With these as beginnings, I arrived at the conclusion that more, possibly, could be done by way of arousing American interests in Far Eastern affairs by going to the United States than by staying in China. I feared, also, that if I remained away from America too long, it would be difficult readily to get in touch again with affairs there.
For such reasons, I came to the decision that I should send my resignation to the President. I did not wish to run away from a difficult and disagreeable situation. Indeed, until the first effects of the Paris decision had been overcome, I would not leave. Beyond that time, I had no desire to remain. Like the Chinese, I at that time still believed that President Wilson had probably met tremendous difficulties of which I had no knowledge. At any rate, it was far from my purpose to embarrass him or the Government through my action. Therefore, the only motive I gave for my resignation was my desire to return to the United States. However, in my letter to the President I tried to express in moderate but serious terms my view of the situation and of the action which had been taken at Paris. This letter follows:
June 7, 1919.
Dear Mr. President:I have the honour to place in your hands my resignation as minister to China and to request that I may be relieved of the duties of this post as soon as convenient to yourself and to the Secretary of State. My reason for this action is that I am wearied after nearly six years of continuous strain, that I feel that the interests of my family demand my return to the United States, and that I should like to reënter affairs at home without making my absence so long as to break off all of the most important relationships.
I desire to thank you for the confidence you have reposed in me, and it shall be my greatest desire to continue in the future to coöperate in helping to realize those great purposes of national and international policy which you have so clearly and strongly put before the American nation and the world.
In making this communication to you I cannot but refer to recent developments with respect China. The general outlook is indeed most discouraging, and it seems impossible to accomplish anything here at present or until the home governments are willing to face the situation and to act. It is not difficulties that deter me, and I should stay at my post if it were necessary and if I did not think that I could be of more use in the United States than in China at the present time. But in fact, the situation requires that the American people should be made to realize what is at stake here for us in order that they may give the necessary backing to the Government for support in any action which the developments here may Inquire. Unless the American people realize this and the Government feels strong enough to take adequate action, the fruits of one hundred and forty years of American work in China will inevitably be lost. Our people will be permitted to exist here only on the sufferance of others, and the great opportunity which has been held out to us by the Chinese people to assist in the development of education and free institutions will be gone beyond recall. In its stead there will come a sinister situation dominated by the unscrupulous methods of the reactionary military régime centred in Tokyo, absolutist in tendency, cynical of the principles of free government and human progress. If this force, with all the methods it is accustomed to apply, remains unopposed there will be created in the Far East the greatest engine of military oppression and dominance that the world has yet seen. Nor can we avoid the conclusion that the brunt of evil results will fall on the United States, as is already foreshadowed by the bitter hostility and abnormal vituperativeness of the Japanese press with regard to America.
The United States and Great Britain will have to stand together in this matter; I do not think this is realized as fully by Britishers at home as by those out here. If Russia can become an independent representative government its interests would parallel ours. The forces of public opinion and strength which can thus be mobilized are entirely sufficient to control the situation here and to keep it from assuming the menacing character which is threatened at present; but this can only be done if the situation is clearly seen and if it is realized that the military party of Japan will continue its present methods and purposes which have proved so successful until it becomes a dead wall of firm, quiet opposition. There will be a great deal of talk of friendship for China, of restoration of Shantung, of loyalty to the League of Nations, but it will be dangerous to accept this and to stop questioning what are the methods actually applied; as long as they exist the menace is growing all the time. We cannot rest secure on treaties nor even on the League of Nations without this checking up of the facts. Otherwise these instruments would only make the game a little more complicated but not change its essential character. The menace can be avoided only if it is made plain to Japan that her purposes are unmistakable and that the methods utilized to effect them will by no means be tolerated. Such purposes are the stirring up of trouble and revolution, encouragement of bandits and pirates, morphia, financial corruption, misleading of the press, refusal of just satisfaction when Americans are injured in order to gain prestige for absolute power, and chief of all official duplicity, such as the disavowal of knowledge when loans are being made to the Chinese Government by leading Japanese banks and the subsequent statement by the Japanese minister that these loans were private arrangements by "merchants."
If continuous support could be given not only to the activities of American merchants but to the constructive forces in Chinese national life itself these purposes and methods would not have the chance to flourish and succeed which they now enjoy.
During the war our action in the support of constructive forces in China necessarily could not be effective, as our energies were required elsewhere. Yet I believe that a great opportunity was missed when China had broken of relations with Germany. The very least recognition of her sentiments, support and efforts, on our part, would have changed the entire situation. But while millions upon millions were paid to the least important of the countries of Europe not a cent was forthcoming for China. This lack of support drove Tuan and his followers into the arms of the pro-Japanese agents. Instead of support we gave China the Lansing-Ishii Note.
Throughout this period the Japanese game has still been in the stage of bluff; while Germany seemed at her strongest in the war, indeed the Japanese were perhaps making their veiled threats with a feeling that if they should ally themselves with a strong Germany the two would be invincible; but even at that time a portion of the American navy detached could have checkmated Japan. Since the complete breakdown of Germany the case of Japan has been carried through solely on bluff though perhaps it may be that the Japanese militarists have succeeded in convincing themselves that their establishment is formidable. But it is plain that they would be absolutely powerless in the face of a stoppage of commerce and a navy demonstration on the part of any one of the great powers. No one desires to think of this contingency, but it is plain that after the breakdown of Germany it was not feasible for Japan to use force nor could she have suffered a greater damage than to exclude herself from the Peace Conference where she had everything to gain and nothing to lose. In ten years there may be a very different situation. Then also our people, having grown wise, will be sure to shout: "Why was not this stopped while there was yet time?" It seems to me necessary that someone in the Government ought to give attention primarily to China and the Far Eastern situation. It is very difficult to get any attention for China. I mean any continuous attention that results in getting something actually done. Everything else seems to come first because Europe seems so much nearer; and yet the destinies of Serbia, Czecho-Slovakia, and Greece are infinitesimal in their importance to the future of America compared With those of China.
During my service here I have constantly suffered from this lack of continuous attention at home to the Far Eastern situation. It has reacted on the consular service; the interpreter service which is absolutely necessary to make our consular corps in China effective has been starved, as no new appointments have been made. In my own case promises of assistance which had been given repeatedly went unfulfilled. In this matter I have not the least personal feeling. I know the result is not due to the personal neglect or ill-will of any man or group of men, only it seems to me to indicate a general sentiment of the unimportance of Far Eastern affairs, which ought to be remedied. I repeat that these statements are not made in a spirit of complaint; all individual members of the Department of State have shown nothing but consideration and readiness to assist, but there has been lacking a concentrated interest in China, which ought to be represented in some one of the high officials, designated to follow up Far Eastern affairs and accorded influence commensurate with responsibilities in this matter.
A NATION STRIKES AND UNITES
The students of Peking "started something." For the first time in thousands of years public opinion was aroused and organized in China. Through the action of the students, with whom the merchants made common cause, before and after the Shantung decision, China found herself.
The Japanese papers insisted steadfastly that these student disturbances had been brought on at the "instigation of certain countries." But instigation was not needed. If foreigners had wished to make trouble in this way, they would have been kept extremely busy trying to keep pace with the Chinese themselves. You do not have to instigate a man to resist a pillager who is trying to break into his house. Those who started this tremendous movement toward nationalism—for that is what it grew into—were students in the government schools and in the private schools of Peking and Tientsin. In the beginning the students were alone in the agitation, but not for long. Throughout the agitators were referred to as "students," but this term came to be used in a broad sense; it came to mean Young China, including all of the youth of the land who had been educated in modern schools.
China is the home of the strike and the boycott; but never before had these weapons been employed on such a scale. The merchants and students of north China met during the second half of May, declared a general boycott of Japanese goods, and demanded the dismissal of the three men called traitors, the notorious agents in the Chino-Japanese negotiations. The boycott spread rapidly, a spontaneous expression of deep resentment. But the movement strove also to control and purify the action of the Chinese Government. The instrument for this was the strike—passive resistance—the stopping of the wheels of commerce and industry till the will of the people was listened to.