The influence of Sun Yat-sen was harmed, rather than reinforced, by the hysterical ritualists who seem to be the parasites of all one-party governments. The memory of the Leader and his teachings settled into the stabilizing roles of founding father and general dogma. Only a few veterans of the movement are still inspired by the fire of his words and the vigor of his personality. To the vast bulk of Chinese public opinion Sun Yat-sen is the human embodiment of virtuous, brave, and intelligent conduct, whose theories are acceptable in their general form and whose programs have proved pragmatically usable. The San Min Chu I failed to cause widespread political ecstasy; it succeeded in bringing direction and sanity, after a limited fashion. To spread allegiance the government fostered a Sun Yat-sen memorial ritual; every Monday morning, in every government office, college, school, police station, and other public building, there was held a service consisting of the reading of Sun Yat-sen's political testament and passages from his speeches clarifying his doctrines. The services seemed for a while to resemble a state religion; but the moderateness and formalism of Chinese life was inimical to the fervor necessary for political religion. The Kuomintang and its government came to see these limitations; although the services have remained, they are now severely secular in spirit.
The most dynamic part of the San Min Chu I, the doctrine of nationalism, had contributed to placing the Kuomintang in power. The new government was accordingly nationalist and centralistic; it opposed any type of regionalism—political, administrative, economic, or military. The Northern generals who sided with the government at the time of its formation were brought within the operation of the national military laws. When they revolted—quite properly, according to their tuchün standards—against reduction of their forces in the Disbandment War of 1930-1931, they were defeated. With the Southern and the Western military leaders Chiang was not as successful, until Japanese and Communist pressure brought first the one and then the other group into his fold. After actual autonomy for a number of years, the province of Kuangtung (Canton) submitted in 1936 to the authority of the National Government, thereby bringing to an end the generation-old division of North and South. Nationalism and centralism affected not only the armies but also the entire administration, whose service functions and police powers developed amazingly. Although the Nanking government had originally faced broad popular suspicion, it began to win genuine respect because of its accomplishments.
Was the Nanking government a dictatorship? Its record does not justify the assumption that it was merely to camouflage a military dictatorship commandeered by Chiang K'ai-shek. Moreover, the policy-making power was not by any means a prerogative of Chiang K'ai-shek. Chiang was nearly sovereign in technical military matters and possessed more political influence than did any other single individual. Yet the power of policy making rested with a small group of men not over a hundred in number. Some of the gentlest, sincerest, and quietest of these leaders had once been tuchüns in their own right; some of the most military and forthright had never handled anything more lethal than a cash register. The leaders tended to work within the party and government structure, so that the political organization, while not of great simplicity or clarity, accurately portrayed the distribution of power. No one can gauge the degree of interdependence between the leaders of a government system in its formative period, and between the offices which these leaders occupy. The Sian episode indicated that the Nanking government could continue without Chiang and that Chiang's incarceration was not the signal for immediate anarchy. But Chiang was not actually dead, nor was the government deprived of the support which his prestige had generated. From 1927 to 1937 the Nanking government remained under approximately the same leading officials.
The last test for the sources of Nanking's power may be found in considering the relation between the men in command and the authority which placed them there. The supreme organ of the party was the Party Congress. This body did determine the course of government policy frequently, and on such occasions clarified issues through action. The Congress elected the Central Executive Committee and the Central Supervisory Committee of the Kuomintang. The entire membership of the Congress would vote in the elections, any of the members being eligible. Since the Congress was composed of representatives from the various regional and functional divisions of the party, intraparty democracy was insured in theory and—though to a lesser extent—in practice. The two top committees elected smaller Standing Committees; the Central Executive Committee in addition elected the Central Political Council, which was the highest organ of government in China and the agency through which the party controlled the government. The Central Political Council did not seek to keep track of the detail of government; it outlined governmental policy, appointed major officials, and directed rather than supervised administration. It was a policy-making body in the strictest sense, and its action took effect upon the Council of State, which coordinated the government establishments.[2]
Had there been a schism between the Nanking government and the Kuomintang, it might have been possible to trace a political issue as it was fought out—all the way from the party membership up through the Party Congress and the Central Executive Committee, from party to government by action of the Central Political Council, and down through the Council of State and the subordinated government organs to the administrative network operating upon the broad masses of the populace. In fact, however, no issue saw the light, since the same group that dominated the party controlled the government. The relation between the leaders and the Party Congresses can perhaps best be compared with that between the leading personalities of a Republican or Democratic convention in the United States and the convention delegates. Convention action rarely transfers power or upsets leadership, nor do constructive plans or formulated policies emerge from convention sessions; and yet the conventions cannot be regarded merely as tools in the hands of the party leadership. A similar situation existed in China. Even when Chiang and the other leaders seemed to hold the bag, the meetings of the Party Congress did not lack importance, and the issues before the Congress were not considered predetermined. This was no personal regime in the Napoleonic sense. Party dictatorship expressed itself in defined forms, as a part of Sun Yat-sen's state philosophy. Benevolent oligarchy of patriotic modernists, acting with party sanction obtained through intraparty democratic processes, was not foreign to Sun's mind. The Nanking government further differed from fascist governments, and resembled the Russian, in that it was democratic in intent; its dictatorial character was avowedly temporary. Throughout the period during which the Kuomintang ruled from Nanking, democracy was regarded as a definite goal of governmental policy. The Japanese invasions culminating in open war made impossible the immediate abrogation of Kuomintang party dictatorship. Yet when war broke out in 1937, the National Government was on the verge of reconstituting itself as a democracy; but now the regime itself became itinerant, moving into the hinterland.
The Nanking government was organized under Kuomintang rule in a form unique among modern states. Its three most distinctive features were: (1) the concentration of power in the supreme agencies; (2) a fivefold division of power and function through the yüans; and (3) the absence of parliamentary chambers.[3] While the Organic Law was in effect as a constitution (1928-1931), the government was headed by a president wielding considerable power and a Council of State which served as the chief control agency. In 1931 a National People's Convention made up of representatives of the Kuomintang and of occupational groups adopted a Provisional Constitution.[4] Under this constitution the power of the president was sharply reduced, making him practically a titular officer. The Council of State became a more formalized agency, and the greater weight of government routine was placed in the Executive Yüan. Under the draft constitution proposed for the period after the end of party dictatorship a presidential system was to have been inaugurated.
The years 1931-1937 were characterized by the use of the Council of State as the supreme agency of formal government. The president of the National Government was little more than the chairman of the Council. The Council received instructions from the Central Political Council, and transmitted them to the five regular departments of government in the form of policies. Great as its powers may seem to be, the Council of State was largely an intermediary agency, although the personal influence of its members was extensive. The Council, with its administrative adjuncts, was of value in that it provided an institutional center for the government and gave governmental form to the commands of the party. There was no judicial check on the executive or the legislative branches.
The fivefold division of powers (adopted as the yüan system) is one of the most original points in Sun Yat-sen's political scheme. Yüan is an almost untranslatable Chinese term signifying a "public body" and used in modern China to designate the five great coordinate departments of government.