
+of the Canton government, but one soon learns that it is the
+accompaniment of a considerable number of constructive administrative
+undertakings. Among the most notable are attempts to reform the local
+magistracies throughout the province, the establishment of municipal
+government in Canton--something new in China where local officials are
+all centrally appointed and controlled--based upon the American
+Commission plan, and directed by graduates of schools of political
+science in the United States; plans for introducing local
+self-government throughout the province; a scheme for introduction of
+universal primary education in Canton to be completed in three steps.
+
+These reforms are provincial and local. They are part of a general
+movement against centralization and toward local autonomy which is
+gaining headway all over China, a protest against the appointment of
+officials from Peking and the management of local affairs in the
+interests of factions--and pocketbooks--whose chief interest in local
+affairs is what can be extracted in the way of profit. For the only
+analogue of provincial government in China at the present time is the
+carpet bag government of the south in the days following our civil
+war. These things explain the restiveness of the country, including
+central as well as southern provinces, under Peking domination. But
+they do not explain the setting up of a new national, or federal
+government, with the election of Mr. Sun Yat Sen as its president. To
+understand this event it is necessary to go back into history.
+
+In June, 1917, the parliament in Peking was about to adopt a
+constitution. The parliament was controlled by leaders of the old
+revolutionary party who had been at loggerheads with Yuan and with the
+executive generally. The latter accused them of being obstructionists,
+wasting time in discussing and theorizing when the country needed
+action. Japan had changed her tactics regarding the participation of
+China in the war, and having got her position established through the
+Twenty-one Demands, saw a way of controlling Chinese arsenals and
+virtually amalgamating the Chinese armies with her own through
+supervising China's entrance into the war. The British and French were
+pressing desperately for the same end. Parliament was slow to act, and
+Tang Shao Yi, Sun Yat Sen and other southern leaders were averse,
+since they regarded the war as none of China's business and were upon
+the whole more anti-British than anti-German--a fact which partly
+accounts for the share of British journals in the present press
+propaganda against the Canton government. But what brought matters to
+a head was the fact that the constitution which was about to be
+adopted eliminated the military governors or tuchuns of the provinces,
+and restored the supremacy of civil authority which had been destroyed
+by Yuan Shi Kai, in addition to introducing a policy of
+decentralization. Coached by members of the so-called progressive
+party which claimed to be constitutionalist and which had a
+factionalist interest in overthrowing the revolutionaries who
+controlled the legislative branch if not the executive, the military
+governors demanded that the president suspend parliament and dismiss
+the legislators. This demand was more than passively supported by all
+the Allied diplomats in Peking with the honorable exception of the
+American legation. The president weakly yielded and issued an edict
+dispelling parliament, virtually admitting in the document the
+illegality of his action. Less than a month afterwards he was a
+refugee in the Dutch legation on account of the farce of monarchical
+restoration staged by Chang Shun--who at the present time is again
+coming to the front in the north as adjutant to the plans of Chang Tso
+Lin, the present "strong man" of China. Later, elections were held and
+a new parliament elected. This parliament has been functioning as the
+legislature of China at Peking and elected the president, Hsu Shi
+Chang, the head of the government recognized by the foreign Powers--in
+short it is the Chinese government from an international standpoint,
+the Peking government from a domestic standpoint.
+
+The revolutionary members of the old parliament never recognized the
+legality of their dispersal, and consequently refused to admit the
+legal status of the new parliament, called by them the bogus
+parliament, and of the president elected by it, especially as the new
+legislative body was not elected according to the rules laid down by
+the constitution. Under the lead of some of the old members, the old
+parliament, called by its opponents the defunct parliament, has led an
+intermittent existence ever since. Claiming to be the sole authentic
+constitutional body of China, it finally elected Dr. Sun president of
+China and thus prepared the act of the fifth of May, already reported.
+
+Such is the technical and formal background of the present southern
+government. Its attack upon the legality of the Peking government is
+doubtless technically justified. But for various reasons its own
+positive status is open to equally grave doubts. The terms "bogus" and
+"defunct," so freely cast at each other, both seem to an outsider to
+be justified. It is less necessary to go into the reasons which appear
+to invalidate the position of the southern parliament because of the
+belated character of its final action. A protest which waits four
+years to assert itself in positive action is confronted not with legal
+technicalities but with accomplished facts. In my opinion, legality
+for legality, the southern government has a bare shade the better of
+the technical argument. But in the face of a government which has
+foreign recognition and which has maintained itself after a fashion
+for four years, a legal shadow is a precarious political basis. It is
+wiser to regard the southern government as a revolutionary government,
+which in addition to the prestige of continuing the revolutionary
+movement of ten years ago has also a considerable sentimental asset as
+a protest of constitutionalism against the military usurpations of the
+Peking government.
+
+It is an open secret that the southern movement has not received the
+undivided support of all the forces present in Canton which are
+opposed to the northern government. Tang Shao Yi, for example, was
+notable for his absence at the time of the inauguration, having found
+it convenient to visit the graves of his ancestors at that time. The
+provincial governor, General Chen Kwang Ming, was in favor of
+confining efforts to the establishment of provincial autonomy and the
+encouragement of similar movements in other provinces, looking forward
+to an eventual federal, or confederated, government of at least all
+the provinces south of the Yangtse. Many of his generals wanted to
+postpone action until Kwantung province had made a military alliance
+with the generals in the other southwestern provinces, so as to be
+able to resist the north should the latter undertake a military
+expedition. Others thought the technical legal argument for the new
+move was being overworked, and while having no objections to an out
+and out revolutionary movement against Peking, thought that the time
+for it had not yet come. They are counting on Chang Tso Lin's
+attempting a monarchical restoration and think that the popular
+revulsion against that move would create the opportune time for such a
+movement as has now been prematurely undertaken. However in spite of
+reports of open strife freely circulated by British and Peking
+government newspapers, most of the opposition elements are now loyally
+suppressing their opposition and supporting the government of Sun Yat
+Sen. A compromise has been arranged by which the federal government
+will confine its attention to foreign affairs, leaving provincial
+matters wholly in the hands of Governor Chen and his adherents. There
+is still room for friction however, especially as to the control of
+revenues, since at present there are hardly enough funds for one
+administration, let alone two.
+
+
+2.
+
+The members of the new southern government are strikingly different in
+type from those one meets elsewhere whether in Peking or the
+provincial capitals. The latter men are literally mediaeval when they
+are not late Roman Empire, though most of them have learned a little
+modern patter to hand out to foreigners. The former are educated men,
+not only in the school sense and in the sense that they have had some
+special training for their jobs, but in the sense that they think the
+ideas and speak the language current among progressive folk all over
+the world. They welcome inquiry and talk freely of their plans, hopes
+and fears. I had the opportunity of meeting all the men who are most
+influential in both the local and federal governments; these
+conversations did not take the form of interviews for publication, but
+I learned that there are at least three angles from which the total
+situation is viewed.
+
+Governor Chen has had no foreign education and speaks no English. He
+is distinctively Chinese in his training and outlook. He is a man of
+force, capable of drastic methods, straightforward intellectually and
+physically, of unquestioned integrity and of almost Spartan life in a
+country where official position is largely prized for the luxuries it
+makes possible. For example, practically alone among Chinese
+provincial officials of the first rank he has no concubines. Not only
+this, but he proposed to the provincial assembly a measure to
+disenfranchise all persons who have concubines. (The measure failed
+because it is said its passage would have deprived the majority of the
+assemblymen of their votes.) He is by all odds the most impressive of
+all the officials whom I have met in China. If I were to select a man
+likely to become a national figure of the first order in the future,
+it would be, unhesitatingly, Governor Chen. He can give and also
+command loyalty--a fact which in itself makes him almost unique.
+
+His views in gist are as follows: The problem of problems in China is
+that of real unification. Industry and education are held back because
+of lack of stability of government, and the better elements in society
+seclude themselves from all public effort. The question is how this
+unification is to be obtained. In the past it has been tried by force
+used by strong individuals. Yuan Shi Kai tried and failed; Feng Kuo
+Chang tried and failed; Tuan Chi Jui tried and failed. That method
+must be surrendered. China can be unified only by the people
+themselves, employing not force but the methods of normal political
+evolution. The only way to engage the people in the task is to
+decentralize the government. Futile efforts at centralization must be
+abandoned. Peking and Canton alike must allow the provinces the
+maximum of autonomy; the provincial capitals must give as much
+authority as possible to the districts, and the districts to the
+communities. Officials must be chosen by and from the local districts
+and everything must be done to encourage local initiative. Governor
+Chen's chief ambition is to introduce this system into Kwantung
+province. He believes that other provinces will follow as soon as the
+method has been demonstrated, and that national unity will then be a
+pyramid built out of the local blocks.
+
+With extreme self-government in administrative matters, Governor Chen
+will endeavor to enforce a policy of centralized economic control. He
+says in effect that the west has developed economic anarchy along with
+political control, with the result of capitalistic domination and
+class struggle. He wishes to avert this consequence in China by having
+government control from the first of all basic raw materials and all
+basic industries, mines, transportation, factories for cement, steel,
+etc. In this way the provincial authorities hope to secure an equable
+industrial development of the province, while at the same time
+procuring ample revenues without resorting to heavy taxation. Since
+almost all the other governors in China are using their power, in
+combination with the exploiting capitalists native and foreign, to
+monopolize the natural resources of their provinces for private
+profit, it is not surprising that Governor Chen's views are felt to be
+a menace to privilege and that he is advertised all over China as a
+devout Bolshevist. His views have special point in view of British
+efforts to get an economic stranglehold upon the province--efforts
+which are dealt with in a prior chapter.
+
+Another type of views lays chief stress upon the internal political
+condition of China. Its adherents say in effect: Why make such a fuss
+about having two governments for China, when, in point of fact, China
+is torn into dozens of governments? In the north, war is sure to break
+out sooner or later between Chang Tso Lin and his rivals. Each
+military governor is afraid of his division generals. The brigade
+generals intrigue against the division leaders, and even colonels are
+doing all they can to further their personal power. The Peking
+government is a stuffed sham, taking orders from the military
+governors of the provinces, living only on account of jealousies among
+these generals, and by the grace of foreign diplomatic support. It is
+actually bankrupt, and this actual state will soon be formally
+recognized. The thing for us to do is to go ahead, maintain in good
+faith the work of the revolution, give this province the best possible
+civil administration; then in the inevitable approaching d�b�cle, the
+southern government will be ready to serve as the nucleus of a genuine
+reconstruction. Meantime we want, if not the formal recognition of
+foreign governments, at least their benevolent neutrality.
+
+Dr. Sun still embodies in himself the spirit of the revolution of
+1911. So far as that was not anti-Manchu it was in essence
+nationalistic, and only accidentally republican. The day after the
+inauguration of Dr. Sun, a memorial was dedicated to the seventy-two
+patriot heroes who fell in an abortive attempt in Canton to throw off
+the Manchu yoke, some six months before the successful revolt. The
+monument is the most instructive single lesson which I have seen in
+the political history of the revolution. It is composed of seventy-two
+granite blocks. Upon each is engraved: Given by the Chinese National
+League of Jersey City, or Melbourne, or Mexico, or Liverpool, or
+Singapore, etc. Chinese nationalism is a product of Chinese migration
+to foreign countries; Chinese nationalism on foreign shores financed
+the revolution, and largely furnished its leaders and provided its
+organization. Sun Yat Sen was the incarnation of this nationalism,
+which was more concerned with freeing China--and Asia--from all
+foreign domination than with particular political problems. And in
+spite of the movement of events since that day, he remains essentially
+at that stage, being closer in spirit to the nationalists of the
+European irredentist type than to the spirit of contemporary young
+China. A convinced republican, he nevertheless measures events and men
+in the concrete by what he thinks they will do to promote the
+independence of China from foreign control, rather than by what they
+will do to promote a truly democratic government. This is the sole
+explanation that can be given for his unfortunate coquetting a year
+ago with the leaders of the now fallen Anfu Club. He allowed himself
+to be deceived into thinking that they were ready to turn against the
+Japanese if he would give them his support; and his nationalist
+imagination was inflamed by the grandiose schemes of little Hsu for
+the Chinese subjugation of Mongolia.
+
+More openly than others, Dr. Sun admits and justifies the new southern
+government as representing a division of China. If, he insists, it had
+not been for the secession of the south in 1917, Japan would now be in
+virtually complete control of all China. A unified China would have
+meant a China ready to be swallowed whole by Japan. The secession
+localized Japanese aggressions, made it evident that the south would
+fight rather than be devoured, and gave a breathing spell in which
+public opinion in the north rallied against the Twenty-one Demands and
+against the military pact with Japan. Thus it saved the independence
+of China. But, while it checked Japan, it did not checkmate her. She
+still expects with the assistance of Chang Tso Lin to make northern
+China her vassal. The support which foreign governments in general and
+the United States in particular are giving Peking is merely playing
+into the hands of the Japanese. The independent south affords the only
+obstacle which causes Japan to pause in her plan of making northern
+China in effect a Japanese province. A more than usually authentic
+rumor says that upon the occasion of the visit of the Japanese consul
+general to the new president (no other foreign official has made an
+official visit), the former offered from his government the official
+recognition of Dr. Sun as president of all China, if the latter would
+recognize the Twenty-one Demands as an accomplished fact. From the
+Japanese standpoint the offer was a safe one, as this acceptance of
+Japanese claims is the one thing impossible to the new government. But
+meantime the offer naturally confirms the nationalists of Dr. Sun's
+type in their belief that the southern split is the key to maintaining
+the political independence of China; or, as Dr. Sun puts it, that a
+divided China is for the time being the only means to an ultimately
+independent China.
+
+These views are not given as stating the whole truth of the situation.
+They are ex parte. But they are given as setting forth in good faith
+the conceptions of the leaders of the southern movement and as
+requiring serious attention if the situation of China, domestic and
+international, is to be understood. Upon my own account, and not
+simply as expressing the views of others, I have reached a conclusion
+quite foreign to my thought before I visited the south. While it is
+not possible to attach too much importance to the unity of China as a
+part of the foreign policy of the United States, it is possible to
+attach altogether too much importance to the Peking government as a
+symbol of that unity. To borrow and adapt the words of one southern
+leader, while the United States can hardly be expected to do other
+than recognize the Peking as the de facto government, there is no need
+to coddle that government and give it face. Such a course maintains a
+nominal and formal unity while in fact encouraging the military and
+corrupt forces that keep China divided and which make for foreign
+aggression.
+
+In my opinion as the outcome of two years' observation of the Chinese
+situation, the real interests of both China and the United States
+would be served if, in the first place, the United States should take
+the lead in securing from the diplomatic body in Peking the serving of
+express notice upon the Peking government that in no case would a
+restoration of the monarchy be recognized by the Powers. This may seem
+in America like an unwarranted intervention in the domestic affairs of
+a foreign country. But in fact such intervention is already a fact.
+The present government endures only in virtue of the support of
+foreign Powers. The notice would put an end to one kind of intrigue,
+one kind of rumor and suspicion, which is holding industry and
+education back and which is keeping China in a state of unrest and
+instability. It would establish a period of comparative quiet in which
+whatever constructive forces exist may come to the front. The second
+measure would be more extreme. The diplomacy of the United States
+should take the lead in making it clear that unless the promises about
+the disbanding of the army, and the introduction of general
+retrenchment are honestly and immediately carried out, the Powers will
+pursue a harsh rather than a benevolent policy toward the Peking
+government, insisting upon immediate payment of interest and loans as
+they fall due and holding up the government to the strictest meeting
+of all its obligations. The notification to be effective might well
+include a virtual threat of withdrawal of recognition in case the
+government does not seriously try to put its profuse promises into
+execution. It should also include a definite discouragement of any
+expenditures designed for military conquest of the south.
+
+Diplomatic recognition of the southern government is out of the
+question at present. It is not out of the question to put on the
+financial screws so that the southern government will be allowed space
+and time to demonstrate what it can do by peaceful means to give one
+or more provinces a decent, honest and progressive civil
+administration. It is unnecessary to enumerate the obstacles in the
+way of carrying out such a policy. But in my judgment it is the only
+policy by which the Great Powers will not become accomplices in
+perpetuating the weakness and division of China. It is the most
+straightforward way of meeting whatever plans of aggression Japan may
+entertain.
+
+May, 1921.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+Federalism in China
+
+
+The newcomer in China in observing and judging events usually makes
+the mistake of attaching too much significance to current happenings.
+Occurrences take place which in the western world would portend
+important changes--and nothing important results. It is not easy to
+loosen the habit of years; and so the visitor assumes that an event
+which is striking to the point of sensationalism must surely be part
+of a train of events having a definite trend; some deep-laid plan must
+be behind it. It takes a degree of intellectual patience added to time
+and experience to make one realize that even when there is a rhythm in
+events the tempo is so retarded that one must wait a long time to
+judge what is really going on. Most political events are like daily
+changes in the weather, fluctuations back and forth which may
+seriously affect individuals but which taken one by one tell little
+about the movement of the seasons. Even the occurrences which are due
+to human intention are usually sporadic and casual, and the observer
+errs by reading into them too much plot, too comprehensive a scheme,
+too farsighted a plan. The aim behind the event is likely to be only
+some immediate advantage, some direct increase of power, the overthrow
+of a rival, the grasping at greater wealth by an isolated act, without
+any consecutive or systematic looking ahead.
+
+Foreigners are not the only ones who have erred, however, in judging
+the Chinese political situation of the last few years. Beginning two
+years ago, one heard experienced Chinese with political affiliations
+saying that it was impossible for things to go on as they were for
+more than three months longer. Some decisive change must occur. Yet
+outwardly the situation has remained much the same not only for three
+months but for two years, the exception being the overthrow of the
+Anfu faction a year ago. And this occurrence hardly marked a definite
+turn in events, as it was, to a considerable extent, only a shifting
+of power from the hands of one set of tuchuns to another set.
+Nevertheless at the risk of becoming a victim of the fallacy which I
+have been setting forth, I will hazard the remark that the last few
+months _have_ revealed a definite and enduring trend--that through the
+diurnal fluctuations of the strife for personal power and wealth a
+seasonal political change in society is now showing itself. Certain
+lines of cleavage seem to show themselves, so that through the welter
+of striking, picturesque, sensational but meaningless events, a
+definite pattern is revealed.
+
+This pattern is indicated by the title of this chapter--a movement
+toward the development of a federal form of government. In calling the
+movement one toward federalism, there is, however, more of a jump into
+the remote future than circumstances justify. It would be more
+accurate, as well as more modest, to say that there is a well defined
+and seemingly permanent trend toward provincial autonomy and local
+self-government accompanied by a hope and a vague plan that in the
+future the more or less independent units will recombine into the
+United or Federated States of China. Some who look far into the future
+anticipate three stages; the first being the completion of the present
+secessionist movement; the second the formation of northern and
+southern confederations respectively; the third a reunion into a
+single state.
+
+To go into the detailed evidence for the existence of a definite and
+lasting movement of this sort would presume too much on the reader's
+knowledge of Chinese geography and his acquaintance with specific
+recent events. I shall confine myself to quite general features of the
+situation. The first feature is the new phase which has been assumed
+by the long historic antagonism of the north and the south. Roughly
+speaking, the revolution which established the republic and overthrew
+the Manchus represented a victory for the south. But the
+transformation during the last five years of the nominal republic into
+a corrupt oligarchy of satraps or military governors or feudal lords
+has represented a victory for the north. It is a significant fact,
+symbolically at least, that the most powerful remaining tuchun or
+military governor in China--in some respects the only powerful one who
+has survived the vicissitudes of the last few years--namely Chang Tso
+Lin, is the uncrowned king of the three Manchurian provinces. The
+so-called civil war of the north and south is not, however, to be
+understood as a conflict of republicanism located in the south and
+militarism in the north. Such a notion is directly contrary to facts.
+The "civil war" till six or eight months ago was mainly a conflict of
+military governors and factions, part of that struggle for personal
+power and wealth which has been going on all over China.
+
+But recently events have taken a different course. In four of the
+southern provinces, tuchuns who seemed all powerful have toppled over,
+and the provinces have proclaimed or tacitly assumed their
+independence of both the Peking and the former military Canton
+governments--the province in which Canton situated being one of the
+four. I happened to be in Hunan, the first of the southerly provinces
+to get comparative independence, last fall, not long after the
+overthrow of the vicious despot who had ruled the province with the
+aid of northern troops. For a week a series of meetings were held in
+Changsha, the capital of the province. The burden of every speech was
+"Hunan for the Hunanese." The slogan embodies the spirit of two powers
+each aiming at becoming the central authority; it is a conflict of the
+principle of provincial autonomy, represented by the politically more
+mature south, with that of militaristic centralization, represented by
+Peking.
+
+As I write, in early September (1921), the immediate issue is obscured
+by the fight which Wu Pei Fu is waging with the Hunanese who with
+nominal independence are in aim and interest allied with the south.
+If, as is likely, Wu Pei Fu wins, he may take one of two courses. He
+may use his added power to turn against Chang Tso Lin and the northern
+militarists which will bring him into virtual alliance with the
+southerners and establish him as the antagonist of the federal
+principle. This is the course which his earlier record would call for.
+Or he may yield to the usual official lust for power and money and try
+once more the Yuan Shi Kai policy of military centralization with
+himself as head, after trying out conclusions with Chang Tso Lin as
+his rival. This is the course which the past record of military
+leaders indicates. But even if Wu Pei Fu follows precedent and goes
+bad, he will only hasten his own final end. This is not prophecy. It
+is only a statement of what has uniformly happened in China just at
+the moment a military leader seemed to have complete power in his
+grasp. In other words, a victory for Wu Pei Fu may either accelerate
+or may retard the development of provincial autonomy according to the
+course he pursues. It cannot permanently prevent or deflect it.
+
+The basic factor that makes one sure that this trend toward local
+autonomy is a reality and not merely one of those meaningless
+shiftings of power which confuse the observer, is that it is in accord
+with Chinese temperament, tradition and circumstance. Feudalism is
+past and gone two thousand years ago, and at no period since has China
+possessed a working centralized government. The absolute empires which
+have come and gone in the last two millenniums existed by virtue of
+non-interference and a religious aura. The latter can never be
+restored; and every episode of the republic demonstrates that China
+with its vast and diversified territories, its population of between
+three hundred and fifty and four hundred million, its multitude of
+languages and lack of communications, its enormous local attachments
+sanctified by the family system and ancestral worship, cannot be
+managed from a single and remote centre. China rests upon a network of
+local and voluntary associations cemented by custom. This fact has
+given it its unparallelled stability and its power to progress even
+under the disturbed political conditions of the past ten years. I
+sometimes think that Americans with their own traditional contempt for
+politics and their spontaneous reliance upon self-help and local
+organization are the ones who are naturally fitted to understand
+China's course. The Japanese with their ingrained reliance upon the
+state have continually misjudged and misacted. The British understand
+better than we do the significance of local self-government; but they
+are misled by their reverence for politics so that they cannot readily
+find or see government when it does not take political form.
+
+It is not too much to say that one great cause for the overthrow of
+the Manchus was the fact that because of the pressure of international
+relations they attempted to force, especially in fiscal matters, a
+centralization upon the provinces wholly foreign to the spirit of the
+people. This created hostility where before there had been
+indifference. China may possibly not emerge from her troubles a
+unified nation, any more than a much smaller and less populous Europe
+emerged from the break-up of the Holy Roman Empire, a single state.
+Indeed one often wonders, not that China is divided, but that she is
+not much more broken up than she is. But one thing is certain.
+Whatever progress China finally succeeds in making will come from a
+variety of local centres, not from Peking or Canton. It will be
+effected by means of associations and organizations which even though
+they assume a political form are not primarily political in nature.
+
+Criticisms are passed, especially by foreigners, upon the present
+trend of events. The criticisms are more than plausible. It is evident
+that the present weakness of China is due to her divided condition.
+Hence it is natural to argue that the present movement being one of
+secession and general disintegration will increase the weakness of the
+country. It is also evident that many of China's troubles are due to
+the absence of any efficient administrative system; it is reasonable
+to argue that China cannot get even railways and universal education
+without a strong and stable central government. There is no doubt
+about the facts. It is not surprising that many friends of China
+deeply deplore the present tendency while some regard it as the final
+accomplishment of the long predicted breakup of China. But remedies
+for China's ills based upon ignoring history, psychology and actual
+conditions are so utopian that it is not worth while to argue whether
+or not they are theoretically desirable. The remedy of China's
+troubles by a strong, centralized government is on a par with curing
+disease by the expulsion of a devil. The evil of sectionalism is real,
+but since it is real it cannot be dealt with by trying a method which
+implies its non-existence. If the devil is really there, he will not
+be exorcized by a formula. If the trouble is internal, not due to an
+external demon, the disease can be cured only by using the factors of
+health and vigor which the patient already possesses. And in China
+while these factors of recuperation and growth are numerous, they all
+exist in connection with local organizations and voluntary
+associations. The increasing volume of the cry that the "tuchuns must
+go" comes from the provincial and local interests which have been
+insulted and violated by a nominally centralized but actually chaotic
+situation. After this negative work is completed, the constructive
+rebuilding of China can proceed only by utilizing local interests and
+abilities. In China the movement will be the opposite of that which
+occurred in Japan. It will be from the periphery to the centre.
+
+Another objection to the present tendency has force especially from
+the foreign standpoint. As already stated, the efforts of the Manchu
+dynasty in its latter days to enhance central power were due to
+international pressure. Foreign nations treated Peking as if it were a
+capital like London, Paris or Berlin, and in its efforts to meet
+foreign demands it had to try to become such a centre. The result was
+disaster. But foreign nations still want to have a single centre which
+may be held responsible. And subconsciously, if not consciously, this
+desire is responsible for much of the objection of foreign nationals
+to the local autonomy movement. They well know that it is going to
+take a long time to realize the ideal of federation, and meantime
+where and what is to be the agency responsible for diplomatic
+relations, the enforcing of indemnities and the securing of
+concessions?
+
+In one respect the secessionist tendency is dangerous to China herself
+as well as inconvenient to the powers. It will readily stimulate the
+desire and ability of foreign nations to interfere in China's domestic
+affairs. There will be many centres at which to carry on intrigues and
+from which to get concessions instead of one or two. There is also
+danger that one foreign nation may line up with one group of
+provinces, and another foreign nation with another group, so that
+international friction will increase. Even now some Japanese sources
+and even such an independent liberal paper as Robert Young's Japan
+Chronicle are starting or reporting the rumor that the Cantonese
+experiment is supported by subsidies supplied by American capitalists
+in the hope of economic concessions. The rumor was invented for a
+sinister purpose. But it illustrates the sort of situation that may
+come into existence if there are several political centres in China
+and one foreign nation backs one and another nation, another.
+
+The danger is real enough. But it cannot be dealt with by attempting
+the impossible--namely checking the movement toward local autonomy,
+even though disintegration may temporarily accompany it. The danger
+only emphasizes the fundamental fact of the whole Chinese situation;
+that its essence is time. The evils and troubles of China are real
+enough, and there is no blinking the fact that they are largely of her
+own making, due to corruption, inefficiency and absence of popular
+education. But no one who knows the common people doubts that they
+will win through if they are given time. And in the concrete this
+means that they be left politically alone to work out their own
+destiny. There will doubtless be proposals at the Pacific Conference
+to place China under some kind of international tutelage. This chapter
+and the events connected with the tendency which it reports will be
+cited as showing this need. Some of the schemes will spring from
+motives that are hostile to China. Some will be benevolently conceived
+in a desire to save China from herself and shorten her period of chaos
+and confusion. But the hope of the world's peace, as well as of
+China's freedom, lies in adhering to a policy of Hands Off. Give China
+a chance. Give her time. The danger lies in being in a hurry, in
+impatience, possibly in the desire of America to show that we are a
+power in international affairs and that we too have a positive foreign
+policy. And a benevolent policy of supporting China from without,
+instead of promoting her aspirations from within, may in the end do
+China about as much harm as a policy conceived in malevolence.
+
+July, 1921.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+A Parting of the Ways for America
+
+
+1
+
+The realities of American policy in China and toward China are going
+to be more seriously tested in the future than they ever have been in
+the past. Japanese papers have been full of protests against any
+attempt by the Pacific Conference to place Japan on trial. Would that
+American journals were full of warnings that America is on trial at
+the Conference as to the sincerity and intelligent goodwill behind her
+amiable professions. The world will not stop with the Pacific
+Conference; the latter, however important, will not arrest future
+developments, and the United States will continue to be on trial till
+she has established by her acts a permanent and definite attitude. For
+the realities of the situation cannot be exhausted in any formula or
+in any set of diplomatic agreements, even if the Conference confounds
+the fears of pessimists and results in a harmonious union of the
+powers in support of China's legitimate aspirations for free political
+and economic growth.
+
+The Conference, however, stands as a symbol of the larger situation;
+and its decisions or lack of them will be a considerable factor in the
+determination of subsequent events. Sometimes one is obliged to fall
+back on a trite phrase. We are genuinely at a parting of the ways.
+Even if we should follow in our old path, there would none the less be
+a parting of the ways, for we cannot consistently tread the old path
+unless we are animated by a much more conscious purpose and a more
+general and intelligent knowledge of affairs than have controlled our
+activities in the past.
+
+The ideas expressed by an English correspondent about the fear that
+America is soon to be an active source of danger in the Far East are
+not confined to persons on foreign shores. The prevailing attitude in
+some circles of American opinion is that called by President Hibben
+cynical pessimism. All professed radicals and many liberals believe
+that if our course has been better in the past it has been due to
+geographical accidents combined with indifference and with our
+undeveloped economic status. Consequently they believe that since we
+have now become what is called a world-power and a nation which
+exports instead of importing capital, our course will soon be as bad
+as that of any of the rest of them. In some quarters this opinion is
+clearly an emotional reaction following the disillusionments of
+Versailles. In others, it is due to adherence to a formula: nothing in
+international affairs can come out of capitalism and America is
+emphatically a capitalistic country. Whether or not these feelings are
+correct, they are not discussable; neither an emotion nor an absolute
+formula is subject to analysis.
+
+But there are specific elements in the situation which give grounds
+for apprehension as to the future. These specific elements are capable
+of detection and analysis. An adequate realization of their nature
+will be a large factor in preventing cynical apprehensions from
+becoming actual. This chapter is an attempt at a preliminary listing,
+inadequate, of course, as any preliminary examination must be. While
+an a priori argument based on a fatalistic formula as to how a
+"capitalistic nation" must conduct itself does not appeal to me, there
+are nevertheless concrete facts which are suggested by that formula.
+Part of our comparatively better course in China in the past is due to
+the fact that we have not had the continuous and close alliance
+between the State Department and big banking interests which is found
+in the case of foreign powers. No honest well-informed history of
+developments in China could be written in which the Russian Asiatic
+Bank, the Foreign Bank of Belgium, the French Indo-China Bank and
+Banque Industrielle, the Yokohama Specie Bank, the Hongkong-Shanghai
+Bank, etc., did not figure prominently. These banks work in the
+closest harmony, not only with railway and construction syndicates and
+big manufacturing interests at home, but also with their respective
+foreign offices. It is hardly too much to say that legations and banks
+have been in most important matters the right and left hands of the
+same body. American business interests have complained an the past
+that the American government does not give to American traders abroad
+the same support that the nationals of other states receive. In the
+past these complaints have centred largely about actual wrongs
+suffered or believed to have been suffered by American business
+undertakings carried on in a foreign country. With the present
+expansion of capital and of commerce, the same complaints and demands
+are going to be made not with reference to grievances suffered, but
+with reference to furthering, to pushing American commercial interests
+in connection with large banking groups. It would take a credulous
+person to deny the influence of big business in domestic politics. As
+we become more interested in commerce and banking enterprises what
+assurance have we that the alliance will not be transferred to
+international politics?
+
+It should be noted that the policy of the open door as affirmed by the
+great powers--and as frequently violated by them--even if it be
+henceforth observed in good faith, does not adequately protect us from
+this danger. The open door policy is not primarily a policy about
+China herself but rather about the policies of foreign powers toward
+one another with respect to China. It demands equality of economic
+opportunity for different nations. Were it enforced, it would prevent
+the granting of monopolies to any one nation: there is nothing in it
+to render impossible a conjoint exploitation of China by foreign
+powers, an organized monopoly in which each nation has its due share
+with respect to others. Such an organization might conceivably reduce
+friction among the great powers, and thereby reduce the danger of
+future wars--as long as China herself is impotent to go to war. The
+agreement might conceivably for a considerable time be of benefit to
+China herself. But it is clear that for the United States to become a
+partner in any such arrangement would involve a reversal of our
+historic policy in the Far East. It might be technically consistent
+with the open door policy, but it would be a violation of the larger
+sense in which the American people has understood and praised that
+ideal. He is blind who does not see that there are forces making for
+such a reversal. And since we are all more or less blind, an opening
+of our eyes to the danger is one of the conditions of its not being
+realized.
+
+One of the forces which is operative is indicated by the phrase that
+an international agreement on an economic and financial basis might be
+of value to China herself. The mere suggestion that such a thing is
+possible is abhorrent to many, especially to radicals. There seems to
+be something sinister in it. So it is worth explaining how and why it
+might be so. In the first place, it would obviously terminate the
+particularistic grabbing for "leased" territory, concessions and
+spheres of influence which has so damaged China. At the present time,
+the point of this remark lies in its implied reference to Japan, as at
+one time it might have applied to Russia. Fear of Japan's aims in
+China is not confined to China; the fear is widespread. An
+international economic arrangement may therefore be plausibly
+presented as the easiest and most direct method of relieving China of
+the Japanese menace. For Japan to stay out would be to give herself
+away; if she came in, it would subject Japanese activities to constant
+scrutiny and control. There is no doubt that part of the fear of Japan
+regarding the Pacific Conference is due to a belief that some such
+arrangement is contemplated. The case is easily capable of such
+presentation as to make it appeal to Americans who are really friendly
+to China and who haven't the remotest interest in her economic
+exploitation.
+
+The arrangement would, for example, automatically eliminate the
+Lansing-Ishii agreement with its embarrassing ambiguous recognition of
+Japan's _special_ interests in China.
+
+The other factor is domestic. The distraction and civil wars of China
+are commonplaces. So is the power exercised by the military governors
+and generals. The greater one's knowledge, the more one perceives how
+intimately the former evil is dependent upon the latter. The financial
+plight of the Chinese government, its continual foreign borrowings
+which threaten bankruptcy in the near future, depend upon militaristic
+domination and wild expenditure for unproductive purposes and squeeze.
+Without this expense, China would have no great difficulty henceforth
+in maintaining a balance in her budget. The retardation of public
+education whose advancement--especially in elementary schools--is
+China's greatest single need is due to the same cause. So is the
+growth in official corruption which is rapidly extending into business
+and private life.
+
+In fact, every one of the obstacles to the progress of China is
+connected with the rule of military factions and their struggles with
+one another for complete mastery. An economic international agreement
+among the great powers can be made which would surely reduce and
+possibly eliminate the greatest evils of "militarism." Many liberal
+Chinese say in private that they would be willing to have a temporary
+international receivership for government finance, provided they could
+be assured of its nature and the exact date and conditions of its
+termination--a proviso which they are sensible enough to recognize
+would be extremely difficult of attainment. American leadership in
+forming and executing any such scheme would, they feel, afford the
+best reassurance as to its nature and terms. Under such circumstances
+a plausible case can be made out for proposals which, under the guise
+of traditional American friendship for China, would in fact commit us
+to a reversal of our historic policy.
+
+There are radicals abroad and at home who think that our entrance into
+a Consortium already proves that we have entered upon the road of
+reversal and who naturally see in the Pacific Conference the next
+logical step. I have previously stated my own belief that our State
+Department proposed the Consortium primarily for political ends, as a
+means of checking the policy pursued by Japan of making unproductive
+loans to China in return for which she was getting an immediate grip
+on China's natural resources and preparing the way for direct
+administrative and financial control when the day of reckoning and
+foreclosure should finally come. I also said that the Consortium was
+between two stools, the financial and the political and that up to the
+present its chief value had been negative and preventive, and that
+jealousy or lack of interest by Japan and Great Britain in any
+constructive policy on the part of the Consortium was likely to
+maintain the same condition. I have seen no reason thus far to change
+my mind on this point, nor in regard to the further belief that
+probably the interests of China in the end will be best served by the
+continuation of this deterrent function. But the question is bound to
+arise: why continue the Consortium if it isn't doing anything? The
+pressure of foreign powers interested in the exploitation of China and
+of impatient American economic interests may combine to put an end to
+the present rather otiose existence led by the Consortium. The two
+stools between which the past action of the American government has
+managed to swing the Consortium may be united to form a single solid
+bench.
+
+At the risk of being charged with credulous gullibility, or something
+worse, I add that up to the present time the American phase of the
+Consortium hasn't shown perceptible signs of becoming a club exercised
+by American finance over China's economic integrity and independence.
+I believe the repeated statements of the American representative that
+he himself and the interests he represents would be glad if China
+proved her ability to finance her own public utilities without
+resorting to foreign loans. This belief is confirmed by the first
+public utterance of the new American minister to China who in his
+reference to the Consortium laid emphasis upon its deterrent function
+and upon the stimulation it has given to Chinese bankers to finance
+public utilities. And it is the merest justice to Mr. Stevens, the
+American representative, to say that he represents the conservative
+investment type of banker, not the "promotion" type, and that thus far
+his great concern has been the problem of protecting the buyer of such
+securities as are passed on by the banks to the ultimate investor--so
+much so that he has aroused criticism from American business interests
+impatient for speedy action. But there is a larger phase of the
+Consortium concerning which I think apprehensions may reasonably be
+entertained.
+
+Suppose, if merely by way of hypothesis, that the American government
+is genuinely interested in China and in making the policy of the open
+door and Chinese territorial and administrative integrity a reality,
+not merely a name, and suppose that it is interested in doing so from
+an American self-interest sufficiently enlightened to perceive that
+the political and economic advancement of the United States is best
+furthered by a policy which is identical with China's ability to
+develop herself freely and independently: what then would be the wise
+American course? In short, it would be to view our existing European
+interests and issues (due to the war) and our Far Eastern interests
+and issues as parts of one and the same problem. If we are actuated by
+the motive hypothetically imputed to our government and we fail in its
+realization, the chief reason will be that we regard the European
+question and the Asiatic problem as two different questions, or
+because we identify them from the wrong end.
+
+Our present financial interest in Europe is enormous. It involves not
+merely foreign governmental loans but a multitude of private advances
+and commitments. These financial entanglements affect not merely our
+industry and commerce but our politics. They involve much more
+immediately pressing concerns than to our Asiatic relations, and they
+involve billions where the latter involve millions. The danger under
+such conditions that our Asiatic relations will be sacrificed to our
+European is hardly fanciful.
+
+To make this abstract statement concrete, the firm of bankers, J. P.
+Morgan & Co., which is most heavily involved in European indebtedness
+to the United States, is the firm which is the leading spirit in the
+Consortium for China. It seems almost inevitable that the Asiatic
+problem should look like small potatoes in comparison with the
+European one, especially as our own industrial recuperation is so
+closely connected with European relations, while the Far East cuts a
+negligible figure. To my mind the real danger to set out upon selfish
+exploitation of China: intelligent self-interest, tradition and the
+fact that our chief asset in China is our past freedom from a
+predatory course, dictate a course of cooperation with China. The
+danger is that China will be subordinated and sacrificed because of
+primary preoccupation with the high finance and politics of Europe,
+that she will be lost in the shuffle.
+
+The European aspect of the problem can be made more concrete by
+reference to Great Britain in particular. That country suffers from
+the embarrassment of the Japanese alliance. She has already made it
+sufficiently clear that she would like to draw America into the
+alliance, making it tripartite, since that would be the easiest way of
+maintaining good relations with both Japan and the United States.
+There is no likelihood that any such step will be consummated. But
+British diplomacy is experienced and astute. And by force of
+circumstances our high finance has contracted a sort of economic
+alliance with Great Britain. There is no wish to claim superior virtue
+for America or to appeal to the strong current of anti-British
+sentiment. But the British foreign office exists and operates apart
+from the tradition of liberalism which has mainly actuated English
+domestic politics. It stands peculiarly for the _Empire_ side of the
+British Empire, no matter what party is in the saddle in domestic
+affairs. Every resource will be employed to bring about a settlement
+at the Pacific Conference which, even though it includes some degree
+of compromise on the part of Great Britain, will bend the Asiatic
+policy of the United States to the British traditions in the Far East,
+instead of committing Great Britain to combining with the United
+States in making a reality of the integrity of China to which both
+countries are nominally committed. It does not seem an extreme
+statement to say that the immediate issues of the Conference depend
+upon the way in which our financial commitments in Europe are treated,
+either as reasons for our making concessions to European policy or on
+the other hand as a means of securing an adherence of the European
+powers to the traditional American policy.
+
+A publicist in China who is of British origin and a sincere friend of
+China remarked in private conversation that if the United States could
+not secure the adherence of Great Britain to her Asiatic policy by
+persuasion (he was deploring the Japanese alliance) she might do so by
+buying it--through remission of her national debt to us. It is not
+necessary to resort to the measure so baldly suggested. But the remark
+at least suggests that our involvement in European, especially
+British, finance and politics may be treated in either of two ways for
+either of two results.
+
+
+2
+
+That the Chinese people generally speaking has a less antagonistic
+feeling toward the United States than towards other powers seems to me
+an undoubted fact. The feeling has been disturbed at divers times by
+the treatment of the Chinese upon the Pacific coast, by the exclusion
+act, by the turning over of our interest in the building of the
+Peking-Canton (or Hankow) railway to a European group, by the
+Lansing-Ishii agreement, and finally by the part played by President
+Wilson in the Versailles decision regarding Shantung. Those
+disturbances in the main, however, have made them dubious as to our
+skill, energy and intelligence rather than as to our good-will.
+Americans, taken individually and collectively, are to the Chinese--at
+least such was my impression--a rather simple folk, taking the word in
+its good and its deprecatory sense. In noting the Chinese reaction to
+the proposed Pacific Conference, it was interesting to see the
+combination of an almost unlimited hope that the United States was to
+lead in protecting them from further aggressions and in rectifying
+existing evils, with a lack of confidence, a fear that the United
+States would have something put over on it.
+
+Friendly feeling is of course mainly based upon a negative fact, the
+fact that the United States has taken no part in "leasing"
+territories, establishing spheres and setting up extra-national
+post-offices. On the positive side stands the contribution made by
+Americans to education, especially medical, and that of girls and
+women, and to philanthropy and relief. Politically, there are the
+early service of Burlinghame, the open door policy of John Hay (though
+failure to maintain it in fact while securing signatures to it on
+paper is a considerable part of the Chinese belief in our defective
+energy) and the part played by the United States in moderating the
+terms of the settlement of the Boxer outbreak, in addition to a
+considerable number of minor helpful acts. China also remembers that
+we were the only nation to take exception to the treaties embodying
+the Twenty-one Demands. While our exception was chiefly made on the
+basis of our own interests which these treaties might injuriously
+affect, a sentiment exists that the protest was a pledge of assistance
+to China when the time should be opportune for raising the whole
+question. And without doubt the reservation made on May 16, 1915, by
+our State Department is a strong card at the forthcoming Conference if
+the Department wishes to play it.
+
+From an American standpoint, the open door principle represents one of
+the only two established principles of American diplomacy, the other
+being, of course, the Monroe Doctrine. In connection with sentimental
+or idealistic associations which have clustered about it, it
+constitutes us in some vague fashion in both the Chinese and American
+public opinion a sort of guardian or at least spokesman of the
+interests of China in relation to foreign powers. Although, as was
+pointed out in a former chapter, the open door policy directly
+concerns other nations in their relation to China rather than China
+herself, yet the violation of the policy by other powers has been so
+frequent and so much to the detriment of China, that American
+interest, prestige and moral sentiment are now implicated in such an
+enforcement of it as will redound to the advantage of China.
+
+Citizens of other countries are often irritated by a suggestion of
+such a relationship between the United States and China. It presents
+itself as a proclamation of superior national virtue under cover of
+which the United States aims to establish its influence in China at
+the expense of other countries. The irritation is exasperated by the
+fact that the situation as it stands is an undoubted economic and
+political asset of the United States in China. We may concede without
+argument any contention that the situation is not due to any superior
+virtue but rather to contingencies of history and geography--in which
+respect it is not unlike many things that pass for virtues with
+individuals. The contention may be admitted without controversy
+because it is not pertinent to the main issue. The question is not so
+much how the state of affairs came about as what it now is, how it is
+to be treated and what consequences are in flow from it. It is a fact
+that up to the present an intelligent self-interest of America has
+coincided with the interests of a stable, independent and progressive
+China. It is also a fact that American traditions and sentiments have
+gathered about this consideration so that now there is widespread
+conviction in the American people of moral obligations of assistance
+and friendly protection owed by us to China. At present, no policy can
+be entered upon that does not bear the semblance of fairness and
+goodwill. We have at least so much protection against the dangers
+discussed in the prior chapter.
+
+Among Americans in China and presumably at home there is a strong
+feeling that we should adopt for the future stronger and more positive
+policies than we have maintained in the past. This feeling seems to me
+fraught with dangers unless we make very clear to ourselves in just
+what respects we are to continue and make good in a more positive
+manner our traditional policy. To some extent our past policy has been
+one of drifting. Radical change in this respect may go further than
+appears upon the surface in altering other fundamental aspects of our
+policy. What is condemned as drifting is in effect largely the same
+thing that is also praised as non-interference. A detailed settled
+policy, no matter how "constructive" it may appear to be, can hardly
+help involving us in the domestic policies of China, an affair of
+factions and a game which the Chinese understand and play much better
+than any foreigners. Such an involvement would at once lessen a
+present large asset in China, aloofness from internal intrigues and
+struggles.
+
+The specific protests of Chinese in this country--mainly
+Cantonese--against the Consortium seem to me mainly based on
+misapprehension. But their _general_ attitude of opposition
+nevertheless conveys an important lesson. It is based on a belief that
+the effect of the Consortium will be to give the Peking government a
+factitious advantage in the internal conflict which is waging in
+China, so that to all intents and purposes it will mark a taking of
+sides on our part. It is well remembered that the effect of the
+"reorganization" loan of the prior Consortium--in which the United
+States was _not_ a partner--was to give Yuan Shi Kai the funds which
+seated him and the militarist faction after him, firmly in the
+governmental saddle. Viewing the matter from a larger point of view
+than that of Canton vs. Peking, the most fundamental objection I heard
+brought by Chinese against the Consortium was in effect as follows:
+The republican revolution in China has still to be wrought out; the
+beginning of ten years ago has been arrested. It remains to fight it
+out. The inevitable effect of increased foreign financial and economic
+interest in China, even admitting that its industrial effect was
+advantageous to China, would be to create an interest in _stabilizing_
+China politically, which in effect would mean to sanctify the status
+quo, and prevent the development of a revolution which cannot be
+accomplished without internal disorders that would affect foreign
+investments unfavorably. These considerations are not mentioned for
+the sake of throwing light on the Consortium: they are cited as an
+illustration of the probability that a too positive and constructive
+development of our tradition of goodwill to China would involve us in
+an interference with Chinese domestic affairs injurious to China's
+welfare, to that free and independent development in which we profess
+such interest.
+
+But how, it will be asked, are we to protect China from foreign
+depredations, particularly those of Japan, how are we to change our
+nominal goodwill into a reality, if we do not enter much more positive
+and detailed policies? If there was in existence at the present time
+any such thing as a diplomacy of peoples as distinct from a diplomacy
+of governments, the question would mean something quite different from
+what it now means. As things now stand the people should profoundly
+distrust the _politicians'_ love for China. It is too frequently the
+reverse side of fear and incipient hatred of Japan, colored perhaps by
+anti-British feeling.
+
+There should be no disguising of the situation. The aggressive
+activities of other nations in China, centering but not exhausted at
+this time in Japan, are not merely sources of trouble to China but
+they are potential causes of trouble in our own international
+relationships. We are committed by our tradition and by the present
+actualities of the situation to attempting something positive for
+China as respects her international status, to live up to our
+responsibility is a most difficult and delicate matter. We have on the
+one side to avoid getting entangled in quasi-imperialistic European
+policies in Asia, whether under the guise of altruism, of putting
+ourselves in a position where we can exercise a more effective
+supervision of their behavior, or by means of economic expansion. On
+the other side, we have to avoid drifting into that kind of covert or
+avowed antagonism to European and Japanese imperialism which will only
+increase friction, encourage a combination especially of Great Britain
+and Japan---or of France and Japan--against us, and bring war
+appreciably nearer.
+
+We need to bear in mind that China will not be saved from outside
+herself. Even if by a successful war we should relieve China from
+Japanese encroachments, from all encroachments, China would not of
+necessity be brought nearer her legitimate goal of orderly and
+prosperous internal development. Apart from the question of how far
+war can now settle any fundamental issues without begetting others as
+dangerous, China of all countries is the one where settlement by
+force, especially by outside force, is least applicable, and most
+likely to be enormously disserviceable. China is used to taking time
+to deal with her problems: she can neither understand not profit by
+impatient methods of the western world which are profoundly alien to
+her genius. Moreover a civilization which is on a continental scale,
+which is so old that the rest of us are parvenus in comparison, which
+is thick and closely woven, cannot be hurried in its development
+without disaster. Transformation from within is its sole way out, and
+we can best help China by trying to see to it that she gets the time
+she needs in order to effect this transformation, whether or not we
+like the particular form it assumes at any particular time.
+
+A successful war in behalf of China would leave untouched her problems
+of education, of factional and sectional forces, of political
+immaturity showing itself in present incapacity for organization. It
+would affect her industrial growth undoubtedly, but in all human
+probability for the worse, increasing the likelihood that she would
+enter upon an industrialization which would repeat the worst evils of
+western industrial life, without the immunities, resistances and
+remedial measures which the West has evolved. The imagination cannot
+conceive a worse crime than fastening western industrialism upon China
+before she has developed within herself the meaning of coping with the
+forces which it would release. The danger is great enough as it is.
+War waged in China's behalf by western powers and western methods
+would make the danger practically irresistible. In addition we should
+gain a permanent interest in China which is likely to be of the most
+dangerous character to ourselves. If we were not committed by it to
+future imperialism, we should be luckier than we have any right to
+hope to be. These things are said against a mental protest to
+admitting even by implication the prospect of war with Japan, but it
+seems necessary to say them.
+
+These remarks are negative and vague as to our future course. They
+imply a confession of lack of such wisdom as would enable me to make
+positive definite proposals. But at least I have confidence in the
+wisdom and goodwill of the American and other peoples to deal with the
+problem, if they are only called into action. And the first condition
+of calling wisdom and goodwill into effective existence is to
+recognize the seriousness of the problem and the utter futility of
+trying to force its solution by impatient and hurried methods.
+Pro-Japanese apologetics is dangerous; it obscures the realities of
+the situation. An irritated anti-Japanism that would hasten the
+solution of the Chinese problem merely by attacking Japan is equally
+fatal to discovering and applying a proper method.
+
+More specifically and also more generically, proper publicity is the
+greatest need. If, as Secretary Hughes has intimated, a settlement of
+the problems of the Pacific is made a condition of arriving at an
+agreement regarding reduction and limitation of armaments, it is
+likely that the Conference might better never be held. In eagerness to
+do something which will pass as a settlement, either China's--and
+Siberia's--interests will be sacrificed in some unfair compromise, or
+irritation and friction will be increased--and in the end so will
+armaments. In any literal sense, it is ridiculous to suppose that the
+problems of the Pacific can be settled in a few weeks, or months--or
+years. Yet the discussion of the problems, in separation from the
+question of armament, may be of great use. For it may further that
+publicity which is a pre-condition of any genuine settlement. This
+involves the public in diplomacy. But it also involves a wider
+publicity, one which will enlighten the world about the facts of Asia,
+internal and international.
+
+Scepticism about Foreign Offices, as they are at present conducted, is
+justified. But scepticism about the power of public opinion, if it can
+be aroused and instructed, to reshape Foreign Office policies means
+hopelessness about the future of the world. Let everything possible be
+done to reduce armament, if only to secure a naval holiday on the part
+of the three great naval powers, and if only for the sake of lessening
+taxation. Let the Conference on Problems devote itself to discussing
+and making known as fully and widely as possible the element and scope
+of those problems, and the fears--or should one call them hopes?--of
+the cynics will be frustrated. It is not so important that a decision
+in the American sense of the Yap question be finally and forever
+arrived at, as it is that the need of China and the Orient in general
+for freer and fuller communications with the rest of the world be made
+clear--and so on, down or up the list of agenda. The commercial open
+door is needed. But the need is greater that the door be opened to
+light, to knowledge and understanding. If these forces will not create
+a public opinion which will in time secure a lasting and just
+settlement of other problems, there is no recourse save despair of
+civilization. Liberals can do something better than predicting failure
+and impugning motives. They can work for the opened door of open
+diplomacy, of continuous and intelligent inquiry, of discussion free
+from propaganda. To shirk this responsibility on the alleged ground
+that economic imperialism and organized greed will surely bring the
+Conference to failure is supine and snobbish. It is one of the factors
+that may lead the United States to take the wrong course in the
+parting of the ways.
+
+October, 1921.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's China, Japan and the U.S.A., by John Dewey
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+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of China, Japan and the U.S.A., by John Dewey
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: China, Japan and the U.S.A.
+       Present-Day Conditions in the Far East and Their Bearing
+              on the Washington Conference
+
+Author: John Dewey
+
+Release Date: October 25, 2009 [EBook #28393]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHINA, JAPAN AND THE U.S.A. ***
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+
+Produced by Barbara Tozier, Bill Tozier and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
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+</pre>
+
+<div id="title-page"><a class="pagenum disguise" id="page1" title="1"> </a>
+	<h1>CHINA, JAPAN<br /> <span class="smaller">AND THE</span> U. S. A.</h1>
+
+	<p class="second-title">Present-day Conditions<br />
+	in the Far East<br />
+	and Their Bearing on<br />
+	the Washington<br />
+	Conference</p>
+
+	<p class="byline"><em>by</em><br />
+	<span class="author">JOHN DEWEY</span><br />
+
+	<span class="affiliation">Professor of Philosophy at<br />
+	Columbia University</span></p>
+
+	<p class="number">New Republic Pamphlet No. 1</p>
+
+	<p class="publisher">Published by the<br />
+	<span class="pub-name">REPUBLIC PUBLISHING CO., INC.</span><br />
+	421 West Twenty-first Street<br />
+	<span class="pub-city">New York City</span><br />
+	<span class="pub-date">1921</span></p>
+</div>
+<div id="copyright-page"><a class="pagenum disguise" id="page2" title="2"> </a>
+	<p id="copyright-statement">Copyright 1921<br />
+	<span class="pub-name">Republic Publishing Co. Inc.</span></p>
+</div>
+<div id="contents">
+	<h2>Contents</h2>
+	<ol>
+		<li><a href="#essay1">On Two Sides of the Eastern Seas</a></li>
+		<li><a href="#essay2">Shantung, As Seen From Within</a></li>
+		<li><a href="#essay3">Hinterlands in China</a></li>
+		<li><a href="#essay4">A Political Upheaval in China</a></li>
+		<li><a href="#essay5">Divided China</a></li>
+		<li><a href="#essay6">Federalism in China</a></li>
+		<li><a href="#essay7">A Parting of the Ways for America</a></li>
+	</ol>
+</div>
+<div id="intro"><a class="pagenum" id="page3" title="3"> </a>
+	<p class="internal-title">CHINA, JAPAN and the U. S. A.</p>
+	<p class="intro-title">Introductory Note</p>
+
+	<p>The articles following are reprinted as they were
+	written in spite of the fact that any picture of contemporary
+	events is modified by subsequent increase
+	of knowledge and by later events. In the
+	main, however, the writer would still stand by
+	what was said at the time. A few foot notes
+	have been inserted where the text is likely to
+	give rise to misapprehensions. The date of
+	writing has been retained as a guide to the reader.</p>
+</div>
+<div id="essay1" class="essay">
+	<h2><abbr class="essay-number" title="one">I</abbr><br />
+		On Two Sides of the Eastern Seas</h2>
+
+	<p class="first_paragraph"><span class="first_word">It</span> is three days’ easy journey from Japan to China. It is
+	doubtful whether anywhere in the world another journey
+	of the same length brings with it such a complete change
+	of political temper and belief. Certainly it is greater than the
+	alteration perceived in journeying directly from San Francisco
+	to Shanghai. The difference is not one in customs and modes
+	of life; that goes without saying. It concerns the ideas, beliefs
+	and alleged information current about one and the same fact:
+	the status of Japan in the international world and especially
+	its attitude toward China. One finds everywhere in Japan a
+	feeling of uncertainty, hesitation, even of weakness. There
+	is a subtle nervous tension in the atmosphere as of a country
+	on the verge of change but not knowing where the change will
+	take it. Liberalism is in the air, but genuine liberals are encompassed
+	with all sorts of difficulties especially in combining
+	their liberalism with the devotion to theocratic robes which
+	the imperialist militarists who rule Japan have so skilfully
+	thrown about the Throne and the Government. But what one
+	senses in China from the first moment is the feeling of the all-pervading
+	power of Japan which is working as surely as fate
+	to its unhesitating conclusion—the domination of Chinese politics
+	and industry by Japan with a view to its final absorption.
+	It is not my object to analyze the realities of the situation
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page4" title="4"> </a>or to inquire whether the universal feeling in China is a collective
+	hallucination or is grounded in fact. The phenomenon
+	is worthy of record on its own account. Even if it be merely
+	psychological, it is a fact which must be reckoned with in both
+	its Chinese and its Japanese aspects. In the first place,
+	as to the differences in psychological atmosphere. Everybody
+	who knows anything about Japan knows that it is the land of
+	reserves and reticences. The half-informed American will tell
+	you that this is put on for the misleading of foreigners. The
+	informed know that it is an attitude shown to foreigners only
+	because it is deeply engrained in the moral and social tradition
+	of Japan; and that, if anything, the Japanese are more likely
+	to be communicative—about many things at least—to a sympathetic
+	foreigner, than to one another. The habit of reserve
+	is so deeply embedded in all the etiquette, convention
+	and daily ceremony of living, as well as in the ideals of strength
+	of character, that only the Japanese who have subjected themselves
+	to foreign influences escape it—and many of them revert.
+	To put it mildly, the Japanese are not a loquacious
+	people; they have the gift of doing rather than of gab.</p>
+
+	<p>When accordingly a Japanese statesman or visiting diplomatist
+	engages in unusually prolonged and frank discourse setting
+	forth the aims and procedures of Japan, the student of
+	politics who has been long in the East at once becomes alert,
+	not to say suspicious. A recent illustration is so extreme that
+	it will doubtless seem fantastic beyond belief. But the student
+	at home will have to take these seeming fantasies seriously if
+	he wishes to appreciate the present atmosphere of China.
+	Cables have brought fragmentary reports of some addresses
+	of Baron Goto in America. Doubtless in the American atmosphere
+	these have the effect of reassuring America as to
+	any improper ambitions on the part of Japan. In China, they
+	were taken as announcements that Japan has about completed
+	its plans for the absorption of China, and that the lucubration
+	preliminary to operations of swallowing are about to begin.
+	The reader is forgiven in advance any scepticism he feels about
+	both the fact itself and the correctness of my report of the
+	belief in the alleged fact. His scepticism will not surpass what
+	I should feel in his place. But the suspicion aroused by such
+	statements as this and the recent interview of Foreign Minister
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page5" title="5"> </a>Uchida and Baron Ishii must be noted as evidences of the universal
+	belief in China that Japan has one mode of diplomacy
+	for the East and another for the West, and that what is said
+	in the West must be read in reverse in the East.</p>
+
+	<p>China, whatever else it is, is not the land of privacies. It
+	is a proverb that nothing long remains secret in China. The
+	Chinese talk more easily than they act—especially in politics.
+	They are adepts in revealing their own shortcomings. They
+	dissect their own weaknesses and failures with the most extraordinary
+	reasonableness. One of the defects upon which they
+	dwell is the love of finding substitutes for positive action, of
+	avoiding entering upon a course of action which might be irrevocable.
+	One almost wonders whether their power of self-criticism
+	is not itself another of these substitutes. At all events,
+	they are frank to the point of loquacity. Between the opposite
+	camps there are always communications flowing. Among official
+	enemies there are “sworn friends.” In a land of perpetual
+	compromise, etiquette as well as necessity demands that
+	the ways for later accommodations be kept open. Consequently
+	things which are spoken of only under the breath in Japan
+	are shouted from the housetops in China. It would hardly be
+	good taste in Japan to allude to the report that influential
+	Chinese ministers are in constant receipt of Japanese funds
+	and these corrupt officials are the agencies by which political
+	and economic concessions were wrung from China while Europe
+	and America were busy with the war. But in China nobody
+	even takes the trouble to deny it or even to discuss it.
+	What is psychologically most impressive is the fact that it is
+	merely taken for granted. When it is spoken of, it is as one
+	mentions the heat on an unusually hot day.</p>
+
+	<p>In speaking of the feeling of weakness current in Japan
+	about Japan itself, one must refer to the economic situation
+	because of its obvious connection with the international situation.
+	In the first place, there is the strong impression that
+	Japan is over-extended. Even in normal times, Japan relies
+	more upon production for foreign markets than is regarded
+	in most countries as safe policy. And there is the belief that
+	Japan <em>must</em> do so, because only by large foreign sellings—large
+	in comparison with the purchasing power of a people
+	still having a low standard of life—can it purchase the raw
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page6" title="6"> </a>materials—and even food—it has to have. But during the
+	war, the dependence of manufacturing and trade at home upon
+	the foreign market was greatly increased. The domestic increase
+	of wealth, though very great, is still too much in the
+	hands of the few to affect seriously the internal demand for
+	goods. Item one, which awakens sympathy for Japan as being
+	in a somewhat precarious situation.</p>
+
+	<p>Another item concerns the labor situation. Japan seems to
+	feel itself in a dilemma. If she passes even reasonably decent
+	factory laws (or rather attempts their enforcement) and regulates
+	child and women’s labor, she will lose that advantage
+	of cheap labor which she now counts on to offset her many
+	disadvantages. On the other hand, strikes, labor difficulties,
+	agitation for unions, etc., are constantly increasing, and the
+	tension in the atmosphere is unmistakable. The rice riots are
+	not often spoken of, but their memory persists, and the fact
+	that they came very near to assuming a directly political aspect.
+	Is there a race between fulfillment of the aspirations of the
+	military clans who still hold the reins, and the growth of
+	genuinely democratic forces which will forever terminate those
+	aspirations? Certainly the defeat of Germany gave a blow to
+	bureaucratic militarism in Japan which in time will go far.
+	Will it have the time required to take effect on foreign policy?
+	The hope that it will is a large factor in stimulating liberal
+	sympathy for a Japan which is beginning to undergo the throes
+	of transition.</p>
+
+	<p>As for the direct international situation of Japan, the feeling
+	in Japan is that of the threatening danger of isolation.
+	Germany is gone; Russia is gone. While those facts simplify
+	matters for Japan somewhat, there is also the belief that in
+	taking away potential allies, they have weakened Japan in the
+	general game of balance and counter-balance of power. Particularly
+	does the removal of imperialistic Russia relieve the
+	threat on India which was such a factor in the willingness of
+	Great Britain to make the offensive-defensive alliance. The
+	revelation of the militaristic possibilities of America is another
+	serious factor. Certainly the new triple entente cordiale of
+	Japan, Italy and France is no adequate substitute for a realignment
+	of international forces in which a common understanding
+	between Great Britain and America is a dominant
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page7" title="7"> </a>factor. This factor explains, if it does not excuse, some of
+	the querulousness and studied discourtesies with which the
+	Japanese press for some months treated President Wilson,
+	the United States in general and its relation to the League of
+	Nations in particular, while it also throws light on the ardor
+	with which the opportune question of racial discrimination was
+	discussed. (The Chinese have an unfailing refuge in a sense
+	of humor. It was interesting to note the delight with which
+	they received the utterance of the Japanese Foreign Minister,
+	after Japanese success at Paris, that “his attention had recently
+	been called” to various press attacks on America which
+	he much deprecated). In any case there is no mistaking the
+	air of tension and nervous overstrain which now attends all
+	discussion of Japanese foreign relations. In all directions,
+	there are characteristic signs of hesitation, shaking of old beliefs
+	and movement along new lines. Japan seems to be much
+	in the same mood as that which it experienced in the early
+	eighties before, toward the close of that decade, it crystallized
+	its institutions through acceptance of the German constitution,
+	militarism, educational system, and diplomatic methods. So
+	that, once more, the observer gets the impression that substantially
+	all of Japan’s energy, abundant as that is, must be devoted
+	to her urgent problems of readjustment.</p>
+
+	<p>Come to China, and the difference is incredible. It almost
+	seems as if one were living in a dream; or as if some new
+	Alice had ventured behind an international looking-glass wherein
+	everything is reversed. That we in America should have
+	little idea of the state of things and the frame of mind in
+	China is not astonishing—especially in view of the censorship
+	and the distraction of attention of the last few years. But
+	that Japan and China should be so geographically near, and
+	yet every fact that concerns them appear in precisely opposite
+	perspective, is an experience of a life time. Japanese liberalism?
+	Yes, it is heard of, but only in connection with one form
+	which the longing for the miraculous <em lang="la" xml:lang="la">deus ex machina</em> takes.
+	Perhaps a revolution in Japan may intervene to save China
+	from the fate which now hangs over her. But there is no suggestion
+	that anything less than a complete revolution will
+	alter or even retard the course which is attributed to Japanese
+	diplomacy working hand in hand with Japanese business interests
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page8" title="8"> </a>and militarism. The collapse of Russia and Germany?
+	These things only mean that Japan has in a few years fallen
+	complete heir to Russian hopes, achievements and possessions
+	in Manchuria and Outer Mongolia, and has had opportunities
+	in Siberia thrown into her hands which she could hardly have
+	hoped for in her most optimistic moments. And now Japan
+	has, with the blessing of the great Powers at Paris, become
+	also the heir of German concessions, intrigues and ambitions,
+	with added concessions, wrung (or bought) from incompetent
+	and corrupt officials by secret agreements when the world was
+	busy with war. If all the great Powers are so afraid of Japan
+	that they give way to her every wish, what is China that she
+	can escape the doom prepared for her? That is the cry of
+	helplessness going up all over China. And Japanese propagandists
+	take advantage of the situation, pointing to the action
+	of the Peace Conference as proof that the Allies care nothing
+	for China, and that China must throw herself into the arms
+	of Japan if she is to have any protection at all. In short,
+	Japan stands ready as she stood ready in Korea to guarantee
+	the integrity and independence of China. And the fear that
+	the latter must, in spite of her animosity toward Japan, accept
+	this fate in order to escape something worse swims in the
+	sinister air. It is the exact counterpart of the feeling current
+	among the liberals in Japan that Japan has alienated China
+	permanently when a considerate and slower course might have
+	united the two countries. If the economic straits of Japan are
+	alluded to, it is only as a reason why Japan has hurried her
+	diplomatic coercion, her corrupt and secret bargainings with
+	Chinese traitors and her industrial invasion. While the western
+	world supposes that the military and the industrial party in
+	Japan have opposite ideas as to best methods of securing Japanese
+	supremacy in the East, it is the universal opinion in China
+	that they two are working in complete understanding with one
+	another, and the differences that sometimes occur between the
+	Foreign Office in Tokyo and the Ministry of War (which is
+	extra-constitutional in its status) are staged for effect.</p>
+
+	<p>These are some of the aspects of the most complete transformation
+	scene that it has ever been the lot of the writer to experience.
+	May it turn out to be only an extraordinary psychological
+	experience! But in the interests of truth it must
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page9" title="9"> </a>be recorded that every resident of China, Chinese or American,
+	with whom I have talked in the last four weeks has volunteered
+	the belief that all the seeds of a future great war are now deeply
+	implanted in China. To avert such a calamity they look to the
+	League of Nations or to some other force outside the immediate
+	scene. Unfortunately the press of Japan treats every attempt
+	to discuss the state of opinion in China or the state of facts
+	as evidence that America, having tasted blood in the war, now
+	has its eyes on Asia with the expectation later on of getting its
+	hands on Asia. Consequently America is interested in trying
+	to foster ill-will between China and Japan. If the pro-American
+	Japanese do not enlighten their fellow-countrymen as to the
+	facts, then America ought to return some of the propaganda
+	that visits its shores. But every American who goes to Japan
+	ought also to visit China—if only to complete his education.</p>
+
+	<p class="dateline">May, 1919.</p>
+</div>
+<div id="essay2" class="essay">
+	<h2><abbr class="essay-number" title="two">II</abbr><br />
+		Shantung, As Seen From Within</h2>
+
+	<h3>1.</h3>
+
+	<p class="first_paragraph"><span class="first_word">American</span> apologists for that part of the Peace Treaty
+	which relates to China have the advantage of the illusions
+	of distance. Most of the arguments seem
+	strange to anyone who lives in China even for a few months.
+	He finds the Japanese on the spot using the old saying about
+	territory consecrated by treasure spent and blood shed. He
+	reads in Japanese papers and hears from moderately liberal
+	Japanese that Japan must protect China, as well as Japan,
+	against herself, against her own weak or corrupt government,
+	by keeping control of Shantung to prevent China from again
+	alienating that territory to some other power.</p>
+
+	<p>The history of European aggression in China gives this argument
+	great force among the Japanese, who for the most
+	part know nothing more about what actually goes on in China
+	than they used to know about Korean conditions. These considerations,
+	together with the immense expectations raised
+	among the Japanese during the war concerning their coming
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page10" title="10"> </a>domination of the Far East and the unswerving demand of excited
+	public opinion in Japan during the Versailles Conference
+	for the settlement that actually resulted, give an ironic turn
+	to the statement so often made that Japan may be trusted to
+	carry out her promises. Yes, one is often tempted to say, that
+	is precisely what China fears, that Japan will carry out her
+	promises, for then China is doomed. To one who knows the
+	history of foreign aggression in China, especially the technique
+	of conquest by railway and finance, the irony of promising to
+	keep economic rights while returning sovereignty lies so on
+	the surface that it is hardly irony. China might as well be
+	offered Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason on a silver platter as
+	be offered sovereignty under such conditions. The latter is
+	equally metaphysical.</p>
+
+	<p>A visit to Shantung and a short residence in its capital city,
+	Tsinan, made the conclusions, which so far as I know every
+	foreigner in China has arrived at, a living thing. It gave a
+	vivid picture of the many and intimate ways in which economic
+	and political rights are inextricably entangled together. It
+	made one realize afresh that only a President who kept himself
+	innocent of any knowledge of secret treaties during the
+	war, could be naïve enough to believe that the promise to return
+	complete sovereignty retaining <em>only</em> economic rights is a
+	satisfactory solution. It threw fresh light upon the contention
+	that at most and at worst Japan had only taken over German
+	rights, and that since we had acquiesced in the latter’s arrogations
+	we had no call to make a fuss about Japan. It revealed
+	the hollowness of the claim that pro-Chinese propaganda had
+	wilfully misled Americans into confusing the few hundred
+	square miles around the port of Tsing-tao with the Province
+	of Shantung with its thirty millions of Chinese population.</p>
+
+	<p>As for the comparison of Germany and Japan one might suppose
+	that the objects for which America nominally entered the
+	war had made, in any case, a difference. But aside from this
+	consideration, the Germans exclusively employed Chinese in
+	the railway shops and for all the minor positions on the railway
+	itself. The railway guards (the difference between police
+	and soldiers is nominal in China) were all Chinese, the Germans
+	merely training them. As soon as Japan invaded Shantung and
+	took over the railway, Chinese workmen and Chinese military
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page11" title="11"> </a>guards were at once dismissed and Japanese imported to take
+	their places. Tsinan-fu, the inland terminus of the ex-German
+	railway, is over two hundred miles from Tsing-tao. When the
+	Japanese took over the German railway business office, they
+	at once built barracks, and today there are several hundred
+	soldiers still there—where Germany kept none. Since the armistice
+	even, Japan has erected a powerful military wireless
+	within the grounds of the garrison, against of course the unavailing
+	protest of Chinese authorities. No foreigner can be
+	found who will state that Germany used her ownership of port
+	and railway to discriminate against other nations. No Chinese
+	can be found who will claim that this ownership was used to
+	force the Chinese out of business, or to extend German economic
+	rights beyond those definitely assigned her by treaty.
+	Common sense should also teach even the highest paid propagandist
+	in America that there is, from the standpoint of China,
+	an immense distinction between a national menace located half
+	way around the globe, and one within two days’ sail over an
+	inland sea absolutely controlled by a foreign navy, especially
+	as the remote nation has no other foothold and the nearby
+	one already dominates additional territory of enormous strategic
+	and economic value—namely, Manchuria.</p>
+
+	<p>These facts bear upon the shadowy distinction between the
+	Tsing-tao and the Shantung claim, as well as upon the solid
+	distinction between German and Japanese occupancy. If there
+	still seemed to be a thin wall between Japanese possession of
+	the port of Tsing-tao and usurpation of Shantung, it was
+	enough to stop off the train in Tsinan-fu to see the wall crumble.
+	For the Japanese wireless and the barracks of the army of
+	occupation are the first things that greet your eyes. Within
+	a few hundred feet of the railway that connects Shanghai, via
+	the important center of Tientsin, with the capital, Peking, you
+	see Japanese soldiers on the nominally Chinese street, guarding
+	their barracks. Then you learn that if you travel upon the
+	ex-German railway towards Tsing-tao, you are ordered to show
+	your passport as if you were entering a foreign country. And
+	as you travel along the road (remembering that you are over
+	two hundred miles from Tsing-tao) you find Japanese soldiers
+	at every station, and several garrisons and barracks at important
+	towns on the line. Then you realize that at the shortest
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page12" title="12"> </a>possible notice, Japan could cut all communications between
+	southern China (together with the rich Yangste region) and the
+	capital, and with the aid of the Southern Manchurian Railway
+	at the north of the capital, hold the entire coast and descend at
+	its good pleasure upon Peking.</p>
+
+	<p>You are then prepared to learn from eye-witnesses that when
+	Japan made its Twenty-one Demands upon China, machine guns
+	were actually in position at strategic points throughout Shantung,
+	with trenches dug and sandbags placed. You know that
+	the Japanese liberal spoke the truth, who told you, after a
+	visit to China and his return to protest against the action of his
+	government, that the Japanese already had such a military hold
+	upon China that they could control the country within a week,
+	after a minimum of fighting, if war should arise. You also
+	realize the efficiency of official control of information and
+	domestic propaganda as you recall that he also told you that
+	these things were true at the time of his visit, under the Terauchi
+	cabinet, but had been completely reversed by the present Hara
+	ministry. For I have yet to find a single foreigner or Chinese
+	who is conscious of any difference of policy, save as the end
+	of the war has forced the necessity of caution, since other
+	nations can now look China-wards as they could not during
+	the war.</p>
+
+	<p>An American can get an idea of the realities of the present
+	situation if he imagines a foreign garrison and military wireless in
+	Wilmington, with a railway from that point to a fortified sea-port
+	controlled by the foreign power, at which the foreign nation
+	can land, without resistance, troops as fast as they can be
+	transported, and with bases of supply, munitions, food, uniforms,
+	etc., already located at Wilmington, at the sea-port and
+	several places along the line. Reverse the directions from south
+	to north, and Wilmington will stand for Tsinan-fu, Shanghai
+	for New York, Nanking for Philadelphia with Peking standing
+	for the seat of government at Washington, and Tientsin for
+	Baltimore. Suppose in addition that the Pennsylvania road is
+	the sole means of communication between Washington and the
+	chief commercial and industrial centers, and you have the framework
+	of the Shantung picture as it presents itself daily to the
+	inhabitants of China. Upon second thought, however, the
+	parallel is not quite accurate. You have to add that the same
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page13" title="13"> </a>foreign nation controls also all coast communications from, say,
+	Raleigh southwards, with railway lines both to the nearby coast
+	and to New Orleans. For (still reversing directions) this corresponds
+	to the position of Imperial Japan in Manchuria with
+	its railways to Dairen and through Korea to a port twelve
+	hours sail from a great military center in Japan proper. These
+	are not remote possibilities nor vague prognostications. They
+	are accomplished facts.</p>
+
+	<p>Yet the facts give <em>only</em> the framework of the picture. What
+	is actually going on within Shantung? One of the demands of
+	the “postponed” group of the Twenty-one Demands was that
+	Japan should supply military and police advisers to China.
+	They are not so much postponed but that Japan enforced specific
+	concessions from China during the war by diplomatic threats
+	to reintroduce their discussion, or so postponed that Japanese
+	advisers are not already installed in the police headquarters of
+	the city of Tsinan, the capital city of Shantung of three hundred
+	thousand population where the Provincial Assembly meets and
+	all the Provincial officials reside. Within recent months the
+	Japanese consul has taken a company of armed soldiers with
+	him when he visited the Provincial Governor to make certain
+	demands upon him, the visit being punctuated by an ostentatious
+	surrounding of the Governor’s yamen by these troops. Within
+	the past few weeks, two hundred cavalry came to Tsinan and
+	remained there while Japanese officials demanded of the Governor
+	drastic measures to suppress the boycott, while it was threatened
+	to send Japanese troops to police the foreign settlement
+	if the demand was not heeded.</p>
+
+	<p>A former consul was indiscreet enough to put into writing
+	that if the Chinese Governor did not stop the boycott and the
+	students’ movement by force if need be, he would take matters
+	into his own hands. The chief tangible charge he brought
+	against the Chinese as a basis of his demand for “protection”
+	was that Chinese store-keepers actually refused to accept Japanese
+	money in payment for goods, not ordinary Japanese
+	money at that, but the military notes with which, so as
+	to save drain upon the bullion reserves, the army of occupation
+	is paid. And all this, be it remembered, is more than two hundred
+	miles from Tsing-tao and from eight to twelve months
+	after the armistice. Today’s paper reports a visit of Japanese
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page14" title="14"> </a>to the Governor to inform him that unless he should prevent
+	a private theatrical performance from being given in Tsinan
+	by the students, they would send their own forces into the settlement
+	to protect themselves. And the utmost they might
+	need protection from, was that the students were to give some
+	plays designed to foster the boycott!</p>
+
+	<p>Japanese troops overran the Province before they made any
+	serious attempt to capture Tsing-tao. It is only a slight exaggeration
+	to say that they “took” the Chinese Tsinan before
+	they took the German Tsing-tao. Propaganda in America has
+	justified this act on the ground that a German railway to the
+	rear of Japanese forces would have been a menace. As there
+	were no troops but only legal and diplomatic papers with which
+	to attack the Japanese, it is a fair inference that the “menace”
+	was located in Versailles rather than in Shantung, and concerned
+	the danger of Chinese control of their own territory. Chinese
+	have been arrested by Japanese gendarmes in Tsinan and subjected
+	to a torturing third degree of the kind that Korea has
+	made sickeningly familiar. The Japanese claim that the injuries
+	were received while the men were resisting arrest. Considering
+	that there was no more legal ground for arrest than there
+	would be if Japanese police arrested Americans in New York,
+	almost anybody but the pacifist Chinese certainly would have
+	resisted. But official hospital reports testify to bayonet wounds
+	and the marks of flogging. In the interior where the Japanese
+	had been disconcerted by the student propaganda they raided a
+	High School, seized a school boy at random, and took him to
+	a distant point and kept him locked up several days. When
+	the Japanese consul at Tsinan was visited by Chinese officials
+	in protest against these illegal arrests, the consul disclaimed
+	all jurisdiction. The matter, he said, was wholly in the hands
+	of the military authorities in Tsing-tao. His disclaimer was emphasized
+	by the fact that some of the kidnapped Chinese were
+	taken to Tsing-tao for “trial.”</p>
+
+	<p>The matter of economic rights in relation to political domination
+	will be discussed later in this article. It is no
+	pleasure for one with many warm friends in Japan, who has
+	a great admiration for the Japanese people as distinct from the
+	ruling military and bureaucratic class, to report such facts as
+	have been stated. One might almost say, one might positively
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page15" title="15"> </a>say from the standpoint of Japan itself, that the worst thing
+	that can be charged against the policy of Japan in China for the
+	last six years is its immeasurable stupidity. No nation has ever
+	misjudged the national psychology of another people as Japan
+	has that of China. The alienation of China is widespread, deep,
+	bitter. Even the most pessimistic of the Chinese who think that
+	China is to undergo a complete economic and political domination
+	by Japan do not think it can last, even without outside intervention,
+	more than half a century.</p>
+
+	<p>Today, at the beginning of a new year, (1920) the boycott is
+	much more complete and efficient than in the most tense days of
+	last summer. Unfortunately, the Japanese policy seems to be under
+	a truly Greek fate which drives it on. Concessions that would
+	have produced a revulsion of feeling in favor of Japan a year
+	ago will now merely salve the surface of the wound. What
+	would have been welcomed even eight months ago would now
+	be received with contempt. There is but one way in which
+	Japan can now restore herself. It is nothing less than complete
+	withdrawal from Shantung, with possibly a strictly commercial
+	concession at Tsing-tao and a real, not a Manchurian, Open
+	Door.</p>
+
+	<p>According to the Japanese-owned newspapers published in
+	Tsinan, the Japanese military commander in Tsing-tao recently
+	made a speech to visiting journalists from Tokyo in which he
+	said: “The suspicions of China cannot now be allayed merely
+	by repeating that we have no territorial ambitions in China. We
+	must attain complete economic domination of the Far East. But
+	if Chino-Japanese relations do not improve, some third party will
+	reap the benefit. Japanese residing in China incur the hatred of
+	the Chinese. For they regard themselves as the proud citizens
+	of a conquering country. When the Japanese go into partnership
+	with the Chinese they manage in the greater number of
+	cases to have the profits accrue to themselves. If friendship
+	between China and Japan is to depend wholly upon the government
+	it will come to nothing. Diplomatists, soldiers, merchants,
+	journalists should repent the past. The change must be complete.”
+	But it will not be complete until the Japanese withdraw
+	from Shantung leaving their nationals there upon the footing of
+	other foreigners in China.</p>
+
+	<h3><a class="pagenum" id="page16" title="16"> </a>2.</h3>
+
+	<p>In discussing the return to China by Japan of a metaphysical
+	sovereignty while economic rights are retained, I shall not repeat
+	the details of German treaty rights as to the railway and the
+	mines. The reader is assumed to be familiar with those facts.
+	The German seizure was outrageous. It was a flagrant case of
+	Might making Right. As von Buelow cynically but frankly told
+	the Reichstag, while Germany did not intend to partition China,
+	she also did not intend to be the passenger left behind in the
+	station when the train started. Germany had the excuse of
+	prior European aggressions, and in turn her usurpation was the
+	precedent for further foreign rape. If judgments are made on
+	a comparative basis, Japan is entitled to all of the white-washing
+	that can be derived from the provocations of European imperialistic
+	powers, including those countries that in domestic
+	policy are democratic. And every fairminded person will recognize
+	that, leaving China out of the reckoning, Japan’s proximity
+	to China gives her aggressions the color of self-defence in a way
+	that cannot be urged in behalf of any European power.</p>
+
+	<p>It is possible to look at European aggressions in, say, Africa
+	as incidents of a colonization movement. But no foreign policy
+	in Asia can shelter itself behind any colonization plea. For
+	continental Asia is, for practical purposes, India and China,
+	representing two of the oldest civilizations of the globe and
+	presenting two of its densest populations. If there is any such
+	thing in truth as a philosophy of history with its own inner and
+	inevitable logic, one may well shudder to think of what the
+	closing acts of the drama of the intercourse of the West and
+	East are to be. In any case, and with whatever comfort may
+	be derived from the fact that the American continents have not
+	taken part in the aggression and hence may act as a mediator
+	to avert the final tragedy, residence in China forces upon one
+	the realization that Asia is, after all, a large figure in the future
+	reckoning of history. Asia is really here after all. It is not
+	simply a symbol in western algebraic balances of trade. And in
+	the future, so to speak, it is going to be even more here, with
+	its awakened national consciousness of about half the population
+	of the whole globe.</p>
+
+	<p>Let the agreements of France and Great Britain made with
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page17" title="17"> </a>Japan during the war stand for the measure of western consciousness
+	of the reality of only a small part of Asia, a consciousness
+	generated by the patriotism of Japan backed by its powerful
+	army and navy. The same agreement measures western unconsciousness
+	of the reality of that part of Asia which lies within
+	the confines of China. An even better measure of western
+	unconsciousness may be found perhaps in such a trifling incident
+	as this:—An English friend long resident in Shantung told me
+	of writing indignantly home concerning the British part in the
+	Shantung settlement. The reply came, complacently stating that
+	Japanese ships did so much in the war that the Allies could not
+	properly refuse to recognize Japan’s claims. The secret agreements
+	themselves hardly speak as eloquently for the absence of
+	China from the average western consciousness. In saying that
+	China and Asia are to be enormously significant figures in future
+	reckonings, the spectre of a military Yellow Peril is not meant
+	nor even the more credible spectre of an industrial Yellow Peril.
+	But Asia has come to consciousness, and her consciousness of
+	herself will soon be such a massive and persistent thing that it
+	will force itself upon the reluctant consciousness of the west,
+	and lie heavily upon its conscience. And for this fact, China and
+	the western world are indebted to Japan.</p>
+
+	<p>These remarks are more relevant to a consideration of the
+	relationship of economic and political rights in Shantung than
+	they perhaps seem. For a moment’s reflection will call to mind
+	that all political foreign aggression in China has been carried
+	out for commercial and financial ends, and usually upon some
+	economic pretext. As to the immediate part played by Japan
+	in bringing about a consciousness which will from the present
+	time completely change the relations of the western powers to
+	China, let one little story testify. Some representatives of an
+	English missionary board were making a tour of inspection
+	through China. They went into an interior town in Shantung.
+	They were received with extraordinary cordiality by the entire
+	population. Some time afterwards some of their accompanying
+	friends returned to the village and were received with equally
+	surprising coldness. It came out upon inquiry that the inhabitants
+	had first been moved by the rumor that these people
+	were sent by the British government to secure the removal of
+	the Japanese. Later they were moved by indignation that they
+	had been disappointed.</p>
+
+	<p><a class="pagenum" id="page18" title="18"> </a>It takes no forcing to see a symbol in this incident. Part of
+	it stands for the almost incredible ignorance which has rendered
+	China so impotent nationally speaking. The other part of it
+	stands for the new spirit which has been aroused even among
+	the common people in remote districts. Those who fear, or
+	who pretend to fear, a new Boxer movement, or a definite general
+	anti-foreign movement, are, I think, mistaken. The new
+	consciousness goes much deeper. Foreign policies that fail to
+	take it into account and that think that relations with China
+	can be conducted upon the old basis will find this new consciousness
+	obtruding in the most unexpected and perplexing ways.</p>
+
+	<p>One might fairly say, still speaking comparatively, that it is
+	part of the bad luck of Japan that her proximity to China, and
+	the opportunity the war gave her to outdo the aggressions of
+	European powers, have made her the first victim of this disconcerting
+	change. Whatever the motives of the American
+	Senators in completely disassociating the United States from the
+	peace settlement as regards China, their action is a permanent
+	asset to China, not only in respect to Japan but with respect to
+	all Chinese foreign relations. Just before our visit to Tsinan,
+	the Shantung Provincial Assembly had passed a resolution of
+	thanks to the American Senate. More significant is the fact
+	that they passed another resolution to be cabled to the English
+	Parliament, calling attention to the action of the American
+	Senate and inviting similar action. China in general and
+	Shantung in particular feels the reinforcement of an external
+	approval. With this duplication, its national consciousness has
+	as it were solidified. Japan is simply the first object to be
+	affected.</p>
+
+	<p>The concrete working out of economic rights in Shantung
+	will be illustrated by a single case which will have to stand as
+	typical. Po-shan is an interior mining village. The mines were
+	not part of the German booty; they were Chinese owned. The
+	Germans, whatever their ulterior aims, had made no attempt
+	at dispossessing the Chinese. The mines, however, are at the
+	end of a branch line of the new Japanese owned railway—owned
+	by the government, not by a private corporation, and
+	guarded by Japanese soldiers. Of the forty mines, the Japanese
+	have worked their way, in only four years, into all but four.
+	Different methods are used. The simplest is, of course, discrimination
+	in the use of the railway for shipping. Downright
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page19" title="19"> </a>refusal to furnish cars while competitors who accepted Japanese
+	partners got them, is one method. Another more elaborate
+	method is to send but one car when a large number is asked for,
+	and then when it is too late to use cars, send the whole number
+	asked for or even more, and then charge a large sum for
+	demurrage in spite of the fact the mine no longer wants them
+	or has cancelled the order. Redress there is none.</p>
+
+	<p>Tsinan has no special foreign concessions. It is, however, a
+	“treaty port” where nationals of all friendly powers can do
+	business. But Po-shan is not even a treaty port. Legally speaking
+	no foreigners can lease land or carry on any business there.
+	Yet the Japanese have forced a settlement as large in area as
+	the entire foreign settlement in the much larger town of Tsinan.
+	A Chinese refused to lease land where the Japanese wished to
+	relocate their railway station. Nothing happened to him directly.
+	But merchants could not get shipping space, or receive goods by
+	rail. Some of them were beaten up by thugs. After a time, they
+	used their influence with their compatriot to lease his land. Immediately
+	the persecutions ceased. Not all the land has been
+	secured by threats or coercion; some has been leased directly
+	by Chinese moved by high prices, in spite of the absence of any
+	legal sanction. In addition, the Japanese have obtained control
+	of the electric light works and some pottery factories, etc.</p>
+
+	<p>Now even admitting that this is typical of the methods by
+	which the Japanese plant themselves, a natural American reaction
+	would be to say that, after all, the country is built up
+	industrially by these enterprises, and that though the rights of
+	some individuals may have been violated, there is nothing to
+	make a national, much less an international fuss about. More
+	or less unconsciously we translate foreign incidents into terms
+	of our own experience and environment, and thus miss the
+	entire point. Since America was largely developed by foreign
+	capital to our own economic benefit and without political encroachments,
+	we lazily suppose some such separation of the
+	economic and political to be possible in China. But it must be
+	remembered that China is not an open country. Foreigners can
+	lease land, carry on business, and manufacture only in accord
+	with express treaty agreements. There are no such agreements
+	in the cases typified by the Po-shan incident. We may profoundly
+	disagree with the closed economic policy of China, or
+	we may believe that under existing circumstances it represents
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page20" title="20"> </a>the part of prudence for her. That makes no difference. <em>Given
+	the frequent occurrence of such economic invasions, with the
+	backing of soldiers of the Imperial Army, with the overt aid
+	of the Imperial Railway, and with the refusal of Imperial officials
+	to intervene, there is clear evidence of the attitude and
+	intention of the Japanese government in Shantung.</em></p>
+
+	<p>Because the population of Shantung is directly confronted
+	with an immense amount of just such evidence, it cannot take
+	seriously the professions of vague diplomatic utterances. What
+	foreign nation is going to intervene to enforce Chinese rights in
+	such a case as Po-shan? Which one is going effectively to call
+	the attention of Japan to such evidences of its failure to carry
+	out its promise? Yet the accumulation of precisely such seemingly
+	petty incidents, and not any single dramatic great wrong,
+	will secure Japan’s economic and political domination of
+	Shantung. It is for this reason that foreigners resident in
+	Shantung, no matter in what part, say that they see no sign
+	whatever that Japan is going to get out; that, on the contrary,
+	everything points to a determination to consolidate her position.
+	How long ago was the Portsmouth treaty signed, and what
+	were its nominal pledges about evacuation of Manchurian
+	territory?</p>
+
+	<p>Not a month will pass without something happening which
+	will give a pretext for delay, and for making the surrender of
+	Shantung conditional upon this, that and the other thing. Meantime
+	the penetration of Shantung by means of railway discrimination,
+	railway military guards, continual nibblings here and
+	there, will be going on. It would make the chapter too long to
+	speak of the part played by manipulation of finance in achieving
+	this process of attrition of sovereignty. Two incidents must
+	suffice. During the war, Japanese traders with the connivance
+	of their government gathered up immense amounts of copper
+	cash from Shantung and shipped it to Japan against the protests
+	of the Chinese government. What does sovereignty amount to
+	when a country cannot control even its own currency system?
+	In Manchuria the Japanese have forced the introduction of
+	several hundred million dollars of paper currency, nominally,
+	of course, based on a gold reserve. These notes are redeemable,
+	however, only in Japan proper. And there is a law in Japan
+	forbidding the exportation of gold. And there you are.</p>
+
+	<p>Japan itself has recently afforded an object lesson in the actual
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page21" title="21"> </a>connection of economic and political rights in China. It is so
+	beautifully complete a demonstration that it was surely unconscious.
+	Within the last two weeks, Mr. Obata, the Japanese
+	minister in Peking, has waited upon the government with a
+	memorandum saying that the Foochow incident was the culminating
+	result of the boycott; that if the boycott continues,
+	a series of such incidents is to be apprehended, saying that the
+	situation has become “intolerable” for Japan, and disavowing
+	all responsibility for further consequences unless the government
+	makes a serious effort to stop the boycott. Japan then
+	immediately makes certain specific demands. China must stop
+	the circulation of handbills, the holding of meetings to urge the
+	boycott, the destruction of Japanese goods that have become
+	Chinese property—none have been destroyed that are Japanese
+	owned. Volumes could not say more as to the real conception
+	of Japan of the connection between the economic and the political
+	relations of the two countries. Surely the pale ghost of
+	“Sovereignty” smiled ironically as he read this official note.
+	President Wilson after having made in the case of Shantung a
+	sharp and complete separation of economic and political rights,
+	also said that a nation boycotted is within sight of surrender.
+	Disassociation of words from acts has gone so far in his case
+	that he will hardly be able to see the meaning of Mr. Obata’s
+	communication. The American sense of humor and fair-play
+	may however be counted upon to get its point.</p>
+
+	<p class="dateline">January, 1920.</p>
+</div>
+<div id="essay3" class="essay">
+	<h2><abbr class="essay-number" title="three">III</abbr><br />
+		Hinterlands in China</h2>
+
+	<p class="first_paragraph"><span class="first_word">One</span> of the two Presidents of China—it is unnecessary
+	to specify which—recently stated that a renewal of
+	the Anglo-Japanese alliance meant a partition of
+	China. In this division, Japan would take the north and Great
+	Britain the south. Probably the remark was not meant to be
+	taken literally in the sense of formal conquest or annexation,
+	but rather symbolically with reference to the tendency of policies
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page22" title="22"> </a>and events. Even so, the statement will appear exaggerated
+	or wild to persons outside of China, who either believe
+	that the Open Door policy is now irrevocably established or
+	that Japan is the only foreign Power which China has to fear.
+	But a recent visit to the south revealed that in that section,
+	especially in Canton, the British occupy much the same position
+	of suspicion and dread which is held by the Japanese in the
+	north.</p>
+
+	<p>Upon the negative side, the Japanese menace is negligible
+	in the province of Kwantung, in which Canton is situated.
+	There are said to be more Americans in Canton than Japanese,
+	and the American colony is not extensive. Upon the positive
+	side the history of the Cassell collieries contract is instructive.
+	It illustrates the cause of the popular attitude toward the
+	British, and quite possibly explains the bitterness in the remark
+	quoted. The contract is noteworthy from whatever standpoint
+	it is viewed, whether that of time, of the conditions it
+	contains or of the circumstances which accompany it.</p>
+
+	<p>Premising that the contract delivers to a British company
+	a monopoly of the rich coal deposits of the province for a
+	period of ninety years and—quite incidentally of course—the
+	right to use all means of transportation, water or rail, wharves
+	and ports now in existence, and also to “construct, manage,
+	superintend and work other roads, railways waterways as may
+	be deemed advisable”—which reads like a monopoly of all
+	further transportation facilities of the province—first take up
+	the time of the making of the contract. It was drawn in April,
+	1920 and confirmed a few months later. It was made,
+	of course, with the authorities of the Kwantung province, subject
+	to confirmation at Peking. During this period, Kwantung
+	province was governed by military carpet-baggers from the
+	neighboring province of Kwangsei, which was practically alone
+	of the southern provinces allied with the northern government,
+	then under the control of the Anfu party. It was matter of
+	common knowledge that the people of Canton and of the province
+	were bitterly hostile to this outside control and submitted
+	to it only because of military coercion. Civil strife for the expulsion
+	of the outsiders was already going on, continually gaining
+	headway, and a few months later the Kwangsei troops were
+	defeated and expelled from the province by the forces of General
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page23" title="23"> </a>Chen, now the civil governor of Kwantung, who received
+	a triumphal ovation upon his entrance into Canton. At this
+	time the present native government was established, a change
+	which made possible the return of Sun Yat Sen and his followers
+	from their exile in Shanghai. It is evident, then, that the collieries
+	contract giving away the natural resources of the people
+	of the province, was knowingly made by a British company
+	with a government which no more represented the people of the
+	province than the military government of Germany represented
+	the people of Belgium during the war.</p>
+
+	<p>As to the terms of the contract, the statement that it gave
+	the British company a monopoly of all the coal mines in the
+	province, was not literally accurate. Verbally, twenty-two districts
+	are enumerated. But these are the districts along the
+	lines of the only railways in the province and the only ones soon
+	to be built, including the as yet uncompleted Hankow-Canton
+	railway. Possibly this fact accounts for the anxiety of the
+	British partners in the Consortium that the completion of this
+	line be the first undertaking financed by the Consortium. The
+	document also includes what is perhaps a novelty in legal documents
+	having such a momentous economic importance, namely,
+	the words “etc.” after the districts enumerated by name.</p>
+
+	<p>For this concession, the British syndicate agreed to pay the
+	provincial government the sum of $1,000,000 (silver of
+	course). This million dollars is to bear six per cent interest
+	to the company, and capital and interest are to be paid back
+	to the company by the provincial government out of the dividends
+	(if any) it is to receive. The nature of these “dividends”
+	is set forth in an article which should receive the careful
+	attention of promoters elsewhere as a model of the possibilities
+	of exploiting contracts. The ten million capital is divided
+	equally into “A” shares and “B” shares. The “A” shares
+	go unreservedly to the directors of the company, and three millions
+	of the “B” shares are to be allotted by the directors of
+	the company at their discretion. The other two million are
+	again divided into equal portions, one portion representing the
+	sum advanced by the company to the province and to be paid
+	back as just specified, while the other million—one-tenth of the
+	capitalization—is to be a trust fund the dividends of which are
+	to go for the “benefit of the poor people of the province” and
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page24" title="24"> </a>for an educational fund for the province. But before any dividends
+	are paid upon the “B” shares, eight per cent dividends
+	are to be paid upon the “A” shares and a <em>dollar a ton royalty</em>
+	upon all coal mined. Those having any familiarity with the
+	coal business with its usual royalty of about ten cents a ton can
+	easily calculate the splendid prospects of the “poor people” and
+	the schools, prospects which represent the total return to the
+	provinces of a concession of untold worth. The contract also
+	guarantees to the company the assistance of the provincial government
+	in expropriating the owners of all coal mines which
+	have been granted to other companies but not yet worked.
+	These technical details make dry reading, but they throw light
+	upon the spirit with which the British company undertook its
+	predatory negotiations with a government renounced by the
+	people it professed to govern. In comparison with the relatively
+	crude methods of Japan in Shantung, they show the advantages
+	of wide business experience.</p>
+
+	<p>As for the circumstances and context which give added menace
+	to the contract, the following facts are significant. Hong
+	Kong, a British crown colony, lies directly opposite the river
+	upon which Canton is situated. It is the port of export and
+	import for the vast districts served by the mines and railways
+	of the province. It is unnecessary to point out the hold upon
+	all economic development which is given through a monopolistic
+	control of coal. It is hardly too much to say that the enforcement
+	of the contract would enable British interests in Hong
+	Kong to control the entire industrial development of the most
+	flourishing of the provinces of China. It would be a comparatively
+	easy and inexpensive matter to provide the main land
+	with a first class modern harbor and port near Canton. But
+	such a port would tend to reduce the assets of Hong Kong to
+	the possession of the most beautiful scenery in the world. There
+	is already fear that a new harbor will be built. Many persons
+	think that the concession of building such railways etc., “as
+	are deemed advisable for the purpose of the business of the
+	company and to improve those now existing” is the object of
+	the contract, even more than the coal monopoly. For the British
+	already own a considerable part of the mainland, including
+	part of the railway connecting the littoral with Canton. By
+	building a cross-cut from the British owned portion of this railway
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page25" title="25"> </a>to the Hankow-Canton line, the latter would become virtually
+	the Hankow-Hong Kong line, and Canton would be a
+	way-station. With the advantages thus secured, the project
+	for building a new port could be indefinitely blocked.</p>
+
+	<p>During the period in which the contract was being secured,
+	a congress of British Chambers of Commerce was held in
+	Shanghai. Resolutions were passed in favor of abolishing
+	henceforth the whole principle of special nationalistic concessions,
+	and of cooperating with the Chinese for the upbuilding
+	of China. At the close of the meeting the Chairman announced
+	that a new era for China had finally dawned. All of the British
+	newspapers in China lauded the wise action of the Chambers.
+	At the same time, Mr. Lamont was in Peking, and was setting
+	forth that the object of the Consortium was the abolition of
+	further concessions, and the uniting of the financial resources
+	of the banks in the Consortium for the economic development
+	of China itself. By an ironical coincidence, the Hong Kong-Shanghai
+	Bank, which is the financial power behind the contract
+	and the new company, is the leading British partner in the
+	Consortium. It is difficult to see how the British can henceforth
+	accuse the Japanese of bad faith if any of the banking
+	interests of that country should enter upon independent negotiations
+	with any government in China.</p>
+
+	<p>By the time the scene of action was transferred to Peking
+	in order to secure the confirmation of the central government,
+	the Anfu regime was no more, and as yet no confirmation has
+	been secured. The new government at Canton has declined to
+	recognize the contract as having any validity. An official of
+	the Hong Kong government has told an official of the Canton
+	government that the Hong Kong government stands behind the
+	enforcement of the contract, and that Kwantung province is a
+	British Hinterland. Within the last few weeks the Governor
+	of Hong Kong and a leading Chinese banker of Hong Kong
+	who is a British subject have visited Peking. Rumors were rife
+	in the south as to the object of the visit. British sources published
+	the report that one object was to return Weihaiwei to
+	China—in case Peking agreed to turn over more of the Kwantung
+	mainland to Hong Kong as a quid pro quo. Chinese opinion
+	in the south was that one main object was to secure the
+	Peking confirmation of the Cassell contract, in which case
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page26" title="26"> </a>$900,000 more would be forthcoming, $100,000 having been
+	paid down when the contract was signed with the provincial
+	government. Peking does not recognize the present Canton
+	government but regards it as an outlaw. The crowd that
+	signed the contract is still in control of the neighboring province
+	of Kwangsei and they are relied upon by the north to effect
+	the military subjugation of the seceded province. Fighting
+	has already, indeed, begun, but the Kwangsei militarists are
+	badly in need of money; if Peking ratifies the contract, a large
+	part of the funds will be paid over to them—all that isn’t lost
+	by the wayside to the northern militarists.<a href="#footnote_1" id="fnm1" title="Since the text was written..." class="fnmarker">1</a>
+	Meantime British
+	news agencies keep up a constant circulation of reports tending
+	to discredit the Kwantung government, although all impartial
+	observers on the spot regard it as altogether the most promising
+	one in China.</p>
+
+	<p>These considerations not only throw light on some of the difficulties
+	of the functioning of the Consortium, but they give an indispensable
+	background for judging the actual effect of the renewal
+	of the Anglo-Japanese alliance. By force of circumstances each
+	government, even against its own wish, will be compelled to wink
+	at the predatory policies of the other; and the tendency will be to
+	create a division of spheres of influence between the north and
+	south in order to avoid more direct conflicts. The English liberals
+	who stand for the renewal of the alliance on the ground that
+	it will enable England to exercise a check on Japanese policies,
+	are more naïve than was Mr. Wilson with his belief in the separation
+	of the economic and political control of Shantung.</p>
+
+	<p>It cannot be too often repeated that the real point of friction
+	between the United States and Japan is not in California but
+	in China. It is silly—unless it is calculated—for English authorities
+	to keep repeating that under no circumstances does
+	the alliance mean that Great Britain would support Japan in
+	a war with the United States. The day the alliance is renewed,
+	the hands of the militarists in Japan will be strengthened and
+	the hands of the liberals—already weak enough—be still further
+	weakened. In consequence, all the sources of friction in
+	China between the United States and Japan will be intensified.
+	I do not believe in the predicted war. But should it come, the
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page27" title="27"> </a>first act of Japan—so everyone in China believes—will be to
+	seize the ports of northern China and its railways in order to
+	make sure of an uninterrupted supply of food and raw materials.
+	The act would be justified as necessary to national
+	existence. Great Britain in alliance with Japan would be in
+	no position to protest in anything but the most perfunctory
+	way. The guarantee of such abstinence would be for Japan
+	the next best thing to open naval and financial support. Without
+	the guarantee they would not dare the seizure of Chinese
+	ports. In recent years diplomatists have shown themselves capable
+	of unlimited stupidity. But it is not possible that the
+	men in the British Foreign Office are not aware of these elementary
+	facts. If they renew the alliance they knowingly take
+	the responsibility for the consequences.</p>
+
+	<p class="dateline">May 24, 1921.</p>
+</div>
+<div id="essay4" class="essay">
+	<h2><abbr class="essay-number" title="four">IV</abbr><br />
+		A Political Upheaval in China</h2>
+
+	<p class="first_paragraph"><span class="first_word">Even</span> in America we have heard of one Chinese revolution,
+	that which thrust the Manchu dynasty from the
+	throne. The visitor in China gets used to casual references
+	to the second revolution, that which frustrated Yuan Shi
+	Kai’s aspirations to be emperor, and the third, the defeat in 1917
+	of the abortive attempt to put the Manchu boy emperor back
+	into power. And within the last few weeks the (September 1920)
+	fourth upheaval has taken place. It may not be dignified by
+	the name of the fourth revolution, for the head of the state
+	has not been changed by it. But as a manifestation of the
+	forces that shape Chinese political events, for evil and for
+	good, perhaps this last disturbance surpasses the last two “revolutions”
+	in significance.</p>
+
+	<p>Chinese politics in detail are highly complicated, a mess of
+	personalities and factions whose oscillations no one can follow
+	who does not know a multitude of personal, family and provincial
+	histories. But occasionally something happens which
+	simplifies the tangle. Definite outlines frame themselves out
+	of the swirling criss-cross of strife, intrigue and ambition. So,
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page28" title="28"> </a>at present, the complete collapse of the Anfu clique which
+	owned the central government for two years marks the end of
+	that union of internal militarism and Japanese foreign influence
+	which was, for China, the most marked fruit of the war. When
+	China entered the war a “War Participation” army was formed.
+	It never participated; probably it was never meant to. But
+	its formation threw power wholly into the hands of the military
+	clique, as against the civilian constitutionalists. And in
+	return for concessions, secret agreements relating to Manchuria,
+	Shantung, new railways, etc., Japan supplied money, munitions,
+	instructors for the army and a benevolent supervision of foreign
+	and domestic politics. The war came to an unexpected
+	and untimely end, but by this time the offspring of the marriage
+	of the militarism of Yuan Shi Kai and Japanese money and
+	influence was a lusty youth. Bolshevism was induced to take
+	the place of Germany as a menace requiring the keeping up
+	of the army, and loans and teachers. Mongolia was persuaded
+	to cut her strenuous ties with Russia, to renounce her independence
+	and come again under Chinese sovereignty.</p>
+
+	<p>The army and its Japanese support and instruction was, accordingly,
+	continued. In place of the “War Participation”
+	army appeared the “Frontier Defense” army. Marshal Tuan,
+	the head of the military party, remained the nominal political
+	power behind the presidential chair, and General Hsu (commonly
+	known as little Hsu, in distinction from old Hsu, the
+	president) was the energetic manager of the Mongolian adventure
+	which, by a happy coincidence, required a bank, land
+	development companies and railway schemes, as well as an
+	army. About this military centre as a nucleus gathered the
+	vultures who fed on the carrion. This flock took the name of
+	the Anfu Club. It did not control the entire cabinet, but to
+	it belonged the Minister of Justice, who manipulated the police
+	and the courts, persecuted the students, suppressed liberal
+	journals and imprisoned inconvenient critics. And the Club
+	owned the ministers of finance and communications, the two
+	cabinet places that dispense revenues, give out jobs and make
+	loans. It also regulated the distribution of intelligence by mail
+	and telegraph. The reign of corruption and despotic inefficiency,
+	tempered only by the student revolt, set in. In two
+	years the Anfu Club got away with two hundred millions of
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page29" title="29"> </a>public funds directly, to say nothing of what was wasted by
+	incompetency and upon the army. The Allies had set out to
+	get China into the war. They succeeded in getting Japan into
+	control of Peking and getting China, politically speaking, into
+	a seemingly hopeless state of corruption and confusion.</p>
+
+	<p>The militaristic or Pei-Yang party was, however, divided into
+	two factions, each called after a province. The Anwhei
+	party gathered about little Hsu and was almost identical with
+	the Anfus. The Chili faction had been obliged, so far as Peking
+	was concerned, to content itself with such leavings as the Anfu
+	Club tossed to it. Apparently it was hopelessly weaker than
+	its rival, although Tuan, who was personally honest and above
+	financial scandal, was supported by both factions and was the
+	head of both. About three months ago there were a few signs
+	that, while the Anfu Club had been entrenching itself in Peking,
+	the rival faction had been quietly establishing itself in the
+	provinces. A league of Eight Tuchuns (military governors of
+	the provinces) came to the assistance of the president against
+	some unusually strong pressure from the Anfu Club. In spite
+	of the fact that the military governor of the three Manchurian
+	provinces, Chang Tso Lin, popularly known as the Emperor
+	of Manchuria, lined up with this league, practically nobody expected
+	anything except some manœuvering to get a larger share
+	of the spoils.</p>
+
+	<p>But late in June the president invited Chang Tso Lin to
+	Peking. The latter saw Tuan, told him that he was surrounded
+	by evil advisers, demanded that he cut loose from little Hsu
+	and the Anfu Club, and declared open war upon little Hsu—the
+	two had long and notoriously been bitter enemies. Even
+	then people had great difficulty in believing that anything would
+	happen except another Chinese compromise. The president
+	was known to be sympathetic upon the whole with the Chili
+	faction, but the president, if not a typical Chinese, is at least
+	typical of a certain kind of Chinese mandarin, non-resistant,
+	compromising, conciliating, procrastinating, covering up, evading
+	issues, face-saving. But finally something happened. A
+	mandate was issued dismissing little Hsu from office, military
+	and civil, dissolving the frontier defense corps as such, and
+	bringing it under the control of the Ministry of War (usually
+	armies in China belong to some general or Tuchun, not to the
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page30" title="30"> </a>country). For almost forty-eight hours it was thought that
+	Tuan had consented to sacrifice little Hsu and that the latter
+	would submit at least temporarily. Then with equally sensational
+	abruptness Tuan brought pressure to bear on the president.
+	The latter was appointed head of a national defense
+	army, and rewards were issued for the heads of the chiefs of
+	the Chili faction, nothing, however, being said about Chang
+	Tso Lin, who had meanwhile returned to Mukden and who
+	still professed allegiance to Tuan. Troops were mobilized;
+	there was a rush of officials and of the wealthy to the concessions
+	of Tientsin and to the hotels of the legation quarter.</p>
+
+	<p>This sketch is not meant as history, but simply as an indication
+	of the forces at work. Hence it is enough to say that
+	two weeks after Tuan and little Hsu had intimidated the president
+	and proclaimed themselves the saviors of the Republic,
+	they were in hiding, their enemies of the Chili party were in
+	complete control of Peking, and rewards from fifty thousand
+	dollars down were offered for the arrest of little Hsu, the ex-ministers
+	of justice, finance and communications, and other leaders
+	of the Anfu Club. The political turnover was as complete
+	as it was sensational. The seemingly impregnable masters of
+	China were impotent fugitives. The carefully built up Anfu
+	Club, with its military, financial and foreign support, had crumbled
+	and fallen. No country at any time has ever seen a political
+	upheaval more sudden and more thoroughgoing. It was
+	not so much a defeat as a dissolution like that of death, a total
+	disappearance, an evaporation.</p>
+
+	<p>Corruption had worked inward, as it has a way of doing.
+	Japanese-bought munitions would not explode; quartermasters
+	vanished with the funds with which stores were to be bought;
+	troops went without anything to eat for two or three days;
+	large numbers, including the larger part of one division, went
+	over to the enemy en masse; those who did not desert had no
+	heart for fighting and ran away or surrendered on the slightest
+	provocation, saying they were willing to fight for their country
+	but saw no reason why they should fight for a faction, especially
+	a faction that had been selling the country to a foreign nation.
+	In the manner of the defeat of the Anfu clique at the height
+	of its supremacy, rather than in the mere fact of its defeat, lies
+	the credit side of the Chinese political balance sheet. It is a striking
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page31" title="31"> </a>exhibition of the oldest and best faith of the Chinese—the
+	power of moral considerations. Public opinion, even that of
+	the coolie on the street, was wholly against the Anfu party.
+	It went down not so much because of the strength of the other
+	side as because of its own rottenness.</p>
+
+	<p>So far the results are to all appearances negative. The most
+	marked is the disappearance of Japanese prestige. As one of
+	the leading men in the War Office said: “For over a year
+	now the people have been strongly opposed to the Japanese
+	government on account of Shantung. But now even the generals
+	do not care for Japan any more.” It is hardly logical to
+	take the easy collapse of the Japanese-supported Anfu party as
+	a proof of the weakness of Japan, but prestige is always a
+	matter of feeling rather than of logic. Many who were intimidated
+	to the point of hypnotism by the idea of the irresistible
+	power of Japan are now freely laughing at the inefficiency
+	of Japanese leadership. It would not be safe to predict
+	that Japan will not come back as a force to be reckoned
+	with in the internal as well as external politics of China, but
+	it is safe to say that never again will Japan figure as superman
+	to China. And such a negation is after all a positive result.</p>
+
+	<p>And so in its way is the overthrow of the Anwhei faction of
+	the militarist party. The Chinese liberals do not feel very
+	optimistic about the immediate outcome. They have mostly
+	given up the idea that the country can be reformed by political
+	means. They are sceptical about the possibility of reforming
+	even politics until a new generation comes on the scene. They
+	are now putting their faith in education and in social changes
+	which will take some years to consummate themselves visibly.
+	The self-styled southern republican constitutional party has not
+	shown itself in much better light than the northern militarist
+	party. In fact, its old leader Sun Yat Sen now cuts one of the
+	most ridiculous figures in China, as shortly before this upheaval
+	he had definitely aligned himself with Tuan and little Hsu.<a href="#footnote_2" id="fnm2" title="This was written of course..." class="fnmarker">2</a></p>
+
+	<p><a class="pagenum" id="page32" title="32"> </a>This does not mean, however, that democratic opinion thinks
+	nothing has been gained. The demonstration of the inherent
+	weakness of corrupt militarism will itself prevent the development
+	of any militarism as complete as that of the Anfus. As
+	one Chinese gentleman said to me: “When Yuan Shi Kai was
+	overthrown, the tiger killed the lion. Now a snake has killed
+	the tiger. No matter how vicious the snake may become, some
+	smaller animal will be able to kill him, and his life will be
+	shorter than that of either lion or tiger.” In short, each successive
+	upheaval brings nearer the day when civilian supremacy
+	will be established. This result will be achieved partly because
+	of the repeated demonstrations of the uncongeniality of military
+	despotism to the Chinese spirit, and partly because with every
+	passing year education will have done its work. Suppressed
+	liberal papers are coming to life, while over twenty Anfu subsidized
+	newspapers and two subsidized news agencies have gone
+	out of being. The soldiers, including many officers in the Anwhei
+	army, clearly show the effects of student propaganda.
+	And it is worth while to note down the name of one of the
+	leaders on the victorious side, the only one whose troops did
+	any particular fighting, and that against great odds in numbers.
+	The name is Wu Pei Fu. He at least has not fought
+	for the Chili faction against the Anwhei faction. He has proclaimed
+	from the first that he was fighting to rid the country of
+	military control of civil government, and against traitors who
+	would sell their country to foreigners. He has come out
+	strongly for a new popular assembly, to form a new constitution
+	and to unite the country. And although Chang Tso Lin
+	has remarked that Wu Pei Fu as a military subordinate could
+	not be expected to intervene in politics, he has not as yet found
+	it convenient to oppose the demand for a popular assembly.
+	Meanwhile the liberals are organizing their forces, hardly expecting
+	to win a victory, but resolved, win or lose, to take advantage
+	of the opportunity to carry further the education of
+	the Chinese people in the meaning of democracy.</p>
+
+	<p class="dateline">August, 1920.</p>
+
+</div>
+<div id="essay5" class="essay">
+	<h2><a class="pagenum" id="page33" title="33"> </a><abbr class="essay-number" title="five">V</abbr><br />
+		Divided China</h2>
+
+	<h3>1.</h3>
+
+	<p class="first_paragraph"><span class="first_word">In</span> January 1920 the Peking government issued an
+	edict proclaiming the unification of China. On May
+	5th Sun Yat Sen was formally inaugurated in Canton
+	as president of all China. Thus China has within six months
+	been twice unified, once from the northern standpoint and once
+	from the southern. Each act of “unification” is in fact a symbol
+	of the division of China, a division expressing differences
+	of language, temperament, history, and political policy as well
+	as of geography, persons and factions. This division has been
+	one of the outstanding facts of Chinese history since the overthrow
+	of the Manchus ten years ago and it has manifested itself
+	in intermittent civil war. Yet there are two other statements
+	which are equally true, although they flatly contradict each
+	other and the one just made. One statement is that so far as
+	the people of China are concerned there is no real division on
+	geographical lines, but only the common division occurring everywhere
+	between conservatives and progressives. The other
+	is that instead of two divisions in China, there are at least
+	five, two parties in both the north and south, and another
+	in the central or Yangtse region,<a href="#footnote_3" id="fnm3" title="Since the writing..." class="fnmarker">3</a> each one of the five splitting
+	up again more or less on factional and provincial lines.
+	And so far as the future is concerned, probably this last statement
+	is the most significant of the three. That all three statements
+	are true is what makes Chinese politics so difficult to understand
+	even in their larger features.</p>
+
+	<p>By the good fortune of circumstances we were in Canton
+	when the inauguration occurred. Peking and Canton are a
+	long way apart in more than distance. There is little exchange
+	of actual news between the two places; what filters through
+	into either city and gets published consists mostly of rumors
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page34" title="34"> </a>tending to discredit the other city. In Canton, the monarchy
+	is constantly being restored in Peking; and in Peking, Canton
+	is Bolshevized at least once a week, while every other week
+	open war breaks out between the adherents of Sun Yat Sen, and
+	General Chen Kwang Ming, the civil governor of the province.
+	There is nothing to give the impression—even in circles which
+	accept the Peking government only as an evil necessity—that
+	the pretensions of Sun Yat Sen represent anything more than
+	the desires of a small and discredited group to get some slight
+	power for themselves at the expense of national unity. Even
+	in Fukien, the province next north of Kwantung, one found little
+	but gossip whose effect was to minimize the importance of
+	the southern government. In foreign circles in the north as
+	well as in liberal Chinese circles upon the whole, the feeling is
+	general that bad as the de facto Peking government may be, it
+	represents the cause of national unity, while the southern government
+	represents a perpetuation of that division of China
+	which makes her weak and which offers the standing invitation
+	to foreign intrigue and aggression. Only occasionally during
+	the last few months has some returned traveller timidly advanced
+	the opinion that we had the “wrong dope” on the south,
+	and that they were really trying “to do something down there.”</p>
+
+	<p>Consequently there was little preparation on my part for the
+	spectacle afforded in Canton during the week of May 5th.
+	This was the only demonstration I have seen in China during
+	the last two years which gave any evidence of being a spontaneous
+	popular movement. New Yorkers are accustomed to
+	crowds, processions, street decorations and accompanying enthusiasm.
+	I doubt if New York has ever seen a demonstration
+	which surpassed that of Canton in size, noise, color or spontaneity—in
+	spite of tropical rains. The country people flocked
+	in in such masses, that, being unable to find accommodation
+	even in the river boats, they kept up a parade all night. Guilds
+	and localities which were not able to get a place in the regular
+	procession organized minor ones on their own account on the
+	day before and after the official demonstration. Making all possible
+	allowance for the intensity of Cantonese local loyalty and
+	the fact that they might be celebrating a Cantonese affair rather
+	than a principle, the scene was sufficiently impressive to revise
+	one’s preconceived ideas and to make one try to find out what
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page35" title="35"> </a>it is that gives the southern movement its vitality.</p>
+
+	<p>A demonstration may be popular and still be superficial in
+	significance. However one found foreigners on the ground—at
+	least Americans—saying that in the last few months the
+	men in power in Canton were the only officials in China who
+	were actually doing something for the people instead of filling
+	their own pockets and magnifying their personal power. Even
+	the northern newspapers had not entirely omitted reference to
+	the suppression of licensed gambling. On the spot one learned
+	that this suppression was not only genuine and thorough, but
+	that it meant a renunciation of an annual revenue of nearly
+	ten million dollars on the part of a government whose chief
+	difficulty is financial, and where—apart from motives of personal
+	squeeze—it would have been easy to argue that at least
+	temporarily the end justified the means in retaining this source
+	of revenue. English papers throughout China have given
+	much praise to the government of Hong Kong because it has
+	cut down its opium revenue from eight to four millions annually
+	with the plan for ultimate extinction. Yet Hong Kong
+	is prosperous, it has not been touched by civil war, and it only
+	needs revenue for ordinary civil purposes, not as a means of
+	maintaining its existence in a crisis.</p>
+
+	<p>Under the circumstances, the action of the southern government
+	was hardly less than heroic. This renunciation is the
+	most sensational act of the Canton government, but one soon
+	learns that it is the accompaniment of a considerable number
+	of constructive administrative undertakings. Among the most
+	notable are attempts to reform the local magistracies throughout
+	the province, the establishment of municipal government in
+	Canton—something new in China where local officials are all
+	centrally appointed and controlled—based upon the American
+	Commission plan, and directed by graduates of schools of political
+	science in the United States; plans for introducing local
+	self-government throughout the province; a scheme for introduction
+	of universal primary education in Canton to be completed
+	in three steps.</p>
+
+	<p>These reforms are provincial and local. They are part of
+	a general movement against centralization and toward local autonomy
+	which is gaining headway all over China, a protest
+	against the appointment of officials from Peking and the management
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page36" title="36"> </a>of local affairs in the interests of factions—and pocketbooks—whose
+	chief interest in local affairs is what can be extracted
+	in the way of profit. For the only analogue of provincial
+	government in China at the present time is the carpet
+	bag government of the south in the days following our civil
+	war. These things explain the restiveness of the country, including
+	central as well as southern provinces, under Peking
+	domination. But they do not explain the setting up of a new
+	national, or federal government, with the election of Mr. Sun
+	Yat Sen as its president. To understand this event it is necessary
+	to go back into history.</p>
+
+	<p>In June, 1917, the parliament in Peking was about to adopt
+	a constitution. The parliament was controlled by leaders of the
+	old revolutionary party who had been at loggerheads with Yuan
+	and with the executive generally. The latter accused them of
+	being obstructionists, wasting time in discussing and theorizing
+	when the country needed action. Japan had changed her tactics
+	regarding the participation of China in the war, and having got
+	her position established through the Twenty-one Demands, saw
+	a way of controlling Chinese arsenals and virtually amalgamating
+	the Chinese armies with her own through supervising China’s
+	entrance into the war. The British and French were pressing
+	desperately for the same end. Parliament was slow to act, and
+	Tang Shao Yi, Sun Yat Sen and other southern leaders were
+	averse, since they regarded the war as none of China’s business
+	and were upon the whole more anti-British than anti-German—a
+	fact which partly accounts for the share of British journals in
+	the present press propaganda against the Canton government.
+	But what brought matters to a head was the fact that the constitution
+	which was about to be adopted eliminated the military
+	governors or tuchuns of the provinces, and restored the supremacy
+	of civil authority which had been destroyed by Yuan Shi
+	Kai, in addition to introducing a policy of decentralization.
+	Coached by members of the so-called progressive party which
+	claimed to be constitutionalist and which had a factionalist interest
+	in overthrowing the revolutionaries who controlled the
+	legislative branch if not the executive, the military governors
+	demanded that the president suspend parliament and dismiss
+	the legislators. This demand was more than passively supported
+	by all the Allied diplomats in Peking with the honorable exception
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page37" title="37"> </a>of the American legation. The president weakly yielded
+	and issued an edict dispelling parliament, virtually admitting in
+	the document the illegality of his action. Less than a month
+	afterwards he was a refugee in the Dutch legation on account
+	of the farce of monarchical restoration staged by Chang Shun—who
+	at the present time is again coming to the front in the
+	north as adjutant to the plans of Chang Tso Lin, the present
+	“strong man” of China. Later, elections were held and a new
+	parliament elected. This parliament has been functioning as
+	the legislature of China at Peking and elected the president,
+	Hsu Shi Chang, the head of the government recognized by the
+	foreign Powers—in short it is the Chinese government from an
+	international standpoint, the Peking government from a domestic
+	standpoint.</p>
+
+	<p>The revolutionary members of the old parliament never recognized
+	the legality of their dispersal, and consequently refused to
+	admit the legal status of the new parliament, called by them the
+	bogus parliament, and of the president elected by it, especially
+	as the new legislative body was not elected according to the
+	rules laid down by the constitution. Under the lead of some of
+	the old members, the old parliament, called by its opponents the
+	defunct parliament, has led an intermittent existence ever since.
+	Claiming to be the sole authentic constitutional body of China,
+	it finally elected Dr. Sun president of China and thus prepared
+	the act of the fifth of May, already reported.</p>
+
+	<p>Such is the technical and formal background of the present
+	southern government. Its attack upon the legality of the Peking
+	government is doubtless technically justified. But for various
+	reasons its own positive status is open to equally grave doubts.
+	The terms “bogus” and “defunct,” so freely cast at each other,
+	both seem to an outsider to be justified. It is less necessary to
+	go into the reasons which appear to invalidate the position of the
+	southern parliament because of the belated character of its final
+	action. A protest which waits four years to assert itself in positive
+	action is confronted not with legal technicalities but with
+	accomplished facts. In my opinion, legality for legality, the
+	southern government has a bare shade the better of the technical
+	argument. But in the face of a government which has foreign
+	recognition and which has maintained itself after a fashion for
+	four years, a legal shadow is a precarious political basis. It is
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page38" title="38"> </a>wiser to regard the southern government as a revolutionary government,
+	which in addition to the prestige of continuing the
+	revolutionary movement of ten years ago has also a considerable
+	sentimental asset as a protest of constitutionalism against the
+	military usurpations of the Peking government.</p>
+
+	<p>It is an open secret that the southern movement has not received
+	the undivided support of all the forces present in Canton
+	which are opposed to the northern government. Tang Shao Yi,
+	for example, was notable for his absence at the time of the inauguration,
+	having found it convenient to visit the graves of
+	his ancestors at that time. The provincial governor, General
+	Chen Kwang Ming, was in favor of confining efforts to the
+	establishment of provincial autonomy and the encouragement
+	of similar movements in other provinces, looking forward to an
+	eventual federal, or confederated, government of at least all
+	the provinces south of the Yangtse. Many of his generals
+	wanted to postpone action until Kwantung province had made a
+	military alliance with the generals in the other southwestern
+	provinces, so as to be able to resist the north should the latter
+	undertake a military expedition. Others thought the technical
+	legal argument for the new move was being overworked, and
+	while having no objections to an out and out revolutionary
+	movement against Peking, thought that the time for it had not
+	yet come. They are counting on Chang Tso Lin’s attempting
+	a monarchical restoration and think that the popular revulsion
+	against that move would create the opportune time for such a
+	movement as has now been prematurely undertaken. However
+	in spite of reports of open strife freely circulated by British and
+	Peking government newspapers, most of the opposition elements
+	are now loyally suppressing their opposition and supporting the
+	government of Sun Yat Sen. A compromise has been arranged
+	by which the federal government will confine its attention to
+	foreign affairs, leaving provincial matters wholly in the hands
+	of Governor Chen and his adherents. There is still room for
+	friction however, especially as to the control of revenues, since
+	at present there are hardly enough funds for one administration,
+	let alone two.</p>
+
+	<h3><a class="pagenum" id="page39" title="39"> </a>2.</h3>
+
+	<p>The members of the new southern government are
+	strikingly different in type from those one meets elsewhere
+	whether in Peking or the provincial capitals.
+	The latter men are literally mediaeval when they are not late
+	Roman Empire, though most of them have learned a little modern
+	patter to hand out to foreigners. The former are educated
+	men, not only in the school sense and in the sense that they
+	have had some special training for their jobs, but in the sense
+	that they think the ideas and speak the language current among
+	progressive folk all over the world. They welcome inquiry and
+	talk freely of their plans, hopes and fears. I had the opportunity
+	of meeting all the men who are most influential in both the local
+	and federal governments; these conversations did not take the
+	form of interviews for publication, but I learned that there are
+	at least three angles from which the total situation is viewed.</p>
+
+	<p>Governor Chen has had no foreign education and speaks no
+	English. He is distinctively Chinese in his training and outlook.
+	He is a man of force, capable of drastic methods, straightforward
+	intellectually and physically, of unquestioned integrity
+	and of almost Spartan life in a country where official position
+	is largely prized for the luxuries it makes possible. For example,
+	practically alone among Chinese provincial officials of the first
+	rank he has no concubines. Not only this, but he proposed to
+	the provincial assembly a measure to disenfranchise all persons
+	who have concubines. (The measure failed because it is said
+	its passage would have deprived the majority of the assemblymen
+	of their votes.) He is by all odds the most impressive of
+	all the officials whom I have met in China. If I were to select
+	a man likely to become a national figure of the first order in the
+	future, it would be, unhesitatingly, Governor Chen. He can
+	give and also command loyalty—a fact which in itself makes
+	him almost unique.</p>
+
+	<p>His views in gist are as follows: The problem of problems
+	in China is that of real unification. Industry and education are
+	held back because of lack of stability of government, and the
+	better elements in society seclude themselves from all public
+	effort. The question is how this unification is to be obtained.
+	In the past it has been tried by force used by strong individuals.
+	Yuan Shi Kai tried and failed; Feng Kuo Chang tried and
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page40" title="40"> </a>failed; Tuan Chi Jui tried and failed. That method must be
+	surrendered. China can be unified only by the people themselves,
+	employing not force but the methods of normal political
+	evolution. The only way to engage the people in the task is to
+	decentralize the government. Futile efforts at centralization
+	must be abandoned. Peking and Canton alike must allow the
+	provinces the maximum of autonomy; the provincial capitals
+	must give as much authority as possible to the districts, and the
+	districts to the communities. Officials must be chosen by and
+	from the local districts and everything must be done to encourage
+	local initiative. Governor Chen’s chief ambition is to introduce
+	this system into Kwantung province. He believes that
+	other provinces will follow as soon as the method has been demonstrated,
+	and that national unity will then be a pyramid built
+	out of the local blocks.</p>
+
+	<p>With extreme self-government in administrative matters,
+	Governor Chen will endeavor to enforce a policy of centralized
+	economic control. He says in effect that the west has developed
+	economic anarchy along with political control, with the result
+	of capitalistic domination and class struggle. He wishes to avert
+	this consequence in China by having government control from
+	the first of all basic raw materials and all basic industries, mines,
+	transportation, factories for cement, steel, etc. In this way the
+	provincial authorities hope to secure an equable industrial
+	development of the province, while at the same time procuring
+	ample revenues without resorting to heavy taxation. Since almost
+	all the other governors in China are using their power, in
+	combination with the exploiting capitalists native and foreign,
+	to monopolize the natural resources of their provinces for private
+	profit, it is not surprising that Governor Chen’s views are
+	felt to be a menace to privilege and that he is advertised
+	all over China as a devout Bolshevist. His views have
+	special point in view of British efforts to get an economic
+	stranglehold upon the province—efforts which are dealt with
+	in a prior chapter.</p>
+
+	<p>Another type of views lays chief stress upon the internal political
+	condition of China. Its adherents say in effect: Why make
+	such a fuss about having two governments for China, when, in
+	point of fact, China is torn into dozens of governments? In the
+	north, war is sure to break out sooner or later between Chang
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page41" title="41"> </a>Tso Lin and his rivals. Each military governor is afraid of his
+	division generals. The brigade generals intrigue against the
+	division leaders, and even colonels are doing all they can to
+	further their personal power. The Peking government is a
+	stuffed sham, taking orders from the military governors of the
+	provinces, living only on account of jealousies among these generals,
+	and by the grace of foreign diplomatic support. It is
+	actually bankrupt, and this actual state will soon be formally
+	recognized. The thing for us to do is to go ahead, maintain
+	in good faith the work of the revolution, give this province the
+	best possible civil administration; then in the inevitable approaching
+	débâcle, the southern government will be ready to
+	serve as the nucleus of a genuine reconstruction. Meantime we
+	want, if not the formal recognition of foreign governments, at
+	least their benevolent neutrality.</p>
+
+	<p>Dr. Sun still embodies in himself the spirit of the revolution
+	of 1911. So far as that was not anti-Manchu it was in essence
+	nationalistic, and only accidentally republican. The day after
+	the inauguration of Dr. Sun, a memorial was dedicated to the
+	seventy-two patriot heroes who fell in an abortive attempt in
+	Canton to throw off the Manchu yoke, some six months before
+	the successful revolt. The monument is the most instructive
+	single lesson which I have seen in the political history of the
+	revolution. It is composed of seventy-two granite blocks. Upon
+	each is engraved: Given by the Chinese National League of
+	Jersey City, or Melbourne, or Mexico, or Liverpool, or Singapore,
+	etc. Chinese nationalism is a product of Chinese migration
+	to foreign countries; Chinese nationalism on foreign shores
+	financed the revolution, and largely furnished its leaders and
+	provided its organization. Sun Yat Sen was the incarnation
+	of this nationalism, which was more concerned with freeing
+	China—and Asia—from all foreign domination than with
+	particular political problems. And in spite of the movement of
+	events since that day, he remains essentially at that stage, being
+	closer in spirit to the nationalists of the European irredentist
+	type than to the spirit of contemporary young China. A convinced
+	republican, he nevertheless measures events and men in the
+	concrete by what he thinks they will do to promote the independence
+	of China from foreign control, rather than by what
+	they will do to promote a truly democratic government. This
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page42" title="42"> </a>is the sole explanation that can be given for his unfortunate
+	coquetting a year ago with the leaders of the now fallen Anfu
+	Club. He allowed himself to be deceived into thinking that
+	they were ready to turn against the Japanese if he would give
+	them his support; and his nationalist imagination was inflamed
+	by the grandiose schemes of little Hsu for the Chinese subjugation
+	of Mongolia.</p>
+
+	<p>More openly than others, Dr. Sun admits and justifies the
+	new southern government as representing a division of China.
+	If, he insists, it had not been for the secession of the south in
+	1917, Japan would now be in virtually complete control of all
+	China. A unified China would have meant a China ready to
+	be swallowed whole by Japan. The secession localized Japanese
+	aggressions, made it evident that the south would fight rather
+	than be devoured, and gave a breathing spell in which public
+	opinion in the north rallied against the Twenty-one Demands
+	and against the military pact with Japan. Thus it saved the independence
+	of China. But, while it checked Japan, it did not
+	checkmate her. She still expects with the assistance of Chang
+	Tso Lin to make northern China her vassal. The support which
+	foreign governments in general and the United States in particular
+	are giving Peking is merely playing into the hands of the
+	Japanese. The independent south affords the only obstacle
+	which causes Japan to pause in her plan of making northern
+	China in effect a Japanese province. A more than usually authentic
+	rumor says that upon the occasion of the visit of the
+	Japanese consul general to the new president (no other foreign
+	official has made an official visit), the former offered from his
+	government the official recognition of Dr. Sun as president of
+	all China, if the latter would recognize the Twenty-one Demands
+	as an accomplished fact. From the Japanese standpoint
+	the offer was a safe one, as this acceptance of Japanese claims
+	is the one thing impossible to the new government. But meantime
+	the offer naturally confirms the nationalists of Dr. Sun’s
+	type in their belief that the southern split is the key to maintaining
+	the political independence of China; or, as Dr. Sun puts it,
+	that a divided China is for the time being the only means to an
+	ultimately independent China.</p>
+
+	<p>These views are not given as stating the whole truth of the
+	situation. They are ex parte. But they are given as setting
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page43" title="43"> </a>forth in good faith the conceptions of the leaders of the southern
+	movement and as requiring serious attention if the situation
+	of China, domestic and international, is to be understood. Upon
+	my own account, and not simply as expressing the views of
+	others, I have reached a conclusion quite foreign to my thought
+	before I visited the south. While it is not possible to attach
+	too much importance to the unity of China as a part of the
+	foreign policy of the United States, it is possible to attach altogether
+	too much importance to the Peking government as a
+	symbol of that unity. To borrow and adapt the words of one
+	southern leader, while the United States can hardly be expected
+	to do other than recognize the Peking as the de facto government,
+	there is no need to coddle that government and give it
+	face. Such a course maintains a nominal and formal unity while
+	in fact encouraging the military and corrupt forces that keep
+	China divided and which make for foreign aggression.</p>
+
+	<p>In my opinion as the outcome of two years’ observation of
+	the Chinese situation, the real interests of both China and the
+	United States would be served if, in the first place, the United
+	States should take the lead in securing from the diplomatic body
+	in Peking the serving of express notice upon the Peking government
+	that in no case would a restoration of the monarchy be
+	recognized by the Powers. This may seem in America like an
+	unwarranted intervention in the domestic affairs of a foreign
+	country. But in fact such intervention is already a fact. The
+	present government endures only in virtue of the support of
+	foreign Powers. The notice would put an end to one kind of
+	intrigue, one kind of rumor and suspicion, which is holding industry
+	and education back and which is keeping China in a state
+	of unrest and instability. It would establish a period of comparative
+	quiet in which whatever constructive forces exist may
+	come to the front. The second measure would be more extreme.
+	The diplomacy of the United States should take the lead in
+	making it clear that unless the promises about the disbanding
+	of the army, and the introduction of general retrenchment are
+	honestly and immediately carried out, the Powers will pursue
+	a harsh rather than a benevolent policy toward the Peking government,
+	insisting upon immediate payment of interest and loans
+	as they fall due and holding up the government to the strictest
+	meeting of all its obligations. The notification to be effective
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page44" title="44"> </a>might well include a virtual threat of withdrawal of recognition
+	in case the government does not seriously try to put its profuse
+	promises into execution. It should also include a definite discouragement
+	of any expenditures designed for military conquest
+	of the south.</p>
+
+	<p>Diplomatic recognition of the southern government is out of
+	the question at present. It is not out of the question to put on
+	the financial screws so that the southern government will be allowed
+	space and time to demonstrate what it can do by peaceful
+	means to give one or more provinces a decent, honest and progressive
+	civil administration. It is unnecessary to enumerate
+	the obstacles in the way of carrying out such a policy. But in
+	my judgment it is the only policy by which the Great Powers
+	will not become accomplices in perpetuating the weakness and
+	division of China. It is the most straightforward way of meeting
+	whatever plans of aggression Japan may entertain.</p>
+
+	<p class="dateline">May, 1921.</p>
+</div>
+<div id="essay6" class="essay">
+	<h2><abbr class="essay-number" title="six">VI</abbr><br />
+		Federalism in China</h2>
+
+	<p class="first_paragraph"><span class="first_word">The</span> newcomer in China in observing and judging events
+	usually makes the mistake of attaching too much significance
+	to current happenings. Occurrences take
+	place which in the western world would portend important
+	changes—and nothing important results. It is not easy to loosen
+	the habit of years; and so the visitor assumes that an event
+	which is striking to the point of sensationalism must surely be
+	part of a train of events having a definite trend; some deep-laid
+	plan must be behind it. It takes a degree of intellectual patience
+	added to time and experience to make one realize that even
+	when there is a rhythm in events the tempo is so retarded that
+	one must wait a long time to judge what is really going on.
+	Most political events are like daily changes in the weather,
+	fluctuations back and forth which may seriously affect individuals
+	but which taken one by one tell little about the movement
+	of the seasons. Even the occurrences which are due to human
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page45" title="45"> </a>intention are usually sporadic and casual, and the observer errs
+	by reading into them too much plot, too comprehensive a scheme,
+	too farsighted a plan. The aim behind the event is likely to
+	be only some immediate advantage, some direct increase of
+	power, the overthrow of a rival, the grasping at greater wealth
+	by an isolated act, without any consecutive or systematic looking
+	ahead.</p>
+
+	<p>Foreigners are not the only ones who have erred, however,
+	in judging the Chinese political situation of the last few years.
+	Beginning two years ago, one heard experienced Chinese with
+	political affiliations saying that it was impossible for things to
+	go on as they were for more than three months longer. Some
+	decisive change must occur. Yet outwardly the situation has
+	remained much the same not only for three months but for two
+	years, the exception being the overthrow of the Anfu faction a
+	year ago. And this occurrence hardly marked a definite turn in
+	events, as it was, to a considerable extent, only a shifting of
+	power from the hands of one set of tuchuns to another set.
+	Nevertheless at the risk of becoming a victim of the fallacy
+	which I have been setting forth, I will hazard the remark that
+	the last few months <em>have</em> revealed a definite and enduring trend—that
+	through the diurnal fluctuations of the strife for personal
+	power and wealth a seasonal political change in society is now
+	showing itself. Certain lines of cleavage seem to show themselves,
+	so that through the welter of striking, picturesque, sensational
+	but meaningless events, a definite pattern is revealed.</p>
+
+	<p>This pattern is indicated by the title of this chapter—a movement
+	toward the development of a federal form of government.
+	In calling the movement one toward federalism, there is, however,
+	more of a jump into the remote future than circumstances
+	justify. It would be more accurate, as well as more modest, to
+	say that there is a well defined and seemingly permanent trend
+	toward provincial autonomy and local self-government accompanied
+	by a hope and a vague plan that in the future the more
+	or less independent units will recombine into the United or
+	Federated States of China. Some who look far into the future
+	anticipate three stages; the first being the completion of the
+	present secessionist movement; the second the formation of
+	northern and southern confederations respectively; the third a
+	reunion into a single state.</p>
+
+	<p><a class="pagenum" id="page46" title="46"> </a>To go into the detailed evidence for the existence of a definite
+	and lasting movement of this sort would presume too much on
+	the reader’s knowledge of Chinese geography and his acquaintance
+	with specific recent events. I shall confine myself to quite
+	general features of the situation. The first feature is the new
+	phase which has been assumed by the long historic antagonism
+	of the north and the south. Roughly speaking, the revolution
+	which established the republic and overthrew the Manchus represented
+	a victory for the south. But the transformation during
+	the last five years of the nominal republic into a corrupt oligarchy
+	of satraps or military governors or feudal lords has represented
+	a victory for the north. It is a significant fact, symbolically at
+	least, that the most powerful remaining tuchun or military
+	governor in China—in some respects the only powerful one who
+	has survived the vicissitudes of the last few years—namely Chang
+	Tso Lin, is the uncrowned king of the three Manchurian provinces.
+	The so-called civil war of the north and south is not,
+	however, to be understood as a conflict of republicanism located
+	in the south and militarism in the north. Such a notion is directly
+	contrary to facts. The “civil war” till six or eight months ago
+	was mainly a conflict of military governors and factions, part
+	of that struggle for personal power and wealth which has been
+	going on all over China.</p>
+
+	<p>But recently events have taken a different course. In four of
+	the southern provinces, tuchuns who seemed all powerful have
+	toppled over, and the provinces have proclaimed or tacitly assumed
+	their independence of both the Peking and the former
+	military Canton governments—the province in which Canton
+	situated being one of the four. I happened to be in Hunan, the
+	first of the southerly provinces to get comparative independence,
+	last fall, not long after the overthrow of the vicious despot
+	who had ruled the province with the aid of northern troops.
+	For a week a series of meetings were held in Changsha, the
+	capital of the province. The burden of every speech was “Hunan
+	for the Hunanese.” The slogan embodies the spirit of two
+	powers each aiming at becoming the central authority; it is a
+	conflict of the principle of provincial autonomy, represented by
+	the politically more mature south, with that of militaristic centralization,
+	represented by Peking.</p>
+
+	<p>As I write, in early September (1921), the immediate issue is
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page47" title="47"> </a>obscured by the fight which Wu Pei Fu is waging with the Hunanese
+	who with nominal independence are in aim and interest allied
+	with the south. If, as is likely, Wu Pei Fu wins, he may take
+	one of two courses. He may use his added power to turn against
+	Chang Tso Lin and the northern militarists which will bring
+	him into virtual alliance with the southerners and establish him
+	as the antagonist of the federal principle. This is the course
+	which his earlier record would call for. Or he may yield to the
+	usual official lust for power and money and try once more the
+	Yuan Shi Kai policy of military centralization with himself as
+	head, after trying out conclusions with Chang Tso Lin as his
+	rival. This is the course which the past record of military
+	leaders indicates. But even if Wu Pei Fu follows precedent
+	and goes bad, he will only hasten his own final end. This is not
+	prophecy. It is only a statement of what has uniformly happened
+	in China just at the moment a military leader seemed to
+	have complete power in his grasp. In other words, a victory
+	for Wu Pei Fu may either accelerate or may retard the development
+	of provincial autonomy according to the course he pursues.
+	It cannot permanently prevent or deflect it.</p>
+
+	<p>The basic factor that makes one sure that this trend toward
+	local autonomy is a reality and not merely one of those meaningless
+	shiftings of power which confuse the observer, is that it is
+	in accord with Chinese temperament, tradition and circumstance.
+	Feudalism is past and gone two thousand years ago, and at no
+	period since has China possessed a working centralized government.
+	The absolute empires which have come and gone in the
+	last two millenniums existed by virtue of non-interference and a
+	religious aura. The latter can never be restored; and every
+	episode of the republic demonstrates that China with its vast
+	and diversified territories, its population of between three hundred
+	and fifty and four hundred million, its multitude of languages
+	and lack of communications, its enormous local attachments
+	sanctified by the family system and ancestral worship,
+	cannot be managed from a single and remote centre. China
+	rests upon a network of local and voluntary associations cemented
+	by custom. This fact has given it its unparallelled stability
+	and its power to progress even under the disturbed political conditions
+	of the past ten years. I sometimes think that Americans
+	with their own traditional contempt for politics and their spontaneous
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page48" title="48"> </a>reliance upon self-help and local organization are the
+	ones who are naturally fitted to understand China’s course.
+	The Japanese with their ingrained reliance upon the state have
+	continually misjudged and misacted. The British understand
+	better than we do the significance of local self-government; but
+	they are misled by their reverence for politics so that they cannot
+	readily find or see government when it does not take political
+	form.</p>
+
+	<p>It is not too much to say that one great cause for the overthrow
+	of the Manchus was the fact that because of the pressure
+	of international relations they attempted to force, especially in
+	fiscal matters, a centralization upon the provinces wholly foreign
+	to the spirit of the people. This created hostility where
+	before there had been indifference. China may possibly not
+	emerge from her troubles a unified nation, any more than a
+	much smaller and less populous Europe emerged from the break-up
+	of the Holy Roman Empire, a single state. Indeed one often
+	wonders, not that China is divided, but that she is not much
+	more broken up than she is. But one thing is certain. Whatever
+	progress China finally succeeds in making will come from
+	a variety of local centres, not from Peking or Canton. It will
+	be effected by means of associations and organizations which
+	even though they assume a political form are not primarily
+	political in nature.</p>
+
+	<p>Criticisms are passed, especially by foreigners, upon the present
+	trend of events. The criticisms are more than plausible.
+	It is evident that the present weakness of China is due to her
+	divided condition. Hence it is natural to argue that the present
+	movement being one of secession and general disintegration will
+	increase the weakness of the country. It is also evident that
+	many of China’s troubles are due to the absence of any efficient
+	administrative system; it is reasonable to argue that China
+	cannot get even railways and universal education without a
+	strong and stable central government. There is no doubt about
+	the facts. It is not surprising that many friends of China deeply
+	deplore the present tendency while some regard it as the final
+	accomplishment of the long predicted breakup of China. But
+	remedies for China’s ills based upon ignoring history, psychology
+	and actual conditions are so utopian that it is not worth while
+	to argue whether or not they are theoretically desirable. The
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page49" title="49"> </a>remedy of China’s troubles by a strong, centralized government
+	is on a par with curing disease by the expulsion of a devil. The evil
+	of sectionalism is real, but since it is real it cannot be dealt with by
+	trying a method which implies its non-existence. If the devil is
+	really there, he will not be exorcized by a formula. If the trouble
+	is internal, not due to an external demon, the disease can be cured
+	only by using the factors of health and vigor which the patient
+	already possesses. And in China while these factors of recuperation
+	and growth are numerous, they all exist in connection with
+	local organizations and voluntary associations. The increasing
+	volume of the cry that the “tuchuns must go” comes from the
+	provincial and local interests which have been insulted and violated
+	by a nominally centralized but actually chaotic situation. After
+	this negative work is completed, the constructive rebuilding of
+	China can proceed only by utilizing local interests and abilities.
+	In China the movement will be the opposite of that which occurred
+	in Japan. It will be from the periphery to the centre.</p>
+
+	<p>Another objection to the present tendency has force especially
+	from the foreign standpoint. As already stated, the efforts of
+	the Manchu dynasty in its latter days to enhance central power
+	were due to international pressure. Foreign nations treated
+	Peking as if it were a capital like London, Paris or Berlin, and
+	in its efforts to meet foreign demands it had to try to become
+	such a centre. The result was disaster. But foreign nations still
+	want to have a single centre which may be held responsible.
+	And subconsciously, if not consciously, this desire is responsible
+	for much of the objection of foreign nationals to the local
+	autonomy movement. They well know that it is going to take a
+	long time to realize the ideal of federation, and meantime where
+	and what is to be the agency responsible for diplomatic relations,
+	the enforcing of indemnities and the securing of concessions?</p>
+
+	<p>In one respect the secessionist tendency is dangerous to China
+	herself as well as inconvenient to the powers. It will readily
+	stimulate the desire and ability of foreign nations to interfere
+	in China’s domestic affairs. There will be many centres at
+	which to carry on intrigues and from which to get concessions
+	instead of one or two. There is also danger that one foreign
+	nation may line up with one group of provinces, and another
+	foreign nation with another group, so that international friction
+	will increase. Even now some Japanese sources and even such
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page50" title="50"> </a>an independent liberal paper as Robert Young’s Japan Chronicle
+	are starting or reporting the rumor that the Cantonese experiment
+	is supported by subsidies supplied by American capitalists
+	in the hope of economic concessions. The rumor was invented
+	for a sinister purpose. But it illustrates the sort of situation
+	that may come into existence if there are several political centres
+	in China and one foreign nation backs one and another nation,
+	another.</p>
+
+	<p>The danger is real enough. But it cannot be dealt with by
+	attempting the impossible—namely checking the movement toward
+	local autonomy, even though disintegration may temporarily
+	accompany it. The danger only emphasizes the fundamental
+	fact of the whole Chinese situation; that its essence is
+	time. The evils and troubles of China are real enough, and
+	there is no blinking the fact that they are largely of her own
+	making, due to corruption, inefficiency and absence of popular
+	education. But no one who knows the common people doubts
+	that they will win through if they are given time. And in the
+	concrete this means that they be left politically alone to work out
+	their own destiny. There will doubtless be proposals at the Pacific
+	Conference to place China under some kind of international
+	tutelage. This chapter and the events connected with the tendency
+	which it reports will be cited as showing this need. Some
+	of the schemes will spring from motives that are hostile to
+	China. Some will be benevolently conceived in a desire to save
+	China from herself and shorten her period of chaos and confusion.
+	But the hope of the world’s peace, as well as of China’s
+	freedom, lies in adhering to a policy of Hands Off. Give China
+	a chance. Give her time. The danger lies in being in a hurry,
+	in impatience, possibly in the desire of America to show that
+	we are a power in international affairs and that we too have a
+	positive foreign policy. And a benevolent policy of supporting
+	China from without, instead of promoting her aspirations from
+	within, may in the end do China about as much harm as a policy
+	conceived in malevolence.</p>
+
+	<p class="dateline">July, 1921.</p>
+</div>
+<div id="essay7" class="essay">
+	<h2><a class="pagenum" id="page51" title="51"> </a><abbr class="essay-number" title="seven">VII</abbr><br />
+		A Parting of the Ways for America</h2>
+
+	<h3>1</h3>
+
+	<p class="first_paragraph"><span class="first_word">The</span> realities of American policy in China and toward
+	China are going to be more seriously tested in the future
+	than they ever have been in the past. Japanese
+	papers have been full of protests against any attempt by the
+	Pacific Conference to place Japan on trial. Would that American
+	journals were full of warnings that America is on trial at
+	the Conference as to the sincerity and intelligent goodwill behind
+	her amiable professions. The world will not stop with the
+	Pacific Conference; the latter, however important, will not arrest
+	future developments, and the United States will continue to be
+	on trial till she has established by her acts a permanent and
+	definite attitude. For the realities of the situation cannot be exhausted
+	in any formula or in any set of diplomatic agreements,
+	even if the Conference confounds the fears of pessimists and
+	results in a harmonious union of the powers in support of China’s
+	legitimate aspirations for free political and economic growth.</p>
+
+	<p>The Conference, however, stands as a symbol of the larger
+	situation; and its decisions or lack of them will be a considerable
+	factor in the determination of subsequent events. Sometimes
+	one is obliged to fall back on a trite phrase. We are genuinely
+	at a parting of the ways. Even if we should follow in our old
+	path, there would none the less be a parting of the ways, for
+	we cannot consistently tread the old path unless we are animated
+	by a much more conscious purpose and a more general
+	and intelligent knowledge of affairs than have controlled our
+	activities in the past.</p>
+
+	<p>The ideas expressed by an English correspondent about the
+	fear that America is soon to be an active source of danger in
+	the Far East are not confined to persons on foreign shores. The
+	prevailing attitude in some circles of American opinion is that
+	called by President Hibben cynical pessimism. All professed
+	radicals and many liberals believe that if our course has been
+	better in the past it has been due to geographical accidents combined
+	with indifference and with our undeveloped economic status.
+	Consequently they believe that since we have now become what is
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page52" title="52"> </a>called a world-power and a nation which exports instead of importing
+	capital, our course will soon be as bad as that of any of
+	the rest of them. In some quarters this opinion is clearly an
+	emotional reaction following the disillusionments of Versailles.
+	In others, it is due to adherence to a formula: nothing in international
+	affairs can come out of capitalism and America is emphatically
+	a capitalistic country. Whether or not these feelings
+	are correct, they are not discussable; neither an emotion nor an
+	absolute formula is subject to analysis.</p>
+
+	<p>But there are specific elements in the situation which give
+	grounds for apprehension as to the future. These specific elements
+	are capable of detection and analysis. An adequate realization
+	of their nature will be a large factor in preventing cynical
+	apprehensions from becoming actual. This chapter is an attempt
+	at a preliminary listing, inadequate, of course, as any preliminary
+	examination must be. While an a priori argument based on a
+	fatalistic formula as to how a “capitalistic nation” must conduct
+	itself does not appeal to me, there are nevertheless concrete facts
+	which are suggested by that formula. Part of our comparatively
+	better course in China in the past is due to the fact that we have
+	not had the continuous and close alliance between the State
+	Department and big banking interests which is found in the
+	case of foreign powers. No honest well-informed history of
+	developments in China could be written in which the Russian
+	Asiatic Bank, the Foreign Bank of Belgium, the French Indo-China
+	Bank and Banque Industrielle, the Yokohama Specie
+	Bank, the Hongkong-Shanghai Bank, etc., did not figure prominently.
+	These banks work in the closest harmony, not only with
+	railway and construction syndicates and big manufacturing interests
+	at home, but also with their respective foreign offices.
+	It is hardly too much to say that legations and banks have been
+	in most important matters the right and left hands of the same
+	body. American business interests have complained an the past
+	that the American government does not give to American traders
+	abroad the same support that the nationals of other states
+	receive. In the past these complaints have centred largely about
+	actual wrongs suffered or believed to have been suffered by
+	American business undertakings carried on in a foreign country.
+	With the present expansion of capital and of commerce, the
+	same complaints and demands are going to be made not with
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page53" title="53"> </a>reference to grievances suffered, but with reference to furthering,
+	to pushing American commercial interests in connection
+	with large banking groups. It would take a credulous person
+	to deny the influence of big business in domestic politics. As
+	we become more interested in commerce and banking enterprises
+	what assurance have we that the alliance will not be transferred
+	to international politics?</p>
+
+	<p>It should be noted that the policy of the open door as affirmed
+	by the great powers—and as frequently violated by them—even
+	if it be henceforth observed in good faith, does not adequately
+	protect us from this danger. The open door policy is
+	not primarily a policy about China herself but rather about the
+	policies of foreign powers toward one another with respect to
+	China. It demands equality of economic opportunity for different
+	nations. Were it enforced, it would prevent the granting
+	of monopolies to any one nation: there is nothing in it to render
+	impossible a conjoint exploitation of China by foreign powers,
+	an organized monopoly in which each nation has its due share
+	with respect to others. Such an organization might conceivably
+	reduce friction among the great powers, and thereby reduce the
+	danger of future wars—as long as China herself is impotent
+	to go to war. The agreement might conceivably for a considerable
+	time be of benefit to China herself. But it is clear that
+	for the United States to become a partner in any such arrangement
+	would involve a reversal of our historic policy in the Far
+	East. It might be technically consistent with the open door
+	policy, but it would be a violation of the larger sense in which
+	the American people has understood and praised that ideal. He
+	is blind who does not see that there are forces making for such
+	a reversal. And since we are all more or less blind, an opening
+	of our eyes to the danger is one of the conditions of its not being
+	realized.</p>
+
+	<p>One of the forces which is operative is indicated by the phrase
+	that an international agreement on an economic and financial
+	basis might be of value to China herself. The mere suggestion
+	that such a thing is possible is abhorrent to many, especially to
+	radicals. There seems to be something sinister in it. So it is
+	worth explaining how and why it might be so. In the first place,
+	it would obviously terminate the particularistic grabbing for
+	“leased” territory, concessions and spheres of influence which
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page54" title="54"> </a>has so damaged China. At the present time, the point of this
+	remark lies in its implied reference to Japan, as at one time it
+	might have applied to Russia. Fear of Japan’s aims in China
+	is not confined to China; the fear is widespread. An international
+	economic arrangement may therefore be plausibly presented
+	as the easiest and most direct method of relieving China of
+	the Japanese menace. For Japan to stay out would be to give
+	herself away; if she came in, it would subject Japanese activities
+	to constant scrutiny and control. There is no doubt that part
+	of the fear of Japan regarding the Pacific Conference is due
+	to a belief that some such arrangement is contemplated. The
+	case is easily capable of such presentation as to make it appeal
+	to Americans who are really friendly to China and who haven’t
+	the remotest interest in her economic exploitation.</p>
+
+	<p>The arrangement would, for example, automatically eliminate
+	the Lansing-Ishii agreement with its embarrassing ambiguous
+	recognition of Japan’s <em>special</em> interests in China.</p>
+
+	<p>The other factor is domestic. The distraction and civil wars
+	of China are commonplaces. So is the power exercised by the
+	military governors and generals. The greater one’s knowledge,
+	the more one perceives how intimately the former evil is dependent
+	upon the latter. The financial plight of the Chinese
+	government, its continual foreign borrowings which threaten
+	bankruptcy in the near future, depend upon militaristic domination
+	and wild expenditure for unproductive purposes and
+	squeeze. Without this expense, China would have no great
+	difficulty henceforth in maintaining a balance in her budget. The
+	retardation of public education whose advancement—especially
+	in elementary schools—is China’s greatest single need is due to
+	the same cause. So is the growth in official corruption which is
+	rapidly extending into business and private life.</p>
+
+	<p>In fact, every one of the obstacles to the progress of China
+	is connected with the rule of military factions and their struggles
+	with one another for complete mastery. An economic international
+	agreement among the great powers can be made which
+	would surely reduce and possibly eliminate the greatest evils
+	of “militarism.” Many liberal Chinese say in private that they
+	would be willing to have a temporary international receivership
+	for government finance, provided they could be assured of its
+	nature and the exact date and conditions of its termination—a
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page55" title="55"> </a>proviso which they are sensible enough to recognize would be
+	extremely difficult of attainment. American leadership in forming
+	and executing any such scheme would, they feel, afford the
+	best reassurance as to its nature and terms. Under such circumstances
+	a plausible case can be made out for proposals which,
+	under the guise of traditional American friendship for China,
+	would in fact commit us to a reversal of our historic policy.</p>
+
+	<p>There are radicals abroad and at home who think that our
+	entrance into a Consortium already proves that we have entered
+	upon the road of reversal and who naturally see in the Pacific
+	Conference the next logical step. I have previously stated my
+	own belief that our State Department proposed the Consortium
+	primarily for political ends, as a means of checking the policy
+	pursued by Japan of making unproductive loans to China in
+	return for which she was getting an immediate grip on China’s
+	natural resources and preparing the way for direct administrative
+	and financial control when the day of reckoning and foreclosure
+	should finally come. I also said that the Consortium
+	was between two stools, the financial and the political and that
+	up to the present its chief value had been negative and preventive,
+	and that jealousy or lack of interest by Japan and Great
+	Britain in any constructive policy on the part of the Consortium
+	was likely to maintain the same condition. I have seen no reason
+	thus far to change my mind on this point, nor in regard to the
+	further belief that probably the interests of China in the end
+	will be best served by the continuation of this deterrent function.
+	But the question is bound to arise: why continue the Consortium
+	if it isn’t doing anything? The pressure of foreign powers interested
+	in the exploitation of China and of impatient American
+	economic interests may combine to put an end to the present
+	rather otiose existence led by the Consortium. The two stools
+	between which the past action of the American government has
+	managed to swing the Consortium may be united to form a single
+	solid bench.</p>
+
+	<p>At the risk of being charged with credulous gullibility, or
+	something worse, I add that up to the present time the American
+	phase of the Consortium hasn’t shown perceptible signs of
+	becoming a club exercised by American finance over China’s
+	economic integrity and independence. I believe the repeated
+	statements of the American representative that he himself and
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page56" title="56"> </a>the interests he represents would be glad if China proved her
+	ability to finance her own public utilities without resorting to
+	foreign loans. This belief is confirmed by the first public utterance
+	of the new American minister to China who in his reference
+	to the Consortium laid emphasis upon its deterrent function
+	and upon the stimulation it has given to Chinese bankers
+	to finance public utilities. And it is the merest justice to Mr.
+	Stevens, the American representative, to say that he represents
+	the conservative investment type of banker, not the “promotion”
+	type, and that thus far his great concern has been the problem
+	of protecting the buyer of such securities as are passed on by
+	the banks to the ultimate investor—so much so that he has
+	aroused criticism from American business interests impatient
+	for speedy action. But there is a larger phase of the Consortium
+	concerning which I think apprehensions may reasonably
+	be entertained.</p>
+
+	<p>Suppose, if merely by way of hypothesis, that the American
+	government is genuinely interested in China and in making the
+	policy of the open door and Chinese territorial and administrative
+	integrity a reality, not merely a name, and suppose that it
+	is interested in doing so from an American self-interest sufficiently
+	enlightened to perceive that the political and economic advancement
+	of the United States is best furthered by a policy
+	which is identical with China’s ability to develop herself freely
+	and independently: what then would be the wise American
+	course? In short, it would be to view our existing European
+	interests and issues (due to the war) and our Far Eastern interests
+	and issues as parts of one and the same problem. If
+	we are actuated by the motive hypothetically imputed to our
+	government and we fail in its realization, the chief reason will
+	be that we regard the European question and the Asiatic problem
+	as two different questions, or because we identify them from
+	the wrong end.</p>
+
+	<p>Our present financial interest in Europe is enormous. It involves
+	not merely foreign governmental loans but a multitude
+	of private advances and commitments. These financial entanglements
+	affect not merely our industry and commerce but our
+	politics. They involve much more immediately pressing concerns
+	than to our Asiatic relations, and they involve billions
+	where the latter involve millions. The danger under such conditions
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page57" title="57"> </a>that our Asiatic relations will be sacrificed to our European
+	is hardly fanciful.</p>
+
+	<p>To make this abstract statement concrete, the firm of bankers,
+	J. P. Morgan &amp; Co., which is most heavily involved in European
+	indebtedness to the United States, is the firm which is the leading
+	spirit in the Consortium for China. It seems almost inevitable
+	that the Asiatic problem should look like small potatoes
+	in comparison with the European one, especially as our own industrial
+	recuperation is so closely connected with European relations,
+	while the Far East cuts a negligible figure. To my mind
+	the real danger to set out upon selfish exploitation of China:
+	intelligent self-interest, tradition and the fact that our chief asset
+	in China is our past freedom from a predatory course, dictate
+	a course of cooperation with China. The danger is that China
+	will be subordinated and sacrificed because of primary preoccupation
+	with the high finance and politics of Europe, that she will
+	be lost in the shuffle.</p>
+
+	<p>The European aspect of the problem can be made more concrete
+	by reference to Great Britain in particular. That country
+	suffers from the embarrassment of the Japanese alliance. She
+	has already made it sufficiently clear that she would like to
+	draw America into the alliance, making it tripartite, since that
+	would be the easiest way of maintaining good relations with
+	both Japan and the United States. There is no likelihood that
+	any such step will be consummated. But British diplomacy is
+	experienced and astute. And by force of circumstances our
+	high finance has contracted a sort of economic alliance with
+	Great Britain. There is no wish to claim superior virtue for
+	America or to appeal to the strong current of anti-British sentiment.
+	But the British foreign office exists and operates apart
+	from the tradition of liberalism which has mainly actuated English
+	domestic politics. It stands peculiarly for the <em>Empire</em> side
+	of the British Empire, no matter what party is in the saddle
+	in domestic affairs. Every resource will be employed to bring
+	about a settlement at the Pacific Conference which, even though
+	it includes some degree of compromise on the part of Great
+	Britain, will bend the Asiatic policy of the United States to the
+	British traditions in the Far East, instead of committing Great
+	Britain to combining with the United States in making a reality
+	of the integrity of China to which both countries are nominally
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page58" title="58"> </a>committed. It does not seem an extreme statement to say that
+	the immediate issues of the Conference depend upon the way
+	in which our financial commitments in Europe are treated, either
+	as reasons for our making concessions to European policy or
+	on the other hand as a means of securing an adherence of the
+	European powers to the traditional American policy.</p>
+
+	<p>A publicist in China who is of British origin and a sincere
+	friend of China remarked in private conversation that if the
+	United States could not secure the adherence of Great Britain
+	to her Asiatic policy by persuasion (he was deploring the Japanese
+	alliance) she might do so by buying it—through remission
+	of her national debt to us. It is not necessary to resort to the
+	measure so baldly suggested. But the remark at least suggests
+	that our involvement in European, especially British, finance and
+	politics may be treated in either of two ways for either of two
+	results.</p>
+
+	<h3>2</h3>
+
+	<p>That the Chinese people generally speaking has a less
+	antagonistic feeling toward the United States than towards
+	other powers seems to me an undoubted fact.
+	The feeling has been disturbed at divers times by the treatment
+	of the Chinese upon the Pacific coast, by the exclusion act, by
+	the turning over of our interest in the building of the Peking-Canton
+	(or Hankow) railway to a European group, by the
+	Lansing-Ishii agreement, and finally by the part played by
+	President Wilson in the Versailles decision regarding Shantung.
+	Those disturbances in the main, however, have made them dubious
+	as to our skill, energy and intelligence rather than as to our
+	good-will. Americans, taken individually and collectively, are
+	to the Chinese—at least such was my impression—a rather simple
+	folk, taking the word in its good and its deprecatory sense.
+	In noting the Chinese reaction to the proposed Pacific Conference,
+	it was interesting to see the combination of an almost unlimited
+	hope that the United States was to lead in protecting
+	them from further aggressions and in rectifying existing evils,
+	with a lack of confidence, a fear that the United States would
+	have something put over on it.</p>
+
+	<p>Friendly feeling is of course mainly based upon a negative
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page59" title="59"> </a>fact, the fact that the United States has taken no part in “leasing”
+	territories, establishing spheres and setting up extra-national
+	post-offices. On the positive side stands the contribution
+	made by Americans to education, especially medical, and
+	that of girls and women, and to philanthropy and relief. Politically,
+	there are the early service of Burlinghame, the open
+	door policy of John Hay (though failure to maintain it in fact
+	while securing signatures to it on paper is a considerable part
+	of the Chinese belief in our defective energy) and the part
+	played by the United States in moderating the terms of the settlement
+	of the Boxer outbreak, in addition to a considerable
+	number of minor helpful acts. China also remembers that we
+	were the only nation to take exception to the treaties embodying
+	the Twenty-one Demands. While our exception was chiefly
+	made on the basis of our own interests which these treaties might
+	injuriously affect, a sentiment exists that the protest was a pledge
+	of assistance to China when the time should be opportune for
+	raising the whole question. And without doubt the reservation
+	made on May 16, 1915, by our State Department is a strong
+	card at the forthcoming Conference if the Department wishes
+	to play it.</p>
+
+	<p>From an American standpoint, the open door principle represents
+	one of the only two established principles of American
+	diplomacy, the other being, of course, the Monroe Doctrine.
+	In connection with sentimental or idealistic associations which
+	have clustered about it, it constitutes us in some vague fashion
+	in both the Chinese and American public opinion a sort of guardian
+	or at least spokesman of the interests of China in relation
+	to foreign powers. Although, as was pointed out in a former
+	chapter, the open door policy directly concerns other nations in
+	their relation to China rather than China herself, yet the violation
+	of the policy by other powers has been so frequent and so
+	much to the detriment of China, that American interest, prestige
+	and moral sentiment are now implicated in such an enforcement
+	of it as will redound to the advantage of China.</p>
+
+	<p>Citizens of other countries are often irritated by a suggestion
+	of such a relationship between the United States and China.
+	It presents itself as a proclamation of superior national virtue
+	under cover of which the United States aims to establish its
+	influence in China at the expense of other countries. The irritation
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page60" title="60"> </a>is exasperated by the fact that the situation as it stands
+	is an undoubted economic and political asset of the United States
+	in China. We may concede without argument any contention
+	that the situation is not due to any superior virtue but rather to
+	contingencies of history and geography—in which respect it is
+	not unlike many things that pass for virtues with individuals.
+	The contention may be admitted without controversy because it
+	is not pertinent to the main issue. The question is not so much
+	how the state of affairs came about as what it now is, how it is to
+	be treated and what consequences are in flow from it. It is
+	a fact that up to the present an intelligent self-interest of America
+	has coincided with the interests of a stable, independent and
+	progressive China. It is also a fact that American traditions
+	and sentiments have gathered about this consideration so that
+	now there is widespread conviction in the American people of
+	moral obligations of assistance and friendly protection owed by
+	us to China. At present, no policy can be entered upon that
+	does not bear the semblance of fairness and goodwill. We have
+	at least so much protection against the dangers discussed in the
+	prior chapter.</p>
+
+	<p>Among Americans in China and presumably at home there is
+	a strong feeling that we should adopt for the future stronger
+	and more positive policies than we have maintained in the past.
+	This feeling seems to me fraught with dangers unless we make
+	very clear to ourselves in just what respects we are to continue
+	and make good in a more positive manner our traditional policy.
+	To some extent our past policy has been one of drifting. Radical
+	change in this respect may go further than appears upon
+	the surface in altering other fundamental aspects of our policy.
+	What is condemned as drifting is in effect largely the same thing
+	that is also praised as non-interference. A detailed settled policy,
+	no matter how “constructive” it may appear to be, can
+	hardly help involving us in the domestic policies of China, an
+	affair of factions and a game which the Chinese understand and
+	play much better than any foreigners. Such an involvement
+	would at once lessen a present large asset in China, aloofness
+	from internal intrigues and struggles.</p>
+
+	<p>The specific protests of Chinese in this country—mainly Cantonese—against
+	the Consortium seem to me mainly based on
+	misapprehension. But their <em>general</em> attitude of opposition nevertheless
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page61" title="61"> </a>conveys an important lesson. It is based on a belief
+	that the effect of the Consortium will be to give the Peking government
+	a factitious advantage in the internal conflict which is
+	waging in China, so that to all intents and purposes it will mark
+	a taking of sides on our part. It is well remembered that the
+	effect of the “reorganization” loan of the prior Consortium—in
+	which the United States was <em>not</em> a partner—was to give
+	Yuan Shi Kai the funds which seated him and the militarist
+	faction after him, firmly in the governmental saddle. Viewing
+	the matter from a larger point of view than that of Canton vs.
+	Peking, the most fundamental objection I heard brought by
+	Chinese against the Consortium was in effect as follows: The
+	republican revolution in China has still to be wrought out; the
+	beginning of ten years ago has been arrested. It remains to
+	fight it out. The inevitable effect of increased foreign financial
+	and economic interest in China, even admitting that its industrial
+	effect was advantageous to China, would be to create an interest
+	in <em>stabilizing</em> China politically, which in effect would mean to
+	sanctify the status quo, and prevent the development of a revolution
+	which cannot be accomplished without internal disorders
+	that would affect foreign investments unfavorably. These considerations
+	are not mentioned for the sake of throwing light
+	on the Consortium: they are cited as an illustration of the
+	probability that a too positive and constructive development of
+	our tradition of goodwill to China would involve us in an interference
+	with Chinese domestic affairs injurious to China’s welfare,
+	to that free and independent development in which we
+	profess such interest.</p>
+
+	<p>But how, it will be asked, are we to protect China from foreign
+	depredations, particularly those of Japan, how are we to
+	change our nominal goodwill into a reality, if we do not enter
+	much more positive and detailed policies? If there was in
+	existence at the present time any such thing as a diplomacy of
+	peoples as distinct from a diplomacy of governments, the question
+	would mean something quite different from what it now
+	means. As things now stand the people should profoundly distrust
+	the <em>politicians’</em> love for China. It is too frequently the
+	reverse side of fear and incipient hatred of Japan, colored perhaps
+	by anti-British feeling.</p>
+
+	<p>There should be no disguising of the situation. The aggressive
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page62" title="62"> </a>activities of other nations in China, centering but not exhausted
+	at this time in Japan, are not merely sources of trouble
+	to China but they are potential causes of trouble in our own
+	international relationships. We are committed by our tradition
+	and by the present actualities of the situation to attempting
+	something positive for China as respects her international status,
+	to live up to our responsibility is a most difficult and delicate
+	matter. We have on the one side to avoid getting entangled
+	in quasi-imperialistic European policies in Asia, whether under
+	the guise of altruism, of putting ourselves in a position where
+	we can exercise a more effective supervision of their behavior,
+	or by means of economic expansion. On the other side, we
+	have to avoid drifting into that kind of covert or avowed antagonism
+	to European and Japanese imperialism which will only
+	increase friction, encourage a combination especially of Great
+	Britain and Japan—-or of France and Japan—against us, and
+	bring war appreciably nearer.</p>
+
+	<p>We need to bear in mind that China will not be saved from
+	outside herself. Even if by a successful war we should relieve
+	China from Japanese encroachments, from all encroachments,
+	China would not of necessity be brought nearer her legitimate
+	goal of orderly and prosperous internal development. Apart
+	from the question of how far war can now settle any fundamental
+	issues without begetting others as dangerous, China of
+	all countries is the one where settlement by force, especially by
+	outside force, is least applicable, and most likely to be enormously
+	disserviceable. China is used to taking time to deal with her
+	problems: she can neither understand not profit by impatient
+	methods of the western world which are profoundly alien to
+	her genius. Moreover a civilization which is on a continental
+	scale, which is so old that the rest of us are parvenus in comparison,
+	which is thick and closely woven, cannot be hurried in
+	its development without disaster. Transformation from within
+	is its sole way out, and we can best help China by trying to see
+	to it that she gets the time she needs in order to effect this transformation,
+	whether or not we like the particular form it assumes
+	at any particular time.</p>
+
+	<p>A successful war in behalf of China would leave untouched
+	her problems of education, of factional and sectional forces, of
+	political immaturity showing itself in present incapacity for organization.
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page63" title="63"> </a>It would affect her industrial growth undoubtedly,
+	but in all human probability for the worse, increasing the likelihood
+	that she would enter upon an industrialization which
+	would repeat the worst evils of western industrial life, without
+	the immunities, resistances and remedial measures which the
+	West has evolved. The imagination cannot conceive a worse
+	crime than fastening western industrialism upon China before
+	she has developed within herself the meaning of coping with
+	the forces which it would release. The danger is great enough
+	as it is. War waged in China’s behalf by western powers and
+	western methods would make the danger practically irresistible.
+	In addition we should gain a permanent interest in China which
+	is likely to be of the most dangerous character to ourselves. If
+	we were not committed by it to future imperialism, we should
+	be luckier than we have any right to hope to be. These things
+	are said against a mental protest to admitting even by implication
+	the prospect of war with Japan, but it seems necessary to
+	say them.</p>
+
+	<p>These remarks are negative and vague as to our future
+	course. They imply a confession of lack of such wisdom as
+	would enable me to make positive definite proposals. But at
+	least I have confidence in the wisdom and goodwill of the American
+	and other peoples to deal with the problem, if they are
+	only called into action. And the first condition of calling wisdom
+	and goodwill into effective existence is to recognize the
+	seriousness of the problem and the utter futility of trying to
+	force its solution by impatient and hurried methods. Pro-Japanese
+	apologetics is dangerous; it obscures the realities of the
+	situation. An irritated anti-Japanism that would hasten the
+	solution of the Chinese problem merely by attacking Japan is
+	equally fatal to discovering and applying a proper method.</p>
+
+	<p>More specifically and also more generically, proper publicity
+	is the greatest need. If, as Secretary Hughes has intimated,
+	a settlement of the problems of the Pacific is made a condition
+	of arriving at an agreement regarding reduction and limitation
+	of armaments, it is likely that the Conference might better never
+	be held. In eagerness to do something which will pass as a settlement,
+	either China’s—and Siberia’s—interests will be sacrificed
+	in some unfair compromise, or irritation and friction will
+	be increased—and in the end so will armaments. In any literal
+	<a class="pagenum" id="page64" title="64"> </a>sense, it is ridiculous to suppose that the problems of the Pacific
+	can be settled in a few weeks, or months—or years. Yet the
+	discussion of the problems, in separation from the question of
+	armament, may be of great use. For it may further that publicity
+	which is a pre-condition of any genuine settlement. This
+	involves the public in diplomacy. But it also involves a wider
+	publicity, one which will enlighten the world about the facts of
+	Asia, internal and international.</p>
+
+	<p>Scepticism about Foreign Offices, as they are at present conducted,
+	is justified. But scepticism about the power of public opinion,
+	if it can be aroused and instructed, to reshape Foreign Office
+	policies means hopelessness about the future of the world. Let
+	everything possible be done to reduce armament, if only to secure
+	a naval holiday on the part of the three great naval powers,
+	and if only for the sake of lessening taxation. Let the Conference
+	on Problems devote itself to discussing and making
+	known as fully and widely as possible the element and scope
+	of those problems, and the fears—or should one call them
+	hopes?—of the cynics will be frustrated. It is not so important
+	that a decision in the American sense of the Yap question be
+	finally and forever arrived at, as it is that the need of China
+	and the Orient in general for freer and fuller communications
+	with the rest of the world be made clear—and so on, down or
+	up the list of agenda. The commercial open door is needed.
+	But the need is greater that the door be opened to light, to
+	knowledge and understanding. If these forces will not create
+	a public opinion which will in time secure a lasting and just settlement
+	of other problems, there is no recourse save despair of
+	civilization. Liberals can do something better than predicting
+	failure and impugning motives. They can work for the opened
+	door of open diplomacy, of continuous and intelligent inquiry,
+	of discussion free from propaganda. To shirk this responsibility
+	on the alleged ground that economic imperialism and organized
+	greed will surely bring the Conference to failure is
+	supine and snobbish. It is one of the factors that may lead the
+	United States to take the wrong course in the parting of the ways.</p>
+
+	<p class="dateline">October, 1921.</p>
+</div>
+<div id="footnotes" class="section">
+	<h2>Footnotes</h2>
+	<ol>
+		<li id="footnote_1">Since the text was written, the newspapers have stated that the Peking Government
+			has officially refused to validate the agreement.
+			<a href="#fnm1" title="Return to marker 1" class="returnFN">Return</a>
+		</li>
+		<li id="footnote_2">
+			This was written of course several months before Sun Yat Sen was reinstated
+			in control of Canton by the successful revolt of his local adherents against
+			the southern militarists who had usurped power and driven out Sun Yat Sen and
+			his followers. But up to the time when I left China, in July of this year, it was
+			true that the liberals of northern and central China who were bitterly opposed to
+			the Peking Government, did not look to the Southern Government with much hope.
+			The common attitude was a “plague upon both of your houses” and a desire for
+			a new start. The conflict between North and South looms much larger in the
+			United States than it did in China.
+			<a href="#fnm2" title="Return to marker 2" class="returnFN">Return</a>
+		</li>
+		<li id="footnote_3">
+			Since the writing of this and the former chapter there are some signs that
+			Wu Pei Fu wants to set up in control of the middle districts.
+			<a href="#fnm3" title="Return to marker 3" class="returnFN">Return</a>
+		</li>
+
+	</ol>
+</div>
+<div id="transcriber-note">
+	<h2>Transcriber’s Note</h2>
+	<p>Obvious typographical errors have been repaired. The <a href="#contents">Table of Contents</a> was added.</p>
+</div>
+<div id="outro">
+	&nbsp;
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's China, Japan and the U.S.A., by John Dewey
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of China, Japan and the U.S.A., by John Dewey
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: China, Japan and the U.S.A.
+       Present-Day Conditions in the Far East and Their Bearing
+       on the Washington Conference
+
+Author: John Dewey
+
+Release Date: October 25, 2009 [EBook #28393]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHINA, JAPAN AND THE U.S.A. ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Barbara Tozier, Bill Tozier and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+                    CHINA, JAPAN AND THE U. S. A.
+
+                        Present-day Conditions
+                           in the Far East
+                         and Their Bearing on
+                            the Washington
+                              Conference
+
+
+                                 _by_
+
+
+                              JOHN DEWEY
+
+                      Professor of Philosophy at
+                         Columbia University
+
+
+                     _New Republic Pamphlet No. 1_
+
+                           Published by the
+                    REPUBLIC PUBLISHING CO., INC.
+                     421 West Twenty-first Street
+                           _New York City_
+                                 1921
+
+
+
+
+                            Copyright 1921
+                     REPUBLIC PUBLISHING CO. INC.
+
+
+
+
+_Introductory Note_
+
+
+_The articles following are reprinted as they were written in spite of
+the fact that any picture of contemporary events is modified by
+subsequent increase of knowledge and by later events. In the main,
+however, the writer would still stand by what was said at the time. A
+few foot notes have been inserted where the text is likely to give
+rise to misapprehensions. The date of writing has been retained as a
+guide to the reader._
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+On Two Sides of the Eastern Seas
+
+
+It is three days' easy journey from Japan to China. It is doubtful
+whether anywhere in the world another journey of the same length
+brings with it such a complete change of political temper and belief.
+Certainly it is greater than the alteration perceived in journeying
+directly from San Francisco to Shanghai. The difference is not one in
+customs and modes of life; that goes without saying. It concerns the
+ideas, beliefs and alleged information current about one and the same
+fact: the status of Japan in the international world and especially
+its attitude toward China. One finds everywhere in Japan a feeling of
+uncertainty, hesitation, even of weakness. There is a subtle nervous
+tension in the atmosphere as of a country on the verge of change but
+not knowing where the change will take it. Liberalism is in the air,
+but genuine liberals are encompassed with all sorts of difficulties
+especially in combining their liberalism with the devotion to
+theocratic robes which the imperialist militarists who rule Japan have
+so skilfully thrown about the Throne and the Government. But what one
+senses in China from the first moment is the feeling of the
+all-pervading power of Japan which is working as surely as fate to its
+unhesitating conclusion--the domination of Chinese politics and
+industry by Japan with a view to its final absorption. It is not my
+object to analyze the realities of the situation or to inquire whether
+the universal feeling in China is a collective hallucination or is
+grounded in fact. The phenomenon is worthy of record on its own
+account. Even if it be merely psychological, it is a fact which must
+be reckoned with in both its Chinese and its Japanese aspects. In the
+first place, as to the differences in psychological atmosphere.
+Everybody who knows anything about Japan knows that it is the land of
+reserves and reticences. The half-informed American will tell you that
+this is put on for the misleading of foreigners. The informed know
+that it is an attitude shown to foreigners only because it is deeply
+engrained in the moral and social tradition of Japan; and that, if
+anything, the Japanese are more likely to be communicative--about many
+things at least--to a sympathetic foreigner, than to one another. The
+habit of reserve is so deeply embedded in all the etiquette,
+convention and daily ceremony of living, as well as in the ideals of
+strength of character, that only the Japanese who have subjected
+themselves to foreign influences escape it--and many of them revert.
+To put it mildly, the Japanese are not a loquacious people; they have
+the gift of doing rather than of gab.
+
+When accordingly a Japanese statesman or visiting diplomatist engages
+in unusually prolonged and frank discourse setting forth the aims and
+procedures of Japan, the student of politics who has been long in the
+East at once becomes alert, not to say suspicious. A recent
+illustration is so extreme that it will doubtless seem fantastic
+beyond belief. But the student at home will have to take these seeming
+fantasies seriously if he wishes to appreciate the present atmosphere
+of China. Cables have brought fragmentary reports of some addresses of
+Baron Goto in America. Doubtless in the American atmosphere these have
+the effect of reassuring America as to any improper ambitions on the
+part of Japan. In China, they were taken as announcements that Japan
+has about completed its plans for the absorption of China, and that
+the lucubration preliminary to operations of swallowing are about to
+begin. The reader is forgiven in advance any scepticism he feels about
+both the fact itself and the correctness of my report of the belief in
+the alleged fact. His scepticism will not surpass what I should feel
+in his place. But the suspicion aroused by such statements as this and
+the recent interview of Foreign Minister Uchida and Baron Ishii must
+be noted as evidences of the universal belief in China that Japan has
+one mode of diplomacy for the East and another for the West, and that
+what is said in the West must be read in reverse in the East.
+
+China, whatever else it is, is not the land of privacies. It is a
+proverb that nothing long remains secret in China. The Chinese talk
+more easily than they act--especially in politics. They are adepts in
+revealing their own shortcomings. They dissect their own weaknesses
+and failures with the most extraordinary reasonableness. One of the
+defects upon which they dwell is the love of finding substitutes for
+positive action, of avoiding entering upon a course of action which
+might be irrevocable. One almost wonders whether their power of
+self-criticism is not itself another of these substitutes. At all
+events, they are frank to the point of loquacity. Between the opposite
+camps there are always communications flowing. Among official enemies
+there are "sworn friends." In a land of perpetual compromise,
+etiquette as well as necessity demands that the ways for later
+accommodations be kept open. Consequently things which are spoken of
+only under the breath in Japan are shouted from the housetops in
+China. It would hardly be good taste in Japan to allude to the report
+that influential Chinese ministers are in constant receipt of Japanese
+funds and these corrupt officials are the agencies by which political
+and economic concessions were wrung from China while Europe and
+America were busy with the war. But in China nobody even takes the
+trouble to deny it or even to discuss it. What is psychologically most
+impressive is the fact that it is merely taken for granted. When it is
+spoken of, it is as one mentions the heat on an unusually hot day.
+
+In speaking of the feeling of weakness current in Japan about Japan
+itself, one must refer to the economic situation because of its
+obvious connection with the international situation. In the first
+place, there is the strong impression that Japan is over-extended.
+Even in normal times, Japan relies more upon production for foreign
+markets than is regarded in most countries as safe policy. And there
+is the belief that Japan _must_ do so, because only by large foreign
+sellings--large in comparison with the purchasing power of a people
+still having a low standard of life--can it purchase the raw
+materials--and even food--it has to have. But during the war, the
+dependence of manufacturing and trade at home upon the foreign market
+was greatly increased. The domestic increase of wealth, though very
+great, is still too much in the hands of the few to affect seriously
+the internal demand for goods. Item one, which awakens sympathy for
+Japan as being in a somewhat precarious situation.
+
+Another item concerns the labor situation. Japan seems to feel itself
+in a dilemma. If she passes even reasonably decent factory laws (or
+rather attempts their enforcement) and regulates child and women's
+labor, she will lose that advantage of cheap labor which she now
+counts on to offset her many disadvantages. On the other hand,
+strikes, labor difficulties, agitation for unions, etc., are
+constantly increasing, and the tension in the atmosphere is
+unmistakable. The rice riots are not often spoken of, but their memory
+persists, and the fact that they came very near to assuming a directly
+political aspect. Is there a race between fulfillment of the
+aspirations of the military clans who still hold the reins, and the
+growth of genuinely democratic forces which will forever terminate
+those aspirations? Certainly the defeat of Germany gave a blow to
+bureaucratic militarism in Japan which in time will go far. Will it
+have the time required to take effect on foreign policy? The hope that
+it will is a large factor in stimulating liberal sympathy for a Japan
+which is beginning to undergo the throes of transition.
+
+As for the direct international situation of Japan, the feeling in
+Japan is that of the threatening danger of isolation. Germany is gone;
+Russia is gone. While those facts simplify matters for Japan somewhat,
+there is also the belief that in taking away potential allies, they
+have weakened Japan in the general game of balance and counter-balance
+of power. Particularly does the removal of imperialistic Russia
+relieve the threat on India which was such a factor in the willingness
+of Great Britain to make the offensive-defensive alliance. The
+revelation of the militaristic possibilities of America is another
+serious factor. Certainly the new triple entente cordiale of Japan,
+Italy and France is no adequate substitute for a realignment of
+international forces in which a common understanding between Great
+Britain and America is a dominant factor. This factor explains, if it
+does not excuse, some of the querulousness and studied discourtesies
+with which the Japanese press for some months treated President
+Wilson, the United States in general and its relation to the League of
+Nations in particular, while it also throws light on the ardor with
+which the opportune question of racial discrimination was discussed.
+(The Chinese have an unfailing refuge in a sense of humor. It was
+interesting to note the delight with which they received the utterance
+of the Japanese Foreign Minister, after Japanese success at Paris,
+that "his attention had recently been called" to various press attacks
+on America which he much deprecated). In any case there is no
+mistaking the air of tension and nervous overstrain which now attends
+all discussion of Japanese foreign relations. In all directions, there
+are characteristic signs of hesitation, shaking of old beliefs and
+movement along new lines. Japan seems to be much in the same mood as
+that which it experienced in the early eighties before, toward the
+close of that decade, it crystallized its institutions through
+acceptance of the German constitution, militarism, educational system,
+and diplomatic methods. So that, once more, the observer gets the
+impression that substantially all of Japan's energy, abundant as that
+is, must be devoted to her urgent problems of readjustment.
+
+Come to China, and the difference is incredible. It almost seems as if
+one were living in a dream; or as if some new Alice had ventured
+behind an international looking-glass wherein everything is reversed.
+That we in America should have little idea of the state of things and
+the frame of mind in China is not astonishing--especially in view of
+the censorship and the distraction of attention of the last few years.
+But that Japan and China should be so geographically near, and yet
+every fact that concerns them appear in precisely opposite
+perspective, is an experience of a life time. Japanese liberalism?
+Yes, it is heard of, but only in connection with one form which the
+longing for the miraculous _deus ex machina_ takes. Perhaps a
+revolution in Japan may intervene to save China from the fate which
+now hangs over her. But there is no suggestion that anything less than
+a complete revolution will alter or even retard the course which is
+attributed to Japanese diplomacy working hand in hand with Japanese
+business interests and militarism. The collapse of Russia and Germany?
+These things only mean that Japan has in a few years fallen complete
+heir to Russian hopes, achievements and possessions in Manchuria and
+Outer Mongolia, and has had opportunities in Siberia thrown into her
+hands which she could hardly have hoped for in her most optimistic
+moments. And now Japan has, with the blessing of the great Powers at
+Paris, become also the heir of German concessions, intrigues and
+ambitions, with added concessions, wrung (or bought) from incompetent
+and corrupt officials by secret agreements when the world was busy
+with war. If all the great Powers are so afraid of Japan that they
+give way to her every wish, what is China that she can escape the doom
+prepared for her? That is the cry of helplessness going up all over
+China. And Japanese propagandists take advantage of the situation,
+pointing to the action of the Peace Conference as proof that the
+Allies care nothing for China, and that China must throw herself into
+the arms of Japan if she is to have any protection at all. In short,
+Japan stands ready as she stood ready in Korea to guarantee the
+integrity and independence of China. And the fear that the latter
+must, in spite of her animosity toward Japan, accept this fate in
+order to escape something worse swims in the sinister air. It is the
+exact counterpart of the feeling current among the liberals in Japan
+that Japan has alienated China permanently when a considerate and
+slower course might have united the two countries. If the economic
+straits of Japan are alluded to, it is only as a reason why Japan has
+hurried her diplomatic coercion, her corrupt and secret bargainings
+with Chinese traitors and her industrial invasion. While the western
+world supposes that the military and the industrial party in Japan
+have opposite ideas as to best methods of securing Japanese supremacy
+in the East, it is the universal opinion in China that they two are
+working in complete understanding with one another, and the
+differences that sometimes occur between the Foreign Office in Tokyo
+and the Ministry of War (which is extra-constitutional in its status)
+are staged for effect.
+
+These are some of the aspects of the most complete transformation
+scene that it has ever been the lot of the writer to experience. May
+it turn out to be only an extraordinary psychological experience! But
+in the interests of truth it must be recorded that every resident of
+China, Chinese or American, with whom I have talked in the last four
+weeks has volunteered the belief that all the seeds of a future great
+war are now deeply implanted in China. To avert such a calamity they
+look to the League of Nations or to some other force outside the
+immediate scene. Unfortunately the press of Japan treats every attempt
+to discuss the state of opinion in China or the state of facts as
+evidence that America, having tasted blood in the war, now has its
+eyes on Asia with the expectation later on of getting its hands on
+Asia. Consequently America is interested in trying to foster ill-will
+between China and Japan. If the pro-American Japanese do not enlighten
+their fellow-countrymen as to the facts, then America ought to return
+some of the propaganda that visits its shores. But every American who
+goes to Japan ought also to visit China--if only to complete his
+education.
+
+May, 1919.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+Shantung, As Seen From Within
+
+
+1.
+
+American apologists for that part of the Peace Treaty which relates to
+China have the advantage of the illusions of distance. Most of the
+arguments seem strange to anyone who lives in China even for a few
+months. He finds the Japanese on the spot using the old saying about
+territory consecrated by treasure spent and blood shed. He reads in
+Japanese papers and hears from moderately liberal Japanese that Japan
+must protect China, as well as Japan, against herself, against her own
+weak or corrupt government, by keeping control of Shantung to prevent
+China from again alienating that territory to some other power.
+
+The history of European aggression in China gives this argument great
+force among the Japanese, who for the most part know nothing more
+about what actually goes on in China than they used to know about
+Korean conditions. These considerations, together with the immense
+expectations raised among the Japanese during the war concerning their
+coming domination of the Far East and the unswerving demand of excited
+public opinion in Japan during the Versailles Conference for the
+settlement that actually resulted, give an ironic turn to the
+statement so often made that Japan may be trusted to carry out her
+promises. Yes, one is often tempted to say, that is precisely what
+China fears, that Japan will carry out her promises, for then China is
+doomed. To one who knows the history of foreign aggression in China,
+especially the technique of conquest by railway and finance, the irony
+of promising to keep economic rights while returning sovereignty lies
+so on the surface that it is hardly irony. China might as well be
+offered Kant's Critique of Pure Reason on a silver platter as be
+offered sovereignty under such conditions. The latter is equally
+metaphysical.
+
+A visit to Shantung and a short residence in its capital city, Tsinan,
+made the conclusions, which so far as I know every foreigner in China
+has arrived at, a living thing. It gave a vivid picture of the many
+and intimate ways in which economic and political rights are
+inextricably entangled together. It made one realize afresh that only
+a President who kept himself innocent of any knowledge of secret
+treaties during the war, could be naive enough to believe that the
+promise to return complete sovereignty retaining _only_ economic
+rights is a satisfactory solution. It threw fresh light upon the
+contention that at most and at worst Japan had only taken over German
+rights, and that since we had acquiesced in the latter's arrogations
+we had no call to make a fuss about Japan. It revealed the hollowness
+of the claim that pro-Chinese propaganda had wilfully misled Americans
+into confusing the few hundred square miles around the port of
+Tsing-tao with the Province of Shantung with its thirty millions of
+Chinese population.
+
+As for the comparison of Germany and Japan one might suppose that the
+objects for which America nominally entered the war had made, in any
+case, a difference. But aside from this consideration, the Germans
+exclusively employed Chinese in the railway shops and for all the
+minor positions on the railway itself. The railway guards (the
+difference between police and soldiers is nominal in China) were all
+Chinese, the Germans merely training them. As soon as Japan invaded
+Shantung and took over the railway, Chinese workmen and Chinese
+military guards were at once dismissed and Japanese imported to take
+their places. Tsinan-fu, the inland terminus of the ex-German railway,
+is over two hundred miles from Tsing-tao. When the Japanese took over
+the German railway business office, they at once built barracks, and
+today there are several hundred soldiers still there--where Germany
+kept none. Since the armistice even, Japan has erected a powerful
+military wireless within the grounds of the garrison, against of
+course the unavailing protest of Chinese authorities. No foreigner can
+be found who will state that Germany used her ownership of port and
+railway to discriminate against other nations. No Chinese can be found
+who will claim that this ownership was used to force the Chinese out
+of business, or to extend German economic rights beyond those
+definitely assigned her by treaty. Common sense should also teach even
+the highest paid propagandist in America that there is, from the
+standpoint of China, an immense distinction between a national menace
+located half way around the globe, and one within two days' sail over
+an inland sea absolutely controlled by a foreign navy, especially as
+the remote nation has no other foothold and the nearby one already
+dominates additional territory of enormous strategic and economic
+value--namely, Manchuria.
+
+These facts bear upon the shadowy distinction between the Tsing-tao
+and the Shantung claim, as well as upon the solid distinction between
+German and Japanese occupancy. If there still seemed to be a thin wall
+between Japanese possession of the port of Tsing-tao and usurpation of
+Shantung, it was enough to stop off the train in Tsinan-fu to see the
+wall crumble. For the Japanese wireless and the barracks of the army
+of occupation are the first things that greet your eyes. Within a few
+hundred feet of the railway that connects Shanghai, via the important
+center of Tientsin, with the capital, Peking, you see Japanese
+soldiers on the nominally Chinese street, guarding their barracks.
+Then you learn that if you travel upon the ex-German railway towards
+Tsing-tao, you are ordered to show your passport as if you were
+entering a foreign country. And as you travel along the road
+(remembering that you are over two hundred miles from Tsing-tao) you
+find Japanese soldiers at every station, and several garrisons and
+barracks at important towns on the line. Then you realize that at the
+shortest possible notice, Japan could cut all communications between
+southern China (together with the rich Yangste region) and the
+capital, and with the aid of the Southern Manchurian Railway at the
+north of the capital, hold the entire coast and descend at its good
+pleasure upon Peking.
+
+You are then prepared to learn from eye-witnesses that when Japan made
+its Twenty-one Demands upon China, machine guns were actually in
+position at strategic points throughout Shantung, with trenches dug
+and sandbags placed. You know that the Japanese liberal spoke the
+truth, who told you, after a visit to China and his return to protest
+against the action of his government, that the Japanese already had
+such a military hold upon China that they could control the country
+within a week, after a minimum of fighting, if war should arise. You
+also realize the efficiency of official control of information and
+domestic propaganda as you recall that he also told you that these
+things were true at the time of his visit, under the Terauchi cabinet,
+but had been completely reversed by the present Hara ministry. For I
+have yet to find a single foreigner or Chinese who is conscious of any
+difference of policy, save as the end of the war has forced the
+necessity of caution, since other nations can now look China-wards as
+they could not during the war.
+
+An American can get an idea of the realities of the present situation
+if he imagines a foreign garrison and military wireless in Wilmington,
+with a railway from that point to a fortified sea-port controlled by
+the foreign power, at which the foreign nation can land, without
+resistance, troops as fast as they can be transported, and with bases
+of supply, munitions, food, uniforms, etc., already located at
+Wilmington, at the sea-port and several places along the line. Reverse
+the directions from south to north, and Wilmington will stand for
+Tsinan-fu, Shanghai for New York, Nanking for Philadelphia with Peking
+standing for the seat of government at Washington, and Tientsin for
+Baltimore. Suppose in addition that the Pennsylvania road is the sole
+means of communication between Washington and the chief commercial and
+industrial centers, and you have the framework of the Shantung picture
+as it presents itself daily to the inhabitants of China. Upon second
+thought, however, the parallel is not quite accurate. You have to add
+that the same foreign nation controls also all coast communications
+from, say, Raleigh southwards, with railway lines both to the nearby
+coast and to New Orleans. For (still reversing directions) this
+corresponds to the position of Imperial Japan in Manchuria with its
+railways to Dairen and through Korea to a port twelve hours sail from
+a great military center in Japan proper. These are not remote
+possibilities nor vague prognostications. They are accomplished facts.
+
+Yet the facts give _only_ the framework of the picture. What is
+actually going on within Shantung? One of the demands of the
+"postponed" group of the Twenty-one Demands was that Japan should
+supply military and police advisers to China. They are not so much
+postponed but that Japan enforced specific concessions from China
+during the war by diplomatic threats to reintroduce their discussion,
+or so postponed that Japanese advisers are not already installed in
+the police headquarters of the city of Tsinan, the capital city of
+Shantung of three hundred thousand population where the Provincial
+Assembly meets and all the Provincial officials reside. Within recent
+months the Japanese consul has taken a company of armed soldiers with
+him when he visited the Provincial Governor to make certain demands
+upon him, the visit being punctuated by an ostentatious surrounding of
+the Governor's yamen by these troops. Within the past few weeks, two
+hundred cavalry came to Tsinan and remained there while Japanese
+officials demanded of the Governor drastic measures to suppress the
+boycott, while it was threatened to send Japanese troops to police the
+foreign settlement if the demand was not heeded.
+
+A former consul was indiscreet enough to put into writing that if the
+Chinese Governor did not stop the boycott and the students' movement
+by force if need be, he would take matters into his own hands. The
+chief tangible charge he brought against the Chinese as a basis of his
+demand for "protection" was that Chinese store-keepers actually
+refused to accept Japanese money in payment for goods, not ordinary
+Japanese money at that, but the military notes with which, so as to
+save drain upon the bullion reserves, the army of occupation is paid.
+And all this, be it remembered, is more than two hundred miles from
+Tsing-tao and from eight to twelve months after the armistice. Today's
+paper reports a visit of Japanese to the Governor to inform him that
+unless he should prevent a private theatrical performance from being
+given in Tsinan by the students, they would send their own forces into
+the settlement to protect themselves. And the utmost they might need
+protection from, was that the students were to give some plays
+designed to foster the boycott!
+
+Japanese troops overran the Province before they made any serious
+attempt to capture Tsing-tao. It is only a slight exaggeration to say
+that they "took" the Chinese Tsinan before they took the German
+Tsing-tao. Propaganda in America has justified this act on the ground
+that a German railway to the rear of Japanese forces would have been a
+menace. As there were no troops but only legal and diplomatic papers
+with which to attack the Japanese, it is a fair inference that the
+"menace" was located in Versailles rather than in Shantung, and
+concerned the danger of Chinese control of their own territory.
+Chinese have been arrested by Japanese gendarmes in Tsinan and
+subjected to a torturing third degree of the kind that Korea has made
+sickeningly familiar. The Japanese claim that the injuries were
+received while the men were resisting arrest. Considering that there
+was no more legal ground for arrest than there would be if Japanese
+police arrested Americans in New York, almost anybody but the pacifist
+Chinese certainly would have resisted. But official hospital reports
+testify to bayonet wounds and the marks of flogging. In the interior
+where the Japanese had been disconcerted by the student propaganda
+they raided a High School, seized a school boy at random, and took him
+to a distant point and kept him locked up several days. When the
+Japanese consul at Tsinan was visited by Chinese officials in protest
+against these illegal arrests, the consul disclaimed all jurisdiction.
+The matter, he said, was wholly in the hands of the military
+authorities in Tsing-tao. His disclaimer was emphasized by the fact
+that some of the kidnapped Chinese were taken to Tsing-tao for
+"trial."
+
+The matter of economic rights in relation to political domination will
+be discussed later in this article. It is no pleasure for one with
+many warm friends in Japan, who has a great admiration for the
+Japanese people as distinct from the ruling military and bureaucratic
+class, to report such facts as have been stated. One might almost say,
+one might positively say from the standpoint of Japan itself, that the
+worst thing that can be charged against the policy of Japan in China
+for the last six years is its immeasurable stupidity. No nation has
+ever misjudged the national psychology of another people as Japan has
+that of China. The alienation of China is widespread, deep, bitter.
+Even the most pessimistic of the Chinese who think that China is to
+undergo a complete economic and political domination by Japan do not
+think it can last, even without outside intervention, more than half a
+century.
+
+Today, at the beginning of a new year, (1920) the boycott is much more
+complete and efficient than in the most tense days of last summer.
+Unfortunately, the Japanese policy seems to be under a truly Greek
+fate which drives it on. Concessions that would have produced a
+revulsion of feeling in favor of Japan a year ago will now merely
+salve the surface of the wound. What would have been welcomed even
+eight months ago would now be received with contempt. There is but one
+way in which Japan can now restore herself. It is nothing less than
+complete withdrawal from Shantung, with possibly a strictly commercial
+concession at Tsing-tao and a real, not a Manchurian, Open Door.
+
+According to the Japanese-owned newspapers published in Tsinan, the
+Japanese military commander in Tsing-tao recently made a speech to
+visiting journalists from Tokyo in which he said: "The suspicions of
+China cannot now be allayed merely by repeating that we have no
+territorial ambitions in China. We must attain complete economic
+domination of the Far East. But if Chino-Japanese relations do not
+improve, some third party will reap the benefit. Japanese residing in
+China incur the hatred of the Chinese. For they regard themselves as
+the proud citizens of a conquering country. When the Japanese go into
+partnership with the Chinese they manage in the greater number of
+cases to have the profits accrue to themselves. If friendship between
+China and Japan is to depend wholly upon the government it will come
+to nothing. Diplomatists, soldiers, merchants, journalists should
+repent the past. The change must be complete." But it will not be
+complete until the Japanese withdraw from Shantung leaving their
+nationals there upon the footing of other foreigners in China.
+
+
+2.
+
+In discussing the return to China by Japan of a metaphysical
+sovereignty while economic rights are retained, I shall not repeat the
+details of German treaty rights as to the railway and the mines. The
+reader is assumed to be familiar with those facts. The German seizure
+was outrageous. It was a flagrant case of Might making Right. As von
+Buelow cynically but frankly told the Reichstag, while Germany did not
+intend to partition China, she also did not intend to be the passenger
+left behind in the station when the train started. Germany had the
+excuse of prior European aggressions, and in turn her usurpation was
+the precedent for further foreign rape. If judgments are made on a
+comparative basis, Japan is entitled to all of the white-washing that
+can be derived from the provocations of European imperialistic powers,
+including those countries that in domestic policy are democratic. And
+every fairminded person will recognize that, leaving China out of the
+reckoning, Japan's proximity to China gives her aggressions the color
+of self-defence in a way that cannot be urged in behalf of any
+European power.
+
+It is possible to look at European aggressions in, say, Africa as
+incidents of a colonization movement. But no foreign policy in Asia
+can shelter itself behind any colonization plea. For continental Asia
+is, for practical purposes, India and China, representing two of the
+oldest civilizations of the globe and presenting two of its densest
+populations. If there is any such thing in truth as a philosophy of
+history with its own inner and inevitable logic, one may well shudder
+to think of what the closing acts of the drama of the intercourse of
+the West and East are to be. In any case, and with whatever comfort
+may be derived from the fact that the American continents have not
+taken part in the aggression and hence may act as a mediator to avert
+the final tragedy, residence in China forces upon one the realization
+that Asia is, after all, a large figure in the future reckoning of
+history. Asia is really here after all. It is not simply a symbol in
+western algebraic balances of trade. And in the future, so to speak,
+it is going to be even more here, with its awakened national
+consciousness of about half the population of the whole globe.
+
+Let the agreements of France and Great Britain made with Japan during
+the war stand for the measure of western consciousness of the reality
+of only a small part of Asia, a consciousness generated by the
+patriotism of Japan backed by its powerful army and navy. The same
+agreement measures western unconsciousness of the reality of that part
+of Asia which lies within the confines of China. An even better
+measure of western unconsciousness may be found perhaps in such a
+trifling incident as this:--An English friend long resident in
+Shantung told me of writing indignantly home concerning the British
+part in the Shantung settlement. The reply came, complacently stating
+that Japanese ships did so much in the war that the Allies could not
+properly refuse to recognize Japan's claims. The secret agreements
+themselves hardly speak as eloquently for the absence of China from
+the average western consciousness. In saying that China and Asia are
+to be enormously significant figures in future reckonings, the spectre
+of a military Yellow Peril is not meant nor even the more credible
+spectre of an industrial Yellow Peril. But Asia has come to
+consciousness, and her consciousness of herself will soon be such a
+massive and persistent thing that it will force itself upon the
+reluctant consciousness of the west, and lie heavily upon its
+conscience. And for this fact, China and the western world are
+indebted to Japan.
+
+These remarks are more relevant to a consideration of the relationship
+of economic and political rights in Shantung than they perhaps seem.
+For a moment's reflection will call to mind that all political foreign
+aggression in China has been carried out for commercial and financial
+ends, and usually upon some economic pretext. As to the immediate part
+played by Japan in bringing about a consciousness which will from the
+present time completely change the relations of the western powers to
+China, let one little story testify. Some representatives of an
+English missionary board were making a tour of inspection through
+China. They went into an interior town in Shantung. They were received
+with extraordinary cordiality by the entire population. Some time
+afterwards some of their accompanying friends returned to the village
+and were received with equally surprising coldness. It came out upon
+inquiry that the inhabitants had first been moved by the rumor that
+these people were sent by the British government to secure the removal
+of the Japanese. Later they were moved by indignation that they had
+been disappointed.
+
+It takes no forcing to see a symbol in this incident. Part of it
+stands for the almost incredible ignorance which has rendered China so
+impotent nationally speaking. The other part of it stands for the new
+spirit which has been aroused even among the common people in remote
+districts. Those who fear, or who pretend to fear, a new Boxer
+movement, or a definite general anti-foreign movement, are, I think,
+mistaken. The new consciousness goes much deeper. Foreign policies
+that fail to take it into account and that think that relations with
+China can be conducted upon the old basis will find this new
+consciousness obtruding in the most unexpected and perplexing ways.
+
+One might fairly say, still speaking comparatively, that it is part of
+the bad luck of Japan that her proximity to China, and the opportunity
+the war gave her to outdo the aggressions of European powers, have
+made her the first victim of this disconcerting change. Whatever the
+motives of the American Senators in completely disassociating the
+United States from the peace settlement as regards China, their action
+is a permanent asset to China, not only in respect to Japan but with
+respect to all Chinese foreign relations. Just before our visit to
+Tsinan, the Shantung Provincial Assembly had passed a resolution of
+thanks to the American Senate. More significant is the fact that they
+passed another resolution to be cabled to the English Parliament,
+calling attention to the action of the American Senate and inviting
+similar action. China in general and Shantung in particular feels the
+reinforcement of an external approval. With this duplication, its
+national consciousness has as it were solidified. Japan is simply the
+first object to be affected.
+
+The concrete working out of economic rights in Shantung will be
+illustrated by a single case which will have to stand as typical.
+Po-shan is an interior mining village. The mines were not part of the
+German booty; they were Chinese owned. The Germans, whatever their
+ulterior aims, had made no attempt at dispossessing the Chinese. The
+mines, however, are at the end of a branch line of the new Japanese
+owned railway--owned by the government, not by a private corporation,
+and guarded by Japanese soldiers. Of the forty mines, the Japanese
+have worked their way, in only four years, into all but four.
+Different methods are used. The simplest is, of course, discrimination
+in the use of the railway for shipping. Downright refusal to furnish
+cars while competitors who accepted Japanese partners got them, is one
+method. Another more elaborate method is to send but one car when a
+large number is asked for, and then when it is too late to use cars,
+send the whole number asked for or even more, and then charge a large
+sum for demurrage in spite of the fact the mine no longer wants them
+or has cancelled the order. Redress there is none.
+
+Tsinan has no special foreign concessions. It is, however, a "treaty
+port" where nationals of all friendly powers can do business. But
+Po-shan is not even a treaty port. Legally speaking no foreigners can
+lease land or carry on any business there. Yet the Japanese have
+forced a settlement as large in area as the entire foreign settlement
+in the much larger town of Tsinan. A Chinese refused to lease land
+where the Japanese wished to relocate their railway station. Nothing
+happened to him directly. But merchants could not get shipping space,
+or receive goods by rail. Some of them were beaten up by thugs. After
+a time, they used their influence with their compatriot to lease his
+land. Immediately the persecutions ceased. Not all the land has been
+secured by threats or coercion; some has been leased directly by
+Chinese moved by high prices, in spite of the absence of any legal
+sanction. In addition, the Japanese have obtained control of the
+electric light works and some pottery factories, etc.
+
+Now even admitting that this is typical of the methods by which the
+Japanese plant themselves, a natural American reaction would be to say
+that, after all, the country is built up industrially by these
+enterprises, and that though the rights of some individuals may have
+been violated, there is nothing to make a national, much less an
+international fuss about. More or less unconsciously we translate
+foreign incidents into terms of our own experience and environment,
+and thus miss the entire point. Since America was largely developed by
+foreign capital to our own economic benefit and without political
+encroachments, we lazily suppose some such separation of the economic
+and political to be possible in China. But it must be remembered that
+China is not an open country. Foreigners can lease land, carry on
+business, and manufacture only in accord with express treaty
+agreements. There are no such agreements in the cases typified by the
+Po-shan incident. We may profoundly disagree with the closed economic
+policy of China, or we may believe that under existing circumstances
+it represents the part of prudence for her. That makes no difference.
+_Given the frequent occurrence of such economic invasions, with the
+backing of soldiers of the Imperial Army, with the overt aid of the
+Imperial Railway, and with the refusal of Imperial officials to
+intervene, there is clear evidence of the attitude and intention of
+the Japanese government in Shantung._
+
+Because the population of Shantung is directly confronted with an
+immense amount of just such evidence, it cannot take seriously the
+professions of vague diplomatic utterances. What foreign nation is
+going to intervene to enforce Chinese rights in such a case as
+Po-shan? Which one is going effectively to call the attention of Japan
+to such evidences of its failure to carry out its promise? Yet the
+accumulation of precisely such seemingly petty incidents, and not any
+single dramatic great wrong, will secure Japan's economic and
+political domination of Shantung. It is for this reason that
+foreigners resident in Shantung, no matter in what part, say that they
+see no sign whatever that Japan is going to get out; that, on the
+contrary, everything points to a determination to consolidate her
+position. How long ago was the Portsmouth treaty signed, and what were
+its nominal pledges about evacuation of Manchurian territory?
+
+Not a month will pass without something happening which will give a
+pretext for delay, and for making the surrender of Shantung
+conditional upon this, that and the other thing. Meantime the
+penetration of Shantung by means of railway discrimination, railway
+military guards, continual nibblings here and there, will be going on.
+It would make the chapter too long to speak of the part played by
+manipulation of finance in achieving this process of attrition of
+sovereignty. Two incidents must suffice. During the war, Japanese
+traders with the connivance of their government gathered up immense
+amounts of copper cash from Shantung and shipped it to Japan against
+the protests of the Chinese government. What does sovereignty amount
+to when a country cannot control even its own currency system? In
+Manchuria the Japanese have forced the introduction of several hundred
+million dollars of paper currency, nominally, of course, based on a
+gold reserve. These notes are redeemable, however, only in Japan
+proper. And there is a law in Japan forbidding the exportation of
+gold. And there you are.
+
+Japan itself has recently afforded an object lesson in the actual
+connection of economic and political rights in China. It is so
+beautifully complete a demonstration that it was surely unconscious.
+Within the last two weeks, Mr. Obata, the Japanese minister in Peking,
+has waited upon the government with a memorandum saying that the
+Foochow incident was the culminating result of the boycott; that if
+the boycott continues, a series of such incidents is to be
+apprehended, saying that the situation has become "intolerable" for
+Japan, and disavowing all responsibility for further consequences
+unless the government makes a serious effort to stop the boycott.
+Japan then immediately makes certain specific demands. China must stop
+the circulation of handbills, the holding of meetings to urge the
+boycott, the destruction of Japanese goods that have become Chinese
+property--none have been destroyed that are Japanese owned. Volumes
+could not say more as to the real conception of Japan of the
+connection between the economic and the political relations of the two
+countries. Surely the pale ghost of "Sovereignty" smiled ironically as
+he read this official note. President Wilson after having made in the
+case of Shantung a sharp and complete separation of economic and
+political rights, also said that a nation boycotted is within sight of
+surrender. Disassociation of words from acts has gone so far in his
+case that he will hardly be able to see the meaning of Mr. Obata's
+communication. The American sense of humor and fair-play may however
+be counted upon to get its point.
+
+January, 1920.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+Hinterlands in China
+
+
+One of the two Presidents of China--it is unnecessary to specify
+which--recently stated that a renewal of the Anglo-Japanese alliance
+meant a partition of China. In this division, Japan would take the
+north and Great Britain the south. Probably the remark was not meant
+to be taken literally in the sense of formal conquest or annexation,
+but rather symbolically with reference to the tendency of policies and
+events. Even so, the statement will appear exaggerated or wild to
+persons outside of China, who either believe that the Open Door policy
+is now irrevocably established or that Japan is the only foreign Power
+which China has to fear. But a recent visit to the south revealed that
+in that section, especially in Canton, the British occupy much the
+same position of suspicion and dread which is held by the Japanese in
+the north.
+
+Upon the negative side, the Japanese menace is negligible in the
+province of Kwantung, in which Canton is situated. There are said to
+be more Americans in Canton than Japanese, and the American colony is
+not extensive. Upon the positive side the history of the Cassell
+collieries contract is instructive. It illustrates the cause of the
+popular attitude toward the British, and quite possibly explains the
+bitterness in the remark quoted. The contract is noteworthy from
+whatever standpoint it is viewed, whether that of time, of the
+conditions it contains or of the circumstances which accompany it.
+
+Premising that the contract delivers to a British company a monopoly
+of the rich coal deposits of the province for a period of ninety years
+and--quite incidentally of course--the right to use all means of
+transportation, water or rail, wharves and ports now in existence, and
+also to "construct, manage, superintend and work other roads, railways
+waterways as may be deemed advisable"--which reads like a monopoly of
+all further transportation facilities of the province--first take up
+the time of the making of the contract. It was drawn in April, 1920
+and confirmed a few months later. It was made, of course, with the
+authorities of the Kwantung province, subject to confirmation at
+Peking. During this period, Kwantung province was governed by military
+carpet-baggers from the neighboring province of Kwangsei, which was
+practically alone of the southern provinces allied with the northern
+government, then under the control of the Anfu party. It was matter of
+common knowledge that the people of Canton and of the province were
+bitterly hostile to this outside control and submitted to it only
+because of military coercion. Civil strife for the expulsion of the
+outsiders was already going on, continually gaining headway, and a few
+months later the Kwangsei troops were defeated and expelled from the
+province by the forces of General Chen, now the civil governor of
+Kwantung, who received a triumphal ovation upon his entrance into
+Canton. At this time the present native government was established, a
+change which made possible the return of Sun Yat Sen and his followers
+from their exile in Shanghai. It is evident, then, that the collieries
+contract giving away the natural resources of the people of the
+province, was knowingly made by a British company with a government
+which no more represented the people of the province than the military
+government of Germany represented the people of Belgium during the
+war.
+
+As to the terms of the contract, the statement that it gave the
+British company a monopoly of all the coal mines in the province, was
+not literally accurate. Verbally, twenty-two districts are enumerated.
+But these are the districts along the lines of the only railways in
+the province and the only ones soon to be built, including the as yet
+uncompleted Hankow-Canton railway. Possibly this fact accounts for the
+anxiety of the British partners in the Consortium that the completion
+of this line be the first undertaking financed by the Consortium. The
+document also includes what is perhaps a novelty in legal documents
+having such a momentous economic importance, namely, the words "etc."
+after the districts enumerated by name.
+
+For this concession, the British syndicate agreed to pay the
+provincial government the sum of $1,000,000 (silver of course). This
+million dollars is to bear six per cent interest to the company, and
+capital and interest are to be paid back to the company by the
+provincial government out of the dividends (if any) it is to receive.
+The nature of these "dividends" is set forth in an article which
+should receive the careful attention of promoters elsewhere as a model
+of the possibilities of exploiting contracts. The ten million capital
+is divided equally into "A" shares and "B" shares. The "A" shares go
+unreservedly to the directors of the company, and three millions of
+the "B" shares are to be allotted by the directors of the company at
+their discretion. The other two million are again divided into equal
+portions, one portion representing the sum advanced by the company to
+the province and to be paid back as just specified, while the other
+million--one-tenth of the capitalization--is to be a trust fund the
+dividends of which are to go for the "benefit of the poor people of
+the province" and for an educational fund for the province. But before
+any dividends are paid upon the "B" shares, eight per cent dividends
+are to be paid upon the "A" shares and a _dollar a ton royalty_ upon
+all coal mined. Those having any familiarity with the coal business
+with its usual royalty of about ten cents a ton can easily calculate
+the splendid prospects of the "poor people" and the schools, prospects
+which represent the total return to the provinces of a concession of
+untold worth. The contract also guarantees to the company the
+assistance of the provincial government in expropriating the owners of
+all coal mines which have been granted to other companies but not yet
+worked. These technical details make dry reading, but they throw light
+upon the spirit with which the British company undertook its predatory
+negotiations with a government renounced by the people it professed to
+govern. In comparison with the relatively crude methods of Japan in
+Shantung, they show the advantages of wide business experience.
+
+As for the circumstances and context which give added menace to the
+contract, the following facts are significant. Hong Kong, a British
+crown colony, lies directly opposite the river upon which Canton is
+situated. It is the port of export and import for the vast districts
+served by the mines and railways of the province. It is unnecessary to
+point out the hold upon all economic development which is given
+through a monopolistic control of coal. It is hardly too much to say
+that the enforcement of the contract would enable British interests in
+Hong Kong to control the entire industrial development of the most
+flourishing of the provinces of China. It would be a comparatively
+easy and inexpensive matter to provide the main land with a first
+class modern harbor and port near Canton. But such a port would tend
+to reduce the assets of Hong Kong to the possession of the most
+beautiful scenery in the world. There is already fear that a new
+harbor will be built. Many persons think that the concession of
+building such railways etc., "as are deemed advisable for the purpose
+of the business of the company and to improve those now existing" is
+the object of the contract, even more than the coal monopoly. For the
+British already own a considerable part of the mainland, including
+part of the railway connecting the littoral with Canton. By building a
+cross-cut from the British owned portion of this railway to the
+Hankow-Canton line, the latter would become virtually the Hankow-Hong
+Kong line, and Canton would be a way-station. With the advantages thus
+secured, the project for building a new port could be indefinitely
+blocked.
+
+During the period in which the contract was being secured, a congress
+of British Chambers of Commerce was held in Shanghai. Resolutions were
+passed in favor of abolishing henceforth the whole principle of
+special nationalistic concessions, and of cooperating with the Chinese
+for the upbuilding of China. At the close of the meeting the Chairman
+announced that a new era for China had finally dawned. All of the
+British newspapers in China lauded the wise action of the Chambers. At
+the same time, Mr. Lamont was in Peking, and was setting forth that
+the object of the Consortium was the abolition of further concessions,
+and the uniting of the financial resources of the banks in the
+Consortium for the economic development of China itself. By an
+ironical coincidence, the Hong Kong-Shanghai Bank, which is the
+financial power behind the contract and the new company, is the
+leading British partner in the Consortium. It is difficult to see how
+the British can henceforth accuse the Japanese of bad faith if any of
+the banking interests of that country should enter upon independent
+negotiations with any government in China.
+
+By the time the scene of action was transferred to Peking in order to
+secure the confirmation of the central government, the Anfu regime was
+no more, and as yet no confirmation has been secured. The new
+government at Canton has declined to recognize the contract as having
+any validity. An official of the Hong Kong government has told an
+official of the Canton government that the Hong Kong government stands
+behind the enforcement of the contract, and that Kwantung province is
+a British Hinterland. Within the last few weeks the Governor of Hong
+Kong and a leading Chinese banker of Hong Kong who is a British
+subject have visited Peking. Rumors were rife in the south as to the
+object of the visit. British sources published the report that one
+object was to return Weihaiwei to China--in case Peking agreed to turn
+over more of the Kwantung mainland to Hong Kong as a quid pro quo.
+Chinese opinion in the south was that one main object was to secure
+the Peking confirmation of the Cassell contract, in which case
+$900,000 more would be forthcoming, $100,000 having been paid down
+when the contract was signed with the provincial government. Peking
+does not recognize the present Canton government but regards it as an
+outlaw. The crowd that signed the contract is still in control of the
+neighboring province of Kwangsei and they are relied upon by the north
+to effect the military subjugation of the seceded province. Fighting
+has already, indeed, begun, but the Kwangsei militarists are badly in
+need of money; if Peking ratifies the contract, a large part of the
+funds will be paid over to them--all that isn't lost by the wayside to
+the northern militarists.[1] Meantime British news agencies keep up a
+constant circulation of reports tending to discredit the Kwantung
+government, although all impartial observers on the spot regard it as
+altogether the most promising one in China.
+
+    [1] Since the text was written, the newspapers have stated
+        that the Peking Government has officially refused to
+        validate the agreement.
+
+These considerations not only throw light on some of the difficulties
+of the functioning of the Consortium, but they give an indispensable
+background for judging the actual effect of the renewal of the
+Anglo-Japanese alliance. By force of circumstances each government,
+even against its own wish, will be compelled to wink at the predatory
+policies of the other; and the tendency will be to create a division
+of spheres of influence between the north and south in order to avoid
+more direct conflicts. The English liberals who stand for the renewal
+of the alliance on the ground that it will enable England to exercise
+a check on Japanese policies, are more naive than was Mr. Wilson with
+his belief in the separation of the economic and political control of
+Shantung.
+
+It cannot be too often repeated that the real point of friction
+between the United States and Japan is not in California but in China.
+It is silly--unless it is calculated--for English authorities to keep
+repeating that under no circumstances does the alliance mean that
+Great Britain would support Japan in a war with the United States. The
+day the alliance is renewed, the hands of the militarists in Japan
+will be strengthened and the hands of the liberals--already weak
+enough--be still further weakened. In consequence, all the sources of
+friction in China between the United States and Japan will be
+intensified. I do not believe in the predicted war. But should it
+come, the first act of Japan--so everyone in China believes--will be
+to seize the ports of northern China and its railways in order to make
+sure of an uninterrupted supply of food and raw materials. The act
+would be justified as necessary to national existence. Great Britain
+in alliance with Japan would be in no position to protest in anything
+but the most perfunctory way. The guarantee of such abstinence would
+be for Japan the next best thing to open naval and financial support.
+Without the guarantee they would not dare the seizure of Chinese
+ports. In recent years diplomatists have shown themselves capable of
+unlimited stupidity. But it is not possible that the men in the
+British Foreign Office are not aware of these elementary facts. If
+they renew the alliance they knowingly take the responsibility for the
+consequences.
+
+May 24, 1921.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+A Political Upheaval in China
+
+
+Even in America we have heard of one Chinese revolution, that which
+thrust the Manchu dynasty from the throne. The visitor in China gets
+used to casual references to the second revolution, that which
+frustrated Yuan Shi Kai's aspirations to be emperor, and the third,
+the defeat in 1917 of the abortive attempt to put the Manchu boy
+emperor back into power. And within the last few weeks the (September
+1920) fourth upheaval has taken place. It may not be dignified by the
+name of the fourth revolution, for the head of the state has not been
+changed by it. But as a manifestation of the forces that shape Chinese
+political events, for evil and for good, perhaps this last disturbance
+surpasses the last two "revolutions" in significance.
+
+Chinese politics in detail are highly complicated, a mess of
+personalities and factions whose oscillations no one can follow who
+does not know a multitude of personal, family and provincial
+histories. But occasionally something happens which simplifies the
+tangle. Definite outlines frame themselves out of the swirling
+criss-cross of strife, intrigue and ambition. So, at present, the
+complete collapse of the Anfu clique which owned the central
+government for two years marks the end of that union of internal
+militarism and Japanese foreign influence which was, for China, the
+most marked fruit of the war. When China entered the war a "War
+Participation" army was formed. It never participated; probably it was
+never meant to. But its formation threw power wholly into the hands of
+the military clique, as against the civilian constitutionalists. And
+in return for concessions, secret agreements relating to Manchuria,
+Shantung, new railways, etc., Japan supplied money, munitions,
+instructors for the army and a benevolent supervision of foreign and
+domestic politics. The war came to an unexpected and untimely end, but
+by this time the offspring of the marriage of the militarism of Yuan
+Shi Kai and Japanese money and influence was a lusty youth. Bolshevism
+was induced to take the place of Germany as a menace requiring the
+keeping up of the army, and loans and teachers. Mongolia was persuaded
+to cut her strenuous ties with Russia, to renounce her independence
+and come again under Chinese sovereignty.
+
+The army and its Japanese support and instruction was, accordingly,
+continued. In place of the "War Participation" army appeared the
+"Frontier Defense" army. Marshal Tuan, the head of the military party,
+remained the nominal political power behind the presidential chair,
+and General Hsu (commonly known as little Hsu, in distinction from old
+Hsu, the president) was the energetic manager of the Mongolian
+adventure which, by a happy coincidence, required a bank, land
+development companies and railway schemes, as well as an army. About
+this military centre as a nucleus gathered the vultures who fed on the
+carrion. This flock took the name of the Anfu Club. It did not control
+the entire cabinet, but to it belonged the Minister of Justice, who
+manipulated the police and the courts, persecuted the students,
+suppressed liberal journals and imprisoned inconvenient critics. And
+the Club owned the ministers of finance and communications, the two
+cabinet places that dispense revenues, give out jobs and make loans.
+It also regulated the distribution of intelligence by mail and
+telegraph. The reign of corruption and despotic inefficiency, tempered
+only by the student revolt, set in. In two years the Anfu Club got
+away with two hundred millions of public funds directly, to say
+nothing of what was wasted by incompetency and upon the army. The
+Allies had set out to get China into the war. They succeeded in
+getting Japan into control of Peking and getting China, politically
+speaking, into a seemingly hopeless state of corruption and confusion.
+
+The militaristic or Pei-Yang party was, however, divided into two
+factions, each called after a province. The Anwhei party gathered
+about little Hsu and was almost identical with the Anfus. The Chili
+faction had been obliged, so far as Peking was concerned, to content
+itself with such leavings as the Anfu Club tossed to it. Apparently it
+was hopelessly weaker than its rival, although Tuan, who was
+personally honest and above financial scandal, was supported by both
+factions and was the head of both. About three months ago there were a
+few signs that, while the Anfu Club had been entrenching itself in
+Peking, the rival faction had been quietly establishing itself in the
+provinces. A league of Eight Tuchuns (military governors of the
+provinces) came to the assistance of the president against some
+unusually strong pressure from the Anfu Club. In spite of the fact
+that the military governor of the three Manchurian provinces, Chang
+Tso Lin, popularly known as the Emperor of Manchuria, lined up with
+this league, practically nobody expected anything except some
+manoeuvering to get a larger share of the spoils.
+
+But late in June the president invited Chang Tso Lin to Peking. The
+latter saw Tuan, told him that he was surrounded by evil advisers,
+demanded that he cut loose from little Hsu and the Anfu Club, and
+declared open war upon little Hsu--the two had long and notoriously
+been bitter enemies. Even then people had great difficulty in
+believing that anything would happen except another Chinese
+compromise. The president was known to be sympathetic upon the whole
+with the Chili faction, but the president, if not a typical Chinese,
+is at least typical of a certain kind of Chinese mandarin,
+non-resistant, compromising, conciliating, procrastinating, covering
+up, evading issues, face-saving. But finally something happened. A
+mandate was issued dismissing little Hsu from office, military and
+civil, dissolving the frontier defense corps as such, and bringing it
+under the control of the Ministry of War (usually armies in China
+belong to some general or Tuchun, not to the country). For almost
+forty-eight hours it was thought that Tuan had consented to sacrifice
+little Hsu and that the latter would submit at least temporarily. Then
+with equally sensational abruptness Tuan brought pressure to bear on
+the president. The latter was appointed head of a national defense
+army, and rewards were issued for the heads of the chiefs of the Chili
+faction, nothing, however, being said about Chang Tso Lin, who had
+meanwhile returned to Mukden and who still professed allegiance to
+Tuan. Troops were mobilized; there was a rush of officials and of the
+wealthy to the concessions of Tientsin and to the hotels of the
+legation quarter.
+
+This sketch is not meant as history, but simply as an indication of
+the forces at work. Hence it is enough to say that two weeks after
+Tuan and little Hsu had intimidated the president and proclaimed
+themselves the saviors of the Republic, they were in hiding, their
+enemies of the Chili party were in complete control of Peking, and
+rewards from fifty thousand dollars down were offered for the arrest
+of little Hsu, the ex-ministers of justice, finance and
+communications, and other leaders of the Anfu Club. The political
+turnover was as complete as it was sensational. The seemingly
+impregnable masters of China were impotent fugitives. The carefully
+built up Anfu Club, with its military, financial and foreign support,
+had crumbled and fallen. No country at any time has ever seen a
+political upheaval more sudden and more thoroughgoing. It was not so
+much a defeat as a dissolution like that of death, a total
+disappearance, an evaporation.
+
+Corruption had worked inward, as it has a way of doing.
+Japanese-bought munitions would not explode; quartermasters vanished
+with the funds with which stores were to be bought; troops went
+without anything to eat for two or three days; large numbers,
+including the larger part of one division, went over to the enemy en
+masse; those who did not desert had no heart for fighting and ran away
+or surrendered on the slightest provocation, saying they were willing
+to fight for their country but saw no reason why they should fight for
+a faction, especially a faction that had been selling the country to a
+foreign nation. In the manner of the defeat of the Anfu clique at the
+height of its supremacy, rather than in the mere fact of its defeat,
+lies the credit side of the Chinese political balance sheet. It is a
+striking exhibition of the oldest and best faith of the Chinese--the
+power of moral considerations. Public opinion, even that of the coolie
+on the street, was wholly against the Anfu party. It went down not so
+much because of the strength of the other side as because of its own
+rottenness.
+
+So far the results are to all appearances negative. The most marked is
+the disappearance of Japanese prestige. As one of the leading men in
+the War Office said: "For over a year now the people have been
+strongly opposed to the Japanese government on account of Shantung.
+But now even the generals do not care for Japan any more." It is
+hardly logical to take the easy collapse of the Japanese-supported
+Anfu party as a proof of the weakness of Japan, but prestige is always
+a matter of feeling rather than of logic. Many who were intimidated to
+the point of hypnotism by the idea of the irresistible power of Japan
+are now freely laughing at the inefficiency of Japanese leadership. It
+would not be safe to predict that Japan will not come back as a force
+to be reckoned with in the internal as well as external politics of
+China, but it is safe to say that never again will Japan figure as
+superman to China. And such a negation is after all a positive result.
+
+And so in its way is the overthrow of the Anwhei faction of the
+militarist party. The Chinese liberals do not feel very optimistic
+about the immediate outcome. They have mostly given up the idea that
+the country can be reformed by political means. They are sceptical
+about the possibility of reforming even politics until a new
+generation comes on the scene. They are now putting their faith in
+education and in social changes which will take some years to
+consummate themselves visibly. The self-styled southern republican
+constitutional party has not shown itself in much better light than
+the northern militarist party. In fact, its old leader Sun Yat Sen now
+cuts one of the most ridiculous figures in China, as shortly before
+this upheaval he had definitely aligned himself with Tuan and little
+Hsu.[2]
+
+    [2] This was written of course several months before Sun Yat
+        Sen was reinstated in control of Canton by the successful
+        revolt of his local adherents against the southern
+        militarists who had usurped power and driven out Sun Yat Sen
+        and his followers. But up to the time when I left China, in
+        July of this year, it was true that the liberals of northern
+        and central China who were bitterly opposed to the Peking
+        Government, did not look to the Southern Government with
+        much hope. The common attitude was a "plague upon both of
+        your houses" and a desire for a new start. The conflict
+        between North and South looms much larger in the United
+        States than it did in China.
+
+This does not mean, however, that democratic opinion thinks nothing
+has been gained. The demonstration of the inherent weakness of corrupt
+militarism will itself prevent the development of any militarism as
+complete as that of the Anfus. As one Chinese gentleman said to me:
+"When Yuan Shi Kai was overthrown, the tiger killed the lion. Now a
+snake has killed the tiger. No matter how vicious the snake may
+become, some smaller animal will be able to kill him, and his life
+will be shorter than that of either lion or tiger." In short, each
+successive upheaval brings nearer the day when civilian supremacy will
+be established. This result will be achieved partly because of the
+repeated demonstrations of the uncongeniality of military despotism to
+the Chinese spirit, and partly because with every passing year
+education will have done its work. Suppressed liberal papers are
+coming to life, while over twenty Anfu subsidized newspapers and two
+subsidized news agencies have gone out of being. The soldiers,
+including many officers in the Anwhei army, clearly show the effects
+of student propaganda. And it is worth while to note down the name of
+one of the leaders on the victorious side, the only one whose troops
+did any particular fighting, and that against great odds in numbers.
+The name is Wu Pei Fu. He at least has not fought for the Chili
+faction against the Anwhei faction. He has proclaimed from the first
+that he was fighting to rid the country of military control of civil
+government, and against traitors who would sell their country to
+foreigners. He has come out strongly for a new popular assembly, to
+form a new constitution and to unite the country. And although Chang
+Tso Lin has remarked that Wu Pei Fu as a military subordinate could
+not be expected to intervene in politics, he has not as yet found it
+convenient to oppose the demand for a popular assembly. Meanwhile the
+liberals are organizing their forces, hardly expecting to win a
+victory, but resolved, win or lose, to take advantage of the
+opportunity to carry further the education of the Chinese people in
+the meaning of democracy.
+
+August, 1920.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+Divided China
+
+
+1.
+
+In January 1920 the Peking government issued an edict proclaiming the
+unification of China. On May 5th Sun Yat Sen was formally inaugurated
+in Canton as president of all China. Thus China has within six months
+been twice unified, once from the northern standpoint and once from
+the southern. Each act of "unification" is in fact a symbol of the
+division of China, a division expressing differences of language,
+temperament, history, and political policy as well as of geography,
+persons and factions. This division has been one of the outstanding
+facts of Chinese history since the overthrow of the Manchus ten years
+ago and it has manifested itself in intermittent civil war. Yet there
+are two other statements which are equally true, although they flatly
+contradict each other and the one just made. One statement is that so
+far as the people of China are concerned there is no real division on
+geographical lines, but only the common division occurring everywhere
+between conservatives and progressives. The other is that instead of
+two divisions in China, there are at least five, two parties in both
+the north and south, and another in the central or Yangtse region,[3]
+each one of the five splitting up again more or less on factional and
+provincial lines. And so far as the future is concerned, probably this
+last statement is the most significant of the three. That all three
+statements are true is what makes Chinese politics so difficult to
+understand even in their larger features.
+
+    [3] Since the writing of this and the former chapter there
+        are some signs that Wu Pei Fu wants to set up in control of
+        the middle districts.
+
+By the good fortune of circumstances we were in Canton when the
+inauguration occurred. Peking and Canton are a long way apart in more
+than distance. There is little exchange of actual news between the two
+places; what filters through into either city and gets published
+consists mostly of rumors tending to discredit the other city. In
+Canton, the monarchy is constantly being restored in Peking; and in
+Peking, Canton is Bolshevized at least once a week, while every other
+week open war breaks out between the adherents of Sun Yat Sen, and
+General Chen Kwang Ming, the civil governor of the province. There is
+nothing to give the impression--even in circles which accept the
+Peking government only as an evil necessity--that the pretensions of
+Sun Yat Sen represent anything more than the desires of a small and
+discredited group to get some slight power for themselves at the
+expense of national unity. Even in Fukien, the province next north of
+Kwantung, one found little but gossip whose effect was to minimize the
+importance of the southern government. In foreign circles in the north
+as well as in liberal Chinese circles upon the whole, the feeling is
+general that bad as the de facto Peking government may be, it
+represents the cause of national unity, while the southern government
+represents a perpetuation of that division of China which makes her
+weak and which offers the standing invitation to foreign intrigue and
+aggression. Only occasionally during the last few months has some
+returned traveller timidly advanced the opinion that we had the "wrong
+dope" on the south, and that they were really trying "to do something
+down there."
+
+Consequently there was little preparation on my part for the spectacle
+afforded in Canton during the week of May 5th. This was the only
+demonstration I have seen in China during the last two years which
+gave any evidence of being a spontaneous popular movement. New Yorkers
+are accustomed to crowds, processions, street decorations and
+accompanying enthusiasm. I doubt if New York has ever seen a
+demonstration which surpassed that of Canton in size, noise, color or
+spontaneity--in spite of tropical rains. The country people flocked in
+in such masses, that, being unable to find accommodation even in the
+river boats, they kept up a parade all night. Guilds and localities
+which were not able to get a place in the regular procession organized
+minor ones on their own account on the day before and after the
+official demonstration. Making all possible allowance for the
+intensity of Cantonese local loyalty and the fact that they might be
+celebrating a Cantonese affair rather than a principle, the scene was
+sufficiently impressive to revise one's preconceived ideas and to make
+one try to find out what it is that gives the southern movement its
+vitality.
+
+A demonstration may be popular and still be superficial in
+significance. However one found foreigners on the ground--at least
+Americans--saying that in the last few months the men in power in
+Canton were the only officials in China who were actually doing
+something for the people instead of filling their own pockets and
+magnifying their personal power. Even the northern newspapers had not
+entirely omitted reference to the suppression of licensed gambling. On
+the spot one learned that this suppression was not only genuine and
+thorough, but that it meant a renunciation of an annual revenue of
+nearly ten million dollars on the part of a government whose chief
+difficulty is financial, and where--apart from motives of personal
+squeeze--it would have been easy to argue that at least temporarily
+the end justified the means in retaining this source of revenue.
+English papers throughout China have given much praise to the
+government of Hong Kong because it has cut down its opium revenue from
+eight to four millions annually with the plan for ultimate extinction.
+Yet Hong Kong is prosperous, it has not been touched by civil war, and
+it only needs revenue for ordinary civil purposes, not as a means of
+maintaining its existence in a crisis.
+
+Under the circumstances, the action of the southern government was
+hardly less than heroic. This renunciation is the most sensational act
+of the Canton government, but one soon learns that it is the
+accompaniment of a considerable number of constructive administrative
+undertakings. Among the most notable are attempts to reform the local
+magistracies throughout the province, the establishment of municipal
+government in Canton--something new in China where local officials are
+all centrally appointed and controlled--based upon the American
+Commission plan, and directed by graduates of schools of political
+science in the United States; plans for introducing local
+self-government throughout the province; a scheme for introduction of
+universal primary education in Canton to be completed in three steps.
+
+These reforms are provincial and local. They are part of a general
+movement against centralization and toward local autonomy which is
+gaining headway all over China, a protest against the appointment of
+officials from Peking and the management of local affairs in the
+interests of factions--and pocketbooks--whose chief interest in local
+affairs is what can be extracted in the way of profit. For the only
+analogue of provincial government in China at the present time is the
+carpet bag government of the south in the days following our civil
+war. These things explain the restiveness of the country, including
+central as well as southern provinces, under Peking domination. But
+they do not explain the setting up of a new national, or federal
+government, with the election of Mr. Sun Yat Sen as its president. To
+understand this event it is necessary to go back into history.
+
+In June, 1917, the parliament in Peking was about to adopt a
+constitution. The parliament was controlled by leaders of the old
+revolutionary party who had been at loggerheads with Yuan and with the
+executive generally. The latter accused them of being obstructionists,
+wasting time in discussing and theorizing when the country needed
+action. Japan had changed her tactics regarding the participation of
+China in the war, and having got her position established through the
+Twenty-one Demands, saw a way of controlling Chinese arsenals and
+virtually amalgamating the Chinese armies with her own through
+supervising China's entrance into the war. The British and French were
+pressing desperately for the same end. Parliament was slow to act, and
+Tang Shao Yi, Sun Yat Sen and other southern leaders were averse,
+since they regarded the war as none of China's business and were upon
+the whole more anti-British than anti-German--a fact which partly
+accounts for the share of British journals in the present press
+propaganda against the Canton government. But what brought matters to
+a head was the fact that the constitution which was about to be
+adopted eliminated the military governors or tuchuns of the provinces,
+and restored the supremacy of civil authority which had been destroyed
+by Yuan Shi Kai, in addition to introducing a policy of
+decentralization. Coached by members of the so-called progressive
+party which claimed to be constitutionalist and which had a
+factionalist interest in overthrowing the revolutionaries who
+controlled the legislative branch if not the executive, the military
+governors demanded that the president suspend parliament and dismiss
+the legislators. This demand was more than passively supported by all
+the Allied diplomats in Peking with the honorable exception of the
+American legation. The president weakly yielded and issued an edict
+dispelling parliament, virtually admitting in the document the
+illegality of his action. Less than a month afterwards he was a
+refugee in the Dutch legation on account of the farce of monarchical
+restoration staged by Chang Shun--who at the present time is again
+coming to the front in the north as adjutant to the plans of Chang Tso
+Lin, the present "strong man" of China. Later, elections were held and
+a new parliament elected. This parliament has been functioning as the
+legislature of China at Peking and elected the president, Hsu Shi
+Chang, the head of the government recognized by the foreign Powers--in
+short it is the Chinese government from an international standpoint,
+the Peking government from a domestic standpoint.
+
+The revolutionary members of the old parliament never recognized the
+legality of their dispersal, and consequently refused to admit the
+legal status of the new parliament, called by them the bogus
+parliament, and of the president elected by it, especially as the new
+legislative body was not elected according to the rules laid down by
+the constitution. Under the lead of some of the old members, the old
+parliament, called by its opponents the defunct parliament, has led an
+intermittent existence ever since. Claiming to be the sole authentic
+constitutional body of China, it finally elected Dr. Sun president of
+China and thus prepared the act of the fifth of May, already reported.
+
+Such is the technical and formal background of the present southern
+government. Its attack upon the legality of the Peking government is
+doubtless technically justified. But for various reasons its own
+positive status is open to equally grave doubts. The terms "bogus" and
+"defunct," so freely cast at each other, both seem to an outsider to
+be justified. It is less necessary to go into the reasons which appear
+to invalidate the position of the southern parliament because of the
+belated character of its final action. A protest which waits four
+years to assert itself in positive action is confronted not with legal
+technicalities but with accomplished facts. In my opinion, legality
+for legality, the southern government has a bare shade the better of
+the technical argument. But in the face of a government which has
+foreign recognition and which has maintained itself after a fashion
+for four years, a legal shadow is a precarious political basis. It is
+wiser to regard the southern government as a revolutionary government,
+which in addition to the prestige of continuing the revolutionary
+movement of ten years ago has also a considerable sentimental asset as
+a protest of constitutionalism against the military usurpations of the
+Peking government.
+
+It is an open secret that the southern movement has not received the
+undivided support of all the forces present in Canton which are
+opposed to the northern government. Tang Shao Yi, for example, was
+notable for his absence at the time of the inauguration, having found
+it convenient to visit the graves of his ancestors at that time. The
+provincial governor, General Chen Kwang Ming, was in favor of
+confining efforts to the establishment of provincial autonomy and the
+encouragement of similar movements in other provinces, looking forward
+to an eventual federal, or confederated, government of at least all
+the provinces south of the Yangtse. Many of his generals wanted to
+postpone action until Kwantung province had made a military alliance
+with the generals in the other southwestern provinces, so as to be
+able to resist the north should the latter undertake a military
+expedition. Others thought the technical legal argument for the new
+move was being overworked, and while having no objections to an out
+and out revolutionary movement against Peking, thought that the time
+for it had not yet come. They are counting on Chang Tso Lin's
+attempting a monarchical restoration and think that the popular
+revulsion against that move would create the opportune time for such a
+movement as has now been prematurely undertaken. However in spite of
+reports of open strife freely circulated by British and Peking
+government newspapers, most of the opposition elements are now loyally
+suppressing their opposition and supporting the government of Sun Yat
+Sen. A compromise has been arranged by which the federal government
+will confine its attention to foreign affairs, leaving provincial
+matters wholly in the hands of Governor Chen and his adherents. There
+is still room for friction however, especially as to the control of
+revenues, since at present there are hardly enough funds for one
+administration, let alone two.
+
+
+2.
+
+The members of the new southern government are strikingly different in
+type from those one meets elsewhere whether in Peking or the
+provincial capitals. The latter men are literally mediaeval when they
+are not late Roman Empire, though most of them have learned a little
+modern patter to hand out to foreigners. The former are educated men,
+not only in the school sense and in the sense that they have had some
+special training for their jobs, but in the sense that they think the
+ideas and speak the language current among progressive folk all over
+the world. They welcome inquiry and talk freely of their plans, hopes
+and fears. I had the opportunity of meeting all the men who are most
+influential in both the local and federal governments; these
+conversations did not take the form of interviews for publication, but
+I learned that there are at least three angles from which the total
+situation is viewed.
+
+Governor Chen has had no foreign education and speaks no English. He
+is distinctively Chinese in his training and outlook. He is a man of
+force, capable of drastic methods, straightforward intellectually and
+physically, of unquestioned integrity and of almost Spartan life in a
+country where official position is largely prized for the luxuries it
+makes possible. For example, practically alone among Chinese
+provincial officials of the first rank he has no concubines. Not only
+this, but he proposed to the provincial assembly a measure to
+disenfranchise all persons who have concubines. (The measure failed
+because it is said its passage would have deprived the majority of the
+assemblymen of their votes.) He is by all odds the most impressive of
+all the officials whom I have met in China. If I were to select a man
+likely to become a national figure of the first order in the future,
+it would be, unhesitatingly, Governor Chen. He can give and also
+command loyalty--a fact which in itself makes him almost unique.
+
+His views in gist are as follows: The problem of problems in China is
+that of real unification. Industry and education are held back because
+of lack of stability of government, and the better elements in society
+seclude themselves from all public effort. The question is how this
+unification is to be obtained. In the past it has been tried by force
+used by strong individuals. Yuan Shi Kai tried and failed; Feng Kuo
+Chang tried and failed; Tuan Chi Jui tried and failed. That method
+must be surrendered. China can be unified only by the people
+themselves, employing not force but the methods of normal political
+evolution. The only way to engage the people in the task is to
+decentralize the government. Futile efforts at centralization must be
+abandoned. Peking and Canton alike must allow the provinces the
+maximum of autonomy; the provincial capitals must give as much
+authority as possible to the districts, and the districts to the
+communities. Officials must be chosen by and from the local districts
+and everything must be done to encourage local initiative. Governor
+Chen's chief ambition is to introduce this system into Kwantung
+province. He believes that other provinces will follow as soon as the
+method has been demonstrated, and that national unity will then be a
+pyramid built out of the local blocks.
+
+With extreme self-government in administrative matters, Governor Chen
+will endeavor to enforce a policy of centralized economic control. He
+says in effect that the west has developed economic anarchy along with
+political control, with the result of capitalistic domination and
+class struggle. He wishes to avert this consequence in China by having
+government control from the first of all basic raw materials and all
+basic industries, mines, transportation, factories for cement, steel,
+etc. In this way the provincial authorities hope to secure an equable
+industrial development of the province, while at the same time
+procuring ample revenues without resorting to heavy taxation. Since
+almost all the other governors in China are using their power, in
+combination with the exploiting capitalists native and foreign, to
+monopolize the natural resources of their provinces for private
+profit, it is not surprising that Governor Chen's views are felt to be
+a menace to privilege and that he is advertised all over China as a
+devout Bolshevist. His views have special point in view of British
+efforts to get an economic stranglehold upon the province--efforts
+which are dealt with in a prior chapter.
+
+Another type of views lays chief stress upon the internal political
+condition of China. Its adherents say in effect: Why make such a fuss
+about having two governments for China, when, in point of fact, China
+is torn into dozens of governments? In the north, war is sure to break
+out sooner or later between Chang Tso Lin and his rivals. Each
+military governor is afraid of his division generals. The brigade
+generals intrigue against the division leaders, and even colonels are
+doing all they can to further their personal power. The Peking
+government is a stuffed sham, taking orders from the military
+governors of the provinces, living only on account of jealousies among
+these generals, and by the grace of foreign diplomatic support. It is
+actually bankrupt, and this actual state will soon be formally
+recognized. The thing for us to do is to go ahead, maintain in good
+faith the work of the revolution, give this province the best possible
+civil administration; then in the inevitable approaching debacle, the
+southern government will be ready to serve as the nucleus of a genuine
+reconstruction. Meantime we want, if not the formal recognition of
+foreign governments, at least their benevolent neutrality.
+
+Dr. Sun still embodies in himself the spirit of the revolution of
+1911. So far as that was not anti-Manchu it was in essence
+nationalistic, and only accidentally republican. The day after the
+inauguration of Dr. Sun, a memorial was dedicated to the seventy-two
+patriot heroes who fell in an abortive attempt in Canton to throw off
+the Manchu yoke, some six months before the successful revolt. The
+monument is the most instructive single lesson which I have seen in
+the political history of the revolution. It is composed of seventy-two
+granite blocks. Upon each is engraved: Given by the Chinese National
+League of Jersey City, or Melbourne, or Mexico, or Liverpool, or
+Singapore, etc. Chinese nationalism is a product of Chinese migration
+to foreign countries; Chinese nationalism on foreign shores financed
+the revolution, and largely furnished its leaders and provided its
+organization. Sun Yat Sen was the incarnation of this nationalism,
+which was more concerned with freeing China--and Asia--from all
+foreign domination than with particular political problems. And in
+spite of the movement of events since that day, he remains essentially
+at that stage, being closer in spirit to the nationalists of the
+European irredentist type than to the spirit of contemporary young
+China. A convinced republican, he nevertheless measures events and men
+in the concrete by what he thinks they will do to promote the
+independence of China from foreign control, rather than by what they
+will do to promote a truly democratic government. This is the sole
+explanation that can be given for his unfortunate coquetting a year
+ago with the leaders of the now fallen Anfu Club. He allowed himself
+to be deceived into thinking that they were ready to turn against the
+Japanese if he would give them his support; and his nationalist
+imagination was inflamed by the grandiose schemes of little Hsu for
+the Chinese subjugation of Mongolia.
+
+More openly than others, Dr. Sun admits and justifies the new southern
+government as representing a division of China. If, he insists, it had
+not been for the secession of the south in 1917, Japan would now be in
+virtually complete control of all China. A unified China would have
+meant a China ready to be swallowed whole by Japan. The secession
+localized Japanese aggressions, made it evident that the south would
+fight rather than be devoured, and gave a breathing spell in which
+public opinion in the north rallied against the Twenty-one Demands and
+against the military pact with Japan. Thus it saved the independence
+of China. But, while it checked Japan, it did not checkmate her. She
+still expects with the assistance of Chang Tso Lin to make northern
+China her vassal. The support which foreign governments in general and
+the United States in particular are giving Peking is merely playing
+into the hands of the Japanese. The independent south affords the only
+obstacle which causes Japan to pause in her plan of making northern
+China in effect a Japanese province. A more than usually authentic
+rumor says that upon the occasion of the visit of the Japanese consul
+general to the new president (no other foreign official has made an
+official visit), the former offered from his government the official
+recognition of Dr. Sun as president of all China, if the latter would
+recognize the Twenty-one Demands as an accomplished fact. From the
+Japanese standpoint the offer was a safe one, as this acceptance of
+Japanese claims is the one thing impossible to the new government. But
+meantime the offer naturally confirms the nationalists of Dr. Sun's
+type in their belief that the southern split is the key to maintaining
+the political independence of China; or, as Dr. Sun puts it, that a
+divided China is for the time being the only means to an ultimately
+independent China.
+
+These views are not given as stating the whole truth of the situation.
+They are ex parte. But they are given as setting forth in good faith
+the conceptions of the leaders of the southern movement and as
+requiring serious attention if the situation of China, domestic and
+international, is to be understood. Upon my own account, and not
+simply as expressing the views of others, I have reached a conclusion
+quite foreign to my thought before I visited the south. While it is
+not possible to attach too much importance to the unity of China as a
+part of the foreign policy of the United States, it is possible to
+attach altogether too much importance to the Peking government as a
+symbol of that unity. To borrow and adapt the words of one southern
+leader, while the United States can hardly be expected to do other
+than recognize the Peking as the de facto government, there is no need
+to coddle that government and give it face. Such a course maintains a
+nominal and formal unity while in fact encouraging the military and
+corrupt forces that keep China divided and which make for foreign
+aggression.
+
+In my opinion as the outcome of two years' observation of the Chinese
+situation, the real interests of both China and the United States
+would be served if, in the first place, the United States should take
+the lead in securing from the diplomatic body in Peking the serving of
+express notice upon the Peking government that in no case would a
+restoration of the monarchy be recognized by the Powers. This may seem
+in America like an unwarranted intervention in the domestic affairs of
+a foreign country. But in fact such intervention is already a fact.
+The present government endures only in virtue of the support of
+foreign Powers. The notice would put an end to one kind of intrigue,
+one kind of rumor and suspicion, which is holding industry and
+education back and which is keeping China in a state of unrest and
+instability. It would establish a period of comparative quiet in which
+whatever constructive forces exist may come to the front. The second
+measure would be more extreme. The diplomacy of the United States
+should take the lead in making it clear that unless the promises about
+the disbanding of the army, and the introduction of general
+retrenchment are honestly and immediately carried out, the Powers will
+pursue a harsh rather than a benevolent policy toward the Peking
+government, insisting upon immediate payment of interest and loans as
+they fall due and holding up the government to the strictest meeting
+of all its obligations. The notification to be effective might well
+include a virtual threat of withdrawal of recognition in case the
+government does not seriously try to put its profuse promises into
+execution. It should also include a definite discouragement of any
+expenditures designed for military conquest of the south.
+
+Diplomatic recognition of the southern government is out of the
+question at present. It is not out of the question to put on the
+financial screws so that the southern government will be allowed space
+and time to demonstrate what it can do by peaceful means to give one
+or more provinces a decent, honest and progressive civil
+administration. It is unnecessary to enumerate the obstacles in the
+way of carrying out such a policy. But in my judgment it is the only
+policy by which the Great Powers will not become accomplices in
+perpetuating the weakness and division of China. It is the most
+straightforward way of meeting whatever plans of aggression Japan may
+entertain.
+
+May, 1921.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+Federalism in China
+
+
+The newcomer in China in observing and judging events usually makes
+the mistake of attaching too much significance to current happenings.
+Occurrences take place which in the western world would portend
+important changes--and nothing important results. It is not easy to
+loosen the habit of years; and so the visitor assumes that an event
+which is striking to the point of sensationalism must surely be part
+of a train of events having a definite trend; some deep-laid plan must
+be behind it. It takes a degree of intellectual patience added to time
+and experience to make one realize that even when there is a rhythm in
+events the tempo is so retarded that one must wait a long time to
+judge what is really going on. Most political events are like daily
+changes in the weather, fluctuations back and forth which may
+seriously affect individuals but which taken one by one tell little
+about the movement of the seasons. Even the occurrences which are due
+to human intention are usually sporadic and casual, and the observer
+errs by reading into them too much plot, too comprehensive a scheme,
+too farsighted a plan. The aim behind the event is likely to be only
+some immediate advantage, some direct increase of power, the overthrow
+of a rival, the grasping at greater wealth by an isolated act, without
+any consecutive or systematic looking ahead.
+
+Foreigners are not the only ones who have erred, however, in judging
+the Chinese political situation of the last few years. Beginning two
+years ago, one heard experienced Chinese with political affiliations
+saying that it was impossible for things to go on as they were for
+more than three months longer. Some decisive change must occur. Yet
+outwardly the situation has remained much the same not only for three
+months but for two years, the exception being the overthrow of the
+Anfu faction a year ago. And this occurrence hardly marked a definite
+turn in events, as it was, to a considerable extent, only a shifting
+of power from the hands of one set of tuchuns to another set.
+Nevertheless at the risk of becoming a victim of the fallacy which I
+have been setting forth, I will hazard the remark that the last few
+months _have_ revealed a definite and enduring trend--that through the
+diurnal fluctuations of the strife for personal power and wealth a
+seasonal political change in society is now showing itself. Certain
+lines of cleavage seem to show themselves, so that through the welter
+of striking, picturesque, sensational but meaningless events, a
+definite pattern is revealed.
+
+This pattern is indicated by the title of this chapter--a movement
+toward the development of a federal form of government. In calling the
+movement one toward federalism, there is, however, more of a jump into
+the remote future than circumstances justify. It would be more
+accurate, as well as more modest, to say that there is a well defined
+and seemingly permanent trend toward provincial autonomy and local
+self-government accompanied by a hope and a vague plan that in the
+future the more or less independent units will recombine into the
+United or Federated States of China. Some who look far into the future
+anticipate three stages; the first being the completion of the present
+secessionist movement; the second the formation of northern and
+southern confederations respectively; the third a reunion into a
+single state.
+
+To go into the detailed evidence for the existence of a definite and
+lasting movement of this sort would presume too much on the reader's
+knowledge of Chinese geography and his acquaintance with specific
+recent events. I shall confine myself to quite general features of the
+situation. The first feature is the new phase which has been assumed
+by the long historic antagonism of the north and the south. Roughly
+speaking, the revolution which established the republic and overthrew
+the Manchus represented a victory for the south. But the
+transformation during the last five years of the nominal republic into
+a corrupt oligarchy of satraps or military governors or feudal lords
+has represented a victory for the north. It is a significant fact,
+symbolically at least, that the most powerful remaining tuchun or
+military governor in China--in some respects the only powerful one who
+has survived the vicissitudes of the last few years--namely Chang Tso
+Lin, is the uncrowned king of the three Manchurian provinces. The
+so-called civil war of the north and south is not, however, to be
+understood as a conflict of republicanism located in the south and
+militarism in the north. Such a notion is directly contrary to facts.
+The "civil war" till six or eight months ago was mainly a conflict of
+military governors and factions, part of that struggle for personal
+power and wealth which has been going on all over China.
+
+But recently events have taken a different course. In four of the
+southern provinces, tuchuns who seemed all powerful have toppled over,
+and the provinces have proclaimed or tacitly assumed their
+independence of both the Peking and the former military Canton
+governments--the province in which Canton situated being one of the
+four. I happened to be in Hunan, the first of the southerly provinces
+to get comparative independence, last fall, not long after the
+overthrow of the vicious despot who had ruled the province with the
+aid of northern troops. For a week a series of meetings were held in
+Changsha, the capital of the province. The burden of every speech was
+"Hunan for the Hunanese." The slogan embodies the spirit of two powers
+each aiming at becoming the central authority; it is a conflict of the
+principle of provincial autonomy, represented by the politically more
+mature south, with that of militaristic centralization, represented by
+Peking.
+
+As I write, in early September (1921), the immediate issue is obscured
+by the fight which Wu Pei Fu is waging with the Hunanese who with
+nominal independence are in aim and interest allied with the south.
+If, as is likely, Wu Pei Fu wins, he may take one of two courses. He
+may use his added power to turn against Chang Tso Lin and the northern
+militarists which will bring him into virtual alliance with the
+southerners and establish him as the antagonist of the federal
+principle. This is the course which his earlier record would call for.
+Or he may yield to the usual official lust for power and money and try
+once more the Yuan Shi Kai policy of military centralization with
+himself as head, after trying out conclusions with Chang Tso Lin as
+his rival. This is the course which the past record of military
+leaders indicates. But even if Wu Pei Fu follows precedent and goes
+bad, he will only hasten his own final end. This is not prophecy. It
+is only a statement of what has uniformly happened in China just at
+the moment a military leader seemed to have complete power in his
+grasp. In other words, a victory for Wu Pei Fu may either accelerate
+or may retard the development of provincial autonomy according to the
+course he pursues. It cannot permanently prevent or deflect it.
+
+The basic factor that makes one sure that this trend toward local
+autonomy is a reality and not merely one of those meaningless
+shiftings of power which confuse the observer, is that it is in accord
+with Chinese temperament, tradition and circumstance. Feudalism is
+past and gone two thousand years ago, and at no period since has China
+possessed a working centralized government. The absolute empires which
+have come and gone in the last two millenniums existed by virtue of
+non-interference and a religious aura. The latter can never be
+restored; and every episode of the republic demonstrates that China
+with its vast and diversified territories, its population of between
+three hundred and fifty and four hundred million, its multitude of
+languages and lack of communications, its enormous local attachments
+sanctified by the family system and ancestral worship, cannot be
+managed from a single and remote centre. China rests upon a network of
+local and voluntary associations cemented by custom. This fact has
+given it its unparallelled stability and its power to progress even
+under the disturbed political conditions of the past ten years. I
+sometimes think that Americans with their own traditional contempt for
+politics and their spontaneous reliance upon self-help and local
+organization are the ones who are naturally fitted to understand
+China's course. The Japanese with their ingrained reliance upon the
+state have continually misjudged and misacted. The British understand
+better than we do the significance of local self-government; but they
+are misled by their reverence for politics so that they cannot readily
+find or see government when it does not take political form.
+
+It is not too much to say that one great cause for the overthrow of
+the Manchus was the fact that because of the pressure of international
+relations they attempted to force, especially in fiscal matters, a
+centralization upon the provinces wholly foreign to the spirit of the
+people. This created hostility where before there had been
+indifference. China may possibly not emerge from her troubles a
+unified nation, any more than a much smaller and less populous Europe
+emerged from the break-up of the Holy Roman Empire, a single state.
+Indeed one often wonders, not that China is divided, but that she is
+not much more broken up than she is. But one thing is certain.
+Whatever progress China finally succeeds in making will come from a
+variety of local centres, not from Peking or Canton. It will be
+effected by means of associations and organizations which even though
+they assume a political form are not primarily political in nature.
+
+Criticisms are passed, especially by foreigners, upon the present
+trend of events. The criticisms are more than plausible. It is evident
+that the present weakness of China is due to her divided condition.
+Hence it is natural to argue that the present movement being one of
+secession and general disintegration will increase the weakness of the
+country. It is also evident that many of China's troubles are due to
+the absence of any efficient administrative system; it is reasonable
+to argue that China cannot get even railways and universal education
+without a strong and stable central government. There is no doubt
+about the facts. It is not surprising that many friends of China
+deeply deplore the present tendency while some regard it as the final
+accomplishment of the long predicted breakup of China. But remedies
+for China's ills based upon ignoring history, psychology and actual
+conditions are so utopian that it is not worth while to argue whether
+or not they are theoretically desirable. The remedy of China's
+troubles by a strong, centralized government is on a par with curing
+disease by the expulsion of a devil. The evil of sectionalism is real,
+but since it is real it cannot be dealt with by trying a method which
+implies its non-existence. If the devil is really there, he will not
+be exorcized by a formula. If the trouble is internal, not due to an
+external demon, the disease can be cured only by using the factors of
+health and vigor which the patient already possesses. And in China
+while these factors of recuperation and growth are numerous, they all
+exist in connection with local organizations and voluntary
+associations. The increasing volume of the cry that the "tuchuns must
+go" comes from the provincial and local interests which have been
+insulted and violated by a nominally centralized but actually chaotic
+situation. After this negative work is completed, the constructive
+rebuilding of China can proceed only by utilizing local interests and
+abilities. In China the movement will be the opposite of that which
+occurred in Japan. It will be from the periphery to the centre.
+
+Another objection to the present tendency has force especially from
+the foreign standpoint. As already stated, the efforts of the Manchu
+dynasty in its latter days to enhance central power were due to
+international pressure. Foreign nations treated Peking as if it were a
+capital like London, Paris or Berlin, and in its efforts to meet
+foreign demands it had to try to become such a centre. The result was
+disaster. But foreign nations still want to have a single centre which
+may be held responsible. And subconsciously, if not consciously, this
+desire is responsible for much of the objection of foreign nationals
+to the local autonomy movement. They well know that it is going to
+take a long time to realize the ideal of federation, and meantime
+where and what is to be the agency responsible for diplomatic
+relations, the enforcing of indemnities and the securing of
+concessions?
+
+In one respect the secessionist tendency is dangerous to China herself
+as well as inconvenient to the powers. It will readily stimulate the
+desire and ability of foreign nations to interfere in China's domestic
+affairs. There will be many centres at which to carry on intrigues and
+from which to get concessions instead of one or two. There is also
+danger that one foreign nation may line up with one group of
+provinces, and another foreign nation with another group, so that
+international friction will increase. Even now some Japanese sources
+and even such an independent liberal paper as Robert Young's Japan
+Chronicle are starting or reporting the rumor that the Cantonese
+experiment is supported by subsidies supplied by American capitalists
+in the hope of economic concessions. The rumor was invented for a
+sinister purpose. But it illustrates the sort of situation that may
+come into existence if there are several political centres in China
+and one foreign nation backs one and another nation, another.
+
+The danger is real enough. But it cannot be dealt with by attempting
+the impossible--namely checking the movement toward local autonomy,
+even though disintegration may temporarily accompany it. The danger
+only emphasizes the fundamental fact of the whole Chinese situation;
+that its essence is time. The evils and troubles of China are real
+enough, and there is no blinking the fact that they are largely of her
+own making, due to corruption, inefficiency and absence of popular
+education. But no one who knows the common people doubts that they
+will win through if they are given time. And in the concrete this
+means that they be left politically alone to work out their own
+destiny. There will doubtless be proposals at the Pacific Conference
+to place China under some kind of international tutelage. This chapter
+and the events connected with the tendency which it reports will be
+cited as showing this need. Some of the schemes will spring from
+motives that are hostile to China. Some will be benevolently conceived
+in a desire to save China from herself and shorten her period of chaos
+and confusion. But the hope of the world's peace, as well as of
+China's freedom, lies in adhering to a policy of Hands Off. Give China
+a chance. Give her time. The danger lies in being in a hurry, in
+impatience, possibly in the desire of America to show that we are a
+power in international affairs and that we too have a positive foreign
+policy. And a benevolent policy of supporting China from without,
+instead of promoting her aspirations from within, may in the end do
+China about as much harm as a policy conceived in malevolence.
+
+July, 1921.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+A Parting of the Ways for America
+
+
+1
+
+The realities of American policy in China and toward China are going
+to be more seriously tested in the future than they ever have been in
+the past. Japanese papers have been full of protests against any
+attempt by the Pacific Conference to place Japan on trial. Would that
+American journals were full of warnings that America is on trial at
+the Conference as to the sincerity and intelligent goodwill behind her
+amiable professions. The world will not stop with the Pacific
+Conference; the latter, however important, will not arrest future
+developments, and the United States will continue to be on trial till
+she has established by her acts a permanent and definite attitude. For
+the realities of the situation cannot be exhausted in any formula or
+in any set of diplomatic agreements, even if the Conference confounds
+the fears of pessimists and results in a harmonious union of the
+powers in support of China's legitimate aspirations for free political
+and economic growth.
+
+The Conference, however, stands as a symbol of the larger situation;
+and its decisions or lack of them will be a considerable factor in the
+determination of subsequent events. Sometimes one is obliged to fall
+back on a trite phrase. We are genuinely at a parting of the ways.
+Even if we should follow in our old path, there would none the less be
+a parting of the ways, for we cannot consistently tread the old path
+unless we are animated by a much more conscious purpose and a more
+general and intelligent knowledge of affairs than have controlled our
+activities in the past.
+
+The ideas expressed by an English correspondent about the fear that
+America is soon to be an active source of danger in the Far East are
+not confined to persons on foreign shores. The prevailing attitude in
+some circles of American opinion is that called by President Hibben
+cynical pessimism. All professed radicals and many liberals believe
+that if our course has been better in the past it has been due to
+geographical accidents combined with indifference and with our
+undeveloped economic status. Consequently they believe that since we
+have now become what is called a world-power and a nation which
+exports instead of importing capital, our course will soon be as bad
+as that of any of the rest of them. In some quarters this opinion is
+clearly an emotional reaction following the disillusionments of
+Versailles. In others, it is due to adherence to a formula: nothing in
+international affairs can come out of capitalism and America is
+emphatically a capitalistic country. Whether or not these feelings are
+correct, they are not discussable; neither an emotion nor an absolute
+formula is subject to analysis.
+
+But there are specific elements in the situation which give grounds
+for apprehension as to the future. These specific elements are capable
+of detection and analysis. An adequate realization of their nature
+will be a large factor in preventing cynical apprehensions from
+becoming actual. This chapter is an attempt at a preliminary listing,
+inadequate, of course, as any preliminary examination must be. While
+an a priori argument based on a fatalistic formula as to how a
+"capitalistic nation" must conduct itself does not appeal to me, there
+are nevertheless concrete facts which are suggested by that formula.
+Part of our comparatively better course in China in the past is due to
+the fact that we have not had the continuous and close alliance
+between the State Department and big banking interests which is found
+in the case of foreign powers. No honest well-informed history of
+developments in China could be written in which the Russian Asiatic
+Bank, the Foreign Bank of Belgium, the French Indo-China Bank and
+Banque Industrielle, the Yokohama Specie Bank, the Hongkong-Shanghai
+Bank, etc., did not figure prominently. These banks work in the
+closest harmony, not only with railway and construction syndicates and
+big manufacturing interests at home, but also with their respective
+foreign offices. It is hardly too much to say that legations and banks
+have been in most important matters the right and left hands of the
+same body. American business interests have complained an the past
+that the American government does not give to American traders abroad
+the same support that the nationals of other states receive. In the
+past these complaints have centred largely about actual wrongs
+suffered or believed to have been suffered by American business
+undertakings carried on in a foreign country. With the present
+expansion of capital and of commerce, the same complaints and demands
+are going to be made not with reference to grievances suffered, but
+with reference to furthering, to pushing American commercial interests
+in connection with large banking groups. It would take a credulous
+person to deny the influence of big business in domestic politics. As
+we become more interested in commerce and banking enterprises what
+assurance have we that the alliance will not be transferred to
+international politics?
+
+It should be noted that the policy of the open door as affirmed by the
+great powers--and as frequently violated by them--even if it be
+henceforth observed in good faith, does not adequately protect us from
+this danger. The open door policy is not primarily a policy about
+China herself but rather about the policies of foreign powers toward
+one another with respect to China. It demands equality of economic
+opportunity for different nations. Were it enforced, it would prevent
+the granting of monopolies to any one nation: there is nothing in it
+to render impossible a conjoint exploitation of China by foreign
+powers, an organized monopoly in which each nation has its due share
+with respect to others. Such an organization might conceivably reduce
+friction among the great powers, and thereby reduce the danger of
+future wars--as long as China herself is impotent to go to war. The
+agreement might conceivably for a considerable time be of benefit to
+China herself. But it is clear that for the United States to become a
+partner in any such arrangement would involve a reversal of our
+historic policy in the Far East. It might be technically consistent
+with the open door policy, but it would be a violation of the larger
+sense in which the American people has understood and praised that
+ideal. He is blind who does not see that there are forces making for
+such a reversal. And since we are all more or less blind, an opening
+of our eyes to the danger is one of the conditions of its not being
+realized.
+
+One of the forces which is operative is indicated by the phrase that
+an international agreement on an economic and financial basis might be
+of value to China herself. The mere suggestion that such a thing is
+possible is abhorrent to many, especially to radicals. There seems to
+be something sinister in it. So it is worth explaining how and why it
+might be so. In the first place, it would obviously terminate the
+particularistic grabbing for "leased" territory, concessions and
+spheres of influence which has so damaged China. At the present time,
+the point of this remark lies in its implied reference to Japan, as at
+one time it might have applied to Russia. Fear of Japan's aims in
+China is not confined to China; the fear is widespread. An
+international economic arrangement may therefore be plausibly
+presented as the easiest and most direct method of relieving China of
+the Japanese menace. For Japan to stay out would be to give herself
+away; if she came in, it would subject Japanese activities to constant
+scrutiny and control. There is no doubt that part of the fear of Japan
+regarding the Pacific Conference is due to a belief that some such
+arrangement is contemplated. The case is easily capable of such
+presentation as to make it appeal to Americans who are really friendly
+to China and who haven't the remotest interest in her economic
+exploitation.
+
+The arrangement would, for example, automatically eliminate the
+Lansing-Ishii agreement with its embarrassing ambiguous recognition of
+Japan's _special_ interests in China.
+
+The other factor is domestic. The distraction and civil wars of China
+are commonplaces. So is the power exercised by the military governors
+and generals. The greater one's knowledge, the more one perceives how
+intimately the former evil is dependent upon the latter. The financial
+plight of the Chinese government, its continual foreign borrowings
+which threaten bankruptcy in the near future, depend upon militaristic
+domination and wild expenditure for unproductive purposes and squeeze.
+Without this expense, China would have no great difficulty henceforth
+in maintaining a balance in her budget. The retardation of public
+education whose advancement--especially in elementary schools--is
+China's greatest single need is due to the same cause. So is the
+growth in official corruption which is rapidly extending into business
+and private life.
+
+In fact, every one of the obstacles to the progress of China is
+connected with the rule of military factions and their struggles with
+one another for complete mastery. An economic international agreement
+among the great powers can be made which would surely reduce and
+possibly eliminate the greatest evils of "militarism." Many liberal
+Chinese say in private that they would be willing to have a temporary
+international receivership for government finance, provided they could
+be assured of its nature and the exact date and conditions of its
+termination--a proviso which they are sensible enough to recognize
+would be extremely difficult of attainment. American leadership in
+forming and executing any such scheme would, they feel, afford the
+best reassurance as to its nature and terms. Under such circumstances
+a plausible case can be made out for proposals which, under the guise
+of traditional American friendship for China, would in fact commit us
+to a reversal of our historic policy.
+
+There are radicals abroad and at home who think that our entrance into
+a Consortium already proves that we have entered upon the road of
+reversal and who naturally see in the Pacific Conference the next
+logical step. I have previously stated my own belief that our State
+Department proposed the Consortium primarily for political ends, as a
+means of checking the policy pursued by Japan of making unproductive
+loans to China in return for which she was getting an immediate grip
+on China's natural resources and preparing the way for direct
+administrative and financial control when the day of reckoning and
+foreclosure should finally come. I also said that the Consortium was
+between two stools, the financial and the political and that up to the
+present its chief value had been negative and preventive, and that
+jealousy or lack of interest by Japan and Great Britain in any
+constructive policy on the part of the Consortium was likely to
+maintain the same condition. I have seen no reason thus far to change
+my mind on this point, nor in regard to the further belief that
+probably the interests of China in the end will be best served by the
+continuation of this deterrent function. But the question is bound to
+arise: why continue the Consortium if it isn't doing anything? The
+pressure of foreign powers interested in the exploitation of China and
+of impatient American economic interests may combine to put an end to
+the present rather otiose existence led by the Consortium. The two
+stools between which the past action of the American government has
+managed to swing the Consortium may be united to form a single solid
+bench.
+
+At the risk of being charged with credulous gullibility, or something
+worse, I add that up to the present time the American phase of the
+Consortium hasn't shown perceptible signs of becoming a club exercised
+by American finance over China's economic integrity and independence.
+I believe the repeated statements of the American representative that
+he himself and the interests he represents would be glad if China
+proved her ability to finance her own public utilities without
+resorting to foreign loans. This belief is confirmed by the first
+public utterance of the new American minister to China who in his
+reference to the Consortium laid emphasis upon its deterrent function
+and upon the stimulation it has given to Chinese bankers to finance
+public utilities. And it is the merest justice to Mr. Stevens, the
+American representative, to say that he represents the conservative
+investment type of banker, not the "promotion" type, and that thus far
+his great concern has been the problem of protecting the buyer of such
+securities as are passed on by the banks to the ultimate investor--so
+much so that he has aroused criticism from American business interests
+impatient for speedy action. But there is a larger phase of the
+Consortium concerning which I think apprehensions may reasonably be
+entertained.
+
+Suppose, if merely by way of hypothesis, that the American government
+is genuinely interested in China and in making the policy of the open
+door and Chinese territorial and administrative integrity a reality,
+not merely a name, and suppose that it is interested in doing so from
+an American self-interest sufficiently enlightened to perceive that
+the political and economic advancement of the United States is best
+furthered by a policy which is identical with China's ability to
+develop herself freely and independently: what then would be the wise
+American course? In short, it would be to view our existing European
+interests and issues (due to the war) and our Far Eastern interests
+and issues as parts of one and the same problem. If we are actuated by
+the motive hypothetically imputed to our government and we fail in its
+realization, the chief reason will be that we regard the European
+question and the Asiatic problem as two different questions, or
+because we identify them from the wrong end.
+
+Our present financial interest in Europe is enormous. It involves not
+merely foreign governmental loans but a multitude of private advances
+and commitments. These financial entanglements affect not merely our
+industry and commerce but our politics. They involve much more
+immediately pressing concerns than to our Asiatic relations, and they
+involve billions where the latter involve millions. The danger under
+such conditions that our Asiatic relations will be sacrificed to our
+European is hardly fanciful.
+
+To make this abstract statement concrete, the firm of bankers, J. P.
+Morgan & Co., which is most heavily involved in European indebtedness
+to the United States, is the firm which is the leading spirit in the
+Consortium for China. It seems almost inevitable that the Asiatic
+problem should look like small potatoes in comparison with the
+European one, especially as our own industrial recuperation is so
+closely connected with European relations, while the Far East cuts a
+negligible figure. To my mind the real danger to set out upon selfish
+exploitation of China: intelligent self-interest, tradition and the
+fact that our chief asset in China is our past freedom from a
+predatory course, dictate a course of cooperation with China. The
+danger is that China will be subordinated and sacrificed because of
+primary preoccupation with the high finance and politics of Europe,
+that she will be lost in the shuffle.
+
+The European aspect of the problem can be made more concrete by
+reference to Great Britain in particular. That country suffers from
+the embarrassment of the Japanese alliance. She has already made it
+sufficiently clear that she would like to draw America into the
+alliance, making it tripartite, since that would be the easiest way of
+maintaining good relations with both Japan and the United States.
+There is no likelihood that any such step will be consummated. But
+British diplomacy is experienced and astute. And by force of
+circumstances our high finance has contracted a sort of economic
+alliance with Great Britain. There is no wish to claim superior virtue
+for America or to appeal to the strong current of anti-British
+sentiment. But the British foreign office exists and operates apart
+from the tradition of liberalism which has mainly actuated English
+domestic politics. It stands peculiarly for the _Empire_ side of the
+British Empire, no matter what party is in the saddle in domestic
+affairs. Every resource will be employed to bring about a settlement
+at the Pacific Conference which, even though it includes some degree
+of compromise on the part of Great Britain, will bend the Asiatic
+policy of the United States to the British traditions in the Far East,
+instead of committing Great Britain to combining with the United
+States in making a reality of the integrity of China to which both
+countries are nominally committed. It does not seem an extreme
+statement to say that the immediate issues of the Conference depend
+upon the way in which our financial commitments in Europe are treated,
+either as reasons for our making concessions to European policy or on
+the other hand as a means of securing an adherence of the European
+powers to the traditional American policy.
+
+A publicist in China who is of British origin and a sincere friend of
+China remarked in private conversation that if the United States could
+not secure the adherence of Great Britain to her Asiatic policy by
+persuasion (he was deploring the Japanese alliance) she might do so by
+buying it--through remission of her national debt to us. It is not
+necessary to resort to the measure so baldly suggested. But the remark
+at least suggests that our involvement in European, especially
+British, finance and politics may be treated in either of two ways for
+either of two results.
+
+
+2
+
+That the Chinese people generally speaking has a less antagonistic
+feeling toward the United States than towards other powers seems to me
+an undoubted fact. The feeling has been disturbed at divers times by
+the treatment of the Chinese upon the Pacific coast, by the exclusion
+act, by the turning over of our interest in the building of the
+Peking-Canton (or Hankow) railway to a European group, by the
+Lansing-Ishii agreement, and finally by the part played by President
+Wilson in the Versailles decision regarding Shantung. Those
+disturbances in the main, however, have made them dubious as to our
+skill, energy and intelligence rather than as to our good-will.
+Americans, taken individually and collectively, are to the Chinese--at
+least such was my impression--a rather simple folk, taking the word in
+its good and its deprecatory sense. In noting the Chinese reaction to
+the proposed Pacific Conference, it was interesting to see the
+combination of an almost unlimited hope that the United States was to
+lead in protecting them from further aggressions and in rectifying
+existing evils, with a lack of confidence, a fear that the United
+States would have something put over on it.
+
+Friendly feeling is of course mainly based upon a negative fact, the
+fact that the United States has taken no part in "leasing"
+territories, establishing spheres and setting up extra-national
+post-offices. On the positive side stands the contribution made by
+Americans to education, especially medical, and that of girls and
+women, and to philanthropy and relief. Politically, there are the
+early service of Burlinghame, the open door policy of John Hay (though
+failure to maintain it in fact while securing signatures to it on
+paper is a considerable part of the Chinese belief in our defective
+energy) and the part played by the United States in moderating the
+terms of the settlement of the Boxer outbreak, in addition to a
+considerable number of minor helpful acts. China also remembers that
+we were the only nation to take exception to the treaties embodying
+the Twenty-one Demands. While our exception was chiefly made on the
+basis of our own interests which these treaties might injuriously
+affect, a sentiment exists that the protest was a pledge of assistance
+to China when the time should be opportune for raising the whole
+question. And without doubt the reservation made on May 16, 1915, by
+our State Department is a strong card at the forthcoming Conference if
+the Department wishes to play it.
+
+From an American standpoint, the open door principle represents one of
+the only two established principles of American diplomacy, the other
+being, of course, the Monroe Doctrine. In connection with sentimental
+or idealistic associations which have clustered about it, it
+constitutes us in some vague fashion in both the Chinese and American
+public opinion a sort of guardian or at least spokesman of the
+interests of China in relation to foreign powers. Although, as was
+pointed out in a former chapter, the open door policy directly
+concerns other nations in their relation to China rather than China
+herself, yet the violation of the policy by other powers has been so
+frequent and so much to the detriment of China, that American
+interest, prestige and moral sentiment are now implicated in such an
+enforcement of it as will redound to the advantage of China.
+
+Citizens of other countries are often irritated by a suggestion of
+such a relationship between the United States and China. It presents
+itself as a proclamation of superior national virtue under cover of
+which the United States aims to establish its influence in China at
+the expense of other countries. The irritation is exasperated by the
+fact that the situation as it stands is an undoubted economic and
+political asset of the United States in China. We may concede without
+argument any contention that the situation is not due to any superior
+virtue but rather to contingencies of history and geography--in which
+respect it is not unlike many things that pass for virtues with
+individuals. The contention may be admitted without controversy
+because it is not pertinent to the main issue. The question is not so
+much how the state of affairs came about as what it now is, how it is
+to be treated and what consequences are in flow from it. It is a fact
+that up to the present an intelligent self-interest of America has
+coincided with the interests of a stable, independent and progressive
+China. It is also a fact that American traditions and sentiments have
+gathered about this consideration so that now there is widespread
+conviction in the American people of moral obligations of assistance
+and friendly protection owed by us to China. At present, no policy can
+be entered upon that does not bear the semblance of fairness and
+goodwill. We have at least so much protection against the dangers
+discussed in the prior chapter.
+
+Among Americans in China and presumably at home there is a strong
+feeling that we should adopt for the future stronger and more positive
+policies than we have maintained in the past. This feeling seems to me
+fraught with dangers unless we make very clear to ourselves in just
+what respects we are to continue and make good in a more positive
+manner our traditional policy. To some extent our past policy has been
+one of drifting. Radical change in this respect may go further than
+appears upon the surface in altering other fundamental aspects of our
+policy. What is condemned as drifting is in effect largely the same
+thing that is also praised as non-interference. A detailed settled
+policy, no matter how "constructive" it may appear to be, can hardly
+help involving us in the domestic policies of China, an affair of
+factions and a game which the Chinese understand and play much better
+than any foreigners. Such an involvement would at once lessen a
+present large asset in China, aloofness from internal intrigues and
+struggles.
+
+The specific protests of Chinese in this country--mainly
+Cantonese--against the Consortium seem to me mainly based on
+misapprehension. But their _general_ attitude of opposition
+nevertheless conveys an important lesson. It is based on a belief that
+the effect of the Consortium will be to give the Peking government a
+factitious advantage in the internal conflict which is waging in
+China, so that to all intents and purposes it will mark a taking of
+sides on our part. It is well remembered that the effect of the
+"reorganization" loan of the prior Consortium--in which the United
+States was _not_ a partner--was to give Yuan Shi Kai the funds which
+seated him and the militarist faction after him, firmly in the
+governmental saddle. Viewing the matter from a larger point of view
+than that of Canton vs. Peking, the most fundamental objection I heard
+brought by Chinese against the Consortium was in effect as follows:
+The republican revolution in China has still to be wrought out; the
+beginning of ten years ago has been arrested. It remains to fight it
+out. The inevitable effect of increased foreign financial and economic
+interest in China, even admitting that its industrial effect was
+advantageous to China, would be to create an interest in _stabilizing_
+China politically, which in effect would mean to sanctify the status
+quo, and prevent the development of a revolution which cannot be
+accomplished without internal disorders that would affect foreign
+investments unfavorably. These considerations are not mentioned for
+the sake of throwing light on the Consortium: they are cited as an
+illustration of the probability that a too positive and constructive
+development of our tradition of goodwill to China would involve us in
+an interference with Chinese domestic affairs injurious to China's
+welfare, to that free and independent development in which we profess
+such interest.
+
+But how, it will be asked, are we to protect China from foreign
+depredations, particularly those of Japan, how are we to change our
+nominal goodwill into a reality, if we do not enter much more positive
+and detailed policies? If there was in existence at the present time
+any such thing as a diplomacy of peoples as distinct from a diplomacy
+of governments, the question would mean something quite different from
+what it now means. As things now stand the people should profoundly
+distrust the _politicians'_ love for China. It is too frequently the
+reverse side of fear and incipient hatred of Japan, colored perhaps by
+anti-British feeling.
+
+There should be no disguising of the situation. The aggressive
+activities of other nations in China, centering but not exhausted at
+this time in Japan, are not merely sources of trouble to China but
+they are potential causes of trouble in our own international
+relationships. We are committed by our tradition and by the present
+actualities of the situation to attempting something positive for
+China as respects her international status, to live up to our
+responsibility is a most difficult and delicate matter. We have on the
+one side to avoid getting entangled in quasi-imperialistic European
+policies in Asia, whether under the guise of altruism, of putting
+ourselves in a position where we can exercise a more effective
+supervision of their behavior, or by means of economic expansion. On
+the other side, we have to avoid drifting into that kind of covert or
+avowed antagonism to European and Japanese imperialism which will only
+increase friction, encourage a combination especially of Great Britain
+and Japan---or of France and Japan--against us, and bring war
+appreciably nearer.
+
+We need to bear in mind that China will not be saved from outside
+herself. Even if by a successful war we should relieve China from
+Japanese encroachments, from all encroachments, China would not of
+necessity be brought nearer her legitimate goal of orderly and
+prosperous internal development. Apart from the question of how far
+war can now settle any fundamental issues without begetting others as
+dangerous, China of all countries is the one where settlement by
+force, especially by outside force, is least applicable, and most
+likely to be enormously disserviceable. China is used to taking time
+to deal with her problems: she can neither understand not profit by
+impatient methods of the western world which are profoundly alien to
+her genius. Moreover a civilization which is on a continental scale,
+which is so old that the rest of us are parvenus in comparison, which
+is thick and closely woven, cannot be hurried in its development
+without disaster. Transformation from within is its sole way out, and
+we can best help China by trying to see to it that she gets the time
+she needs in order to effect this transformation, whether or not we
+like the particular form it assumes at any particular time.
+
+A successful war in behalf of China would leave untouched her problems
+of education, of factional and sectional forces, of political
+immaturity showing itself in present incapacity for organization. It
+would affect her industrial growth undoubtedly, but in all human
+probability for the worse, increasing the likelihood that she would
+enter upon an industrialization which would repeat the worst evils of
+western industrial life, without the immunities, resistances and
+remedial measures which the West has evolved. The imagination cannot
+conceive a worse crime than fastening western industrialism upon China
+before she has developed within herself the meaning of coping with the
+forces which it would release. The danger is great enough as it is.
+War waged in China's behalf by western powers and western methods
+would make the danger practically irresistible. In addition we should
+gain a permanent interest in China which is likely to be of the most
+dangerous character to ourselves. If we were not committed by it to
+future imperialism, we should be luckier than we have any right to
+hope to be. These things are said against a mental protest to
+admitting even by implication the prospect of war with Japan, but it
+seems necessary to say them.
+
+These remarks are negative and vague as to our future course. They
+imply a confession of lack of such wisdom as would enable me to make
+positive definite proposals. But at least I have confidence in the
+wisdom and goodwill of the American and other peoples to deal with the
+problem, if they are only called into action. And the first condition
+of calling wisdom and goodwill into effective existence is to
+recognize the seriousness of the problem and the utter futility of
+trying to force its solution by impatient and hurried methods.
+Pro-Japanese apologetics is dangerous; it obscures the realities of
+the situation. An irritated anti-Japanism that would hasten the
+solution of the Chinese problem merely by attacking Japan is equally
+fatal to discovering and applying a proper method.
+
+More specifically and also more generically, proper publicity is the
+greatest need. If, as Secretary Hughes has intimated, a settlement of
+the problems of the Pacific is made a condition of arriving at an
+agreement regarding reduction and limitation of armaments, it is
+likely that the Conference might better never be held. In eagerness to
+do something which will pass as a settlement, either China's--and
+Siberia's--interests will be sacrificed in some unfair compromise, or
+irritation and friction will be increased--and in the end so will
+armaments. In any literal sense, it is ridiculous to suppose that the
+problems of the Pacific can be settled in a few weeks, or months--or
+years. Yet the discussion of the problems, in separation from the
+question of armament, may be of great use. For it may further that
+publicity which is a pre-condition of any genuine settlement. This
+involves the public in diplomacy. But it also involves a wider
+publicity, one which will enlighten the world about the facts of Asia,
+internal and international.
+
+Scepticism about Foreign Offices, as they are at present conducted, is
+justified. But scepticism about the power of public opinion, if it can
+be aroused and instructed, to reshape Foreign Office policies means
+hopelessness about the future of the world. Let everything possible be
+done to reduce armament, if only to secure a naval holiday on the part
+of the three great naval powers, and if only for the sake of lessening
+taxation. Let the Conference on Problems devote itself to discussing
+and making known as fully and widely as possible the element and scope
+of those problems, and the fears--or should one call them hopes?--of
+the cynics will be frustrated. It is not so important that a decision
+in the American sense of the Yap question be finally and forever
+arrived at, as it is that the need of China and the Orient in general
+for freer and fuller communications with the rest of the world be made
+clear--and so on, down or up the list of agenda. The commercial open
+door is needed. But the need is greater that the door be opened to
+light, to knowledge and understanding. If these forces will not create
+a public opinion which will in time secure a lasting and just
+settlement of other problems, there is no recourse save despair of
+civilization. Liberals can do something better than predicting failure
+and impugning motives. They can work for the opened door of open
+diplomacy, of continuous and intelligent inquiry, of discussion free
+from propaganda. To shirk this responsibility on the alleged ground
+that economic imperialism and organized greed will surely bring the
+Conference to failure is supine and snobbish. It is one of the factors
+that may lead the United States to take the wrong course in the
+parting of the ways.
+
+October, 1921.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's China, Japan and the U.S.A., by John Dewey
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