The Chinese National Assembly made constitutional history March 19 when it authorized President Chiang Kai-shek to take essential steps to strengthen government organs of the Republic of China. The objective is full mobilization for counterattack and national recovery in the anti-Communist war.
The National Assembly met in Taipei February 19-March 25 in its fourth plenary session. President Chiang was re-elected to a fourth six-year term and Premier C. K. Yen was elected Vice President. By an overwhelming majority vote of 1,138, the nation's supreme political organ also amended the "Temporary Provisions Effective During the Period of Communist Rebellion" of the Constitution to expand the President's emergency powers.
The amendment added two important clauses. One permits the President to "establish, in accordance with the constitutional system, an organ for making major policy decisions concerned with national mobilization for suppression of the Communist rebellion and for assuming administrative control in war zones". The other accords him the right to "make adjustments in the administrative and personnel organs of the Central Government" and "promulgate regulations providing elections to fill the elective offices at the Central Government level, which have become vacant for legitimate reasons, or for which additional representation is called for because of population increase, in areas that are free and/or newly recovered".
The amendment is based on the Presidential power to function as Supreme Commander of the armed forces as prescribed in Article 36 of the Constitution. As a rule, the chief of state of a constitutional democracy has such special powers in time of war or national emergency.
The newly authorized policy organ is expected to be similar to the National Security Council of the United States and to high defense bodies in other democratic nations. It will advise and assist the Supreme Commander to make decisions on matters of national defense and home and foreign affairs. In the Republic of China, the existing organ of this nature is the National Defense Council, under the Office of the President.
Kinmen defenders are vigilant, ready to repulse Reds. (File photo)
Following adoption of the amendment, Presidential Secretary General Chang Chun suggested that the National Defense Council had been accorded a legal status to "carry out its principal task of harmonizing political and military strategies". The Council already is charged with the duty of coordinating military operations and the civil administration of the government to achieve total mobilization. However, it is possible the Council's name will be changed as a consequence of the constitutional authorization.
Within the Law
According to the Presidential Secretary General, the new organ is expected to come into formal existence after President Chiang's fourth term inauguration on May 20. The Chief Executive will preside over the body.
The amendment substantially increases Presidential powers but within constitutional limits. The policy decisions to be made by the new organ will be implemented through ordinary government channels. But "administrative affairs in war zones" will be handled directly by the organ itself, because military government is solely within the competency of the Supreme Commander. Military government presently exists on the offshore islands of Kinmen and Matsu.
The amendment stipulates that the President alone has the power to establish the new organ and readjust administrative and personnel composition of the Central Government. But the expenditures involved will be included in the General Budget Bill. So the national legislature still can exercise control through its power of the purse.
Another significant aspect of the amendment is the empowering of the President to hold new elections to fill elective offices at the Central Government level. This will stimulate the electoral functions of constitutional government at a time when the government itself is confined to part of the national territory.
Communist occupation of the mainland has prevented the national election of representatives to such Central Government organs as the National Assembly, Legislative Yuan, and Control Yuan. Members of these three parliamentary bodies were elected in 1947-48 when constitutional government came into force. Membership has dwindled. Some members were trapped when the Communists overran the mainland in 1949. Death is cutting sharply into the ranks of those who reached Taiwan.
The National Assemblymen and Control Yuan members are supposed to be elected every six years, legislators every three years. Ordinarily their term of office terminates when newly elected members assume their duties. As new elections cannot be held, terms of office are extended automatically.
Taiwan Underrepresented
The three parliamentary bodies provide regional representation for Chinese both at home and abroad. Occupational groups are also represented in the National Assembly and the Legislative Yuan. The new elections to be held in free areas can partially make up the membership losses. The Central Government holds Taiwan province and the offshore islands of Kinmen and Matsu, which are a part of Fukien province. Also loyal to it are numerous overseas Chinese communities.
According to the Constitution, there should be one National Assembly delegate from each county, municipality or area of equal status, and one more delegate for each additional 500,000 persons thereof. The Legislative Yuan should have five members from each province or special municipality, and one additional member for each one million people. Control Yuan membership is made up of five persons from each province and two members from each special municipality. Limited numbers of members are chosen by overseas Chinese communities and occupational groups.
In Taiwan, the island bastion of free China, the 13 million population of today is more than double that of 1947. Additionally, the number of National Assembly constituencies has increased from 8 to 22 as a result of the redemarcation of administrative regions. The province therefore is entitled to much larger National Assembly If representation than in 1947-48. It should also have more seats in the legislature.
National occupational organizations have been reactivated or established anew in free China. Many of them are produces of rapid economic growth and expansion. So occupational representation in the three parliamentary organs should also be replenished and broadened.
New elections in Taiwan, part of Fukien, and in the overseas Chinese communities will be a practical way of refreshing the national parliamentary bodies and of according the new generation with a voice in Central Government. So far popular elections have been held in free China only up to the provincial level.
The Taiwan provincial Assembly already has resolved to ask for early election of additional provincial representatives to the three organs. Armed with his new powers, the President may plan and implement the elections at any time during his next term.
Younger Participation
The new elections plus the proposed personnel readjustment can be expected to bring younger people into government work. At the recent National Assembly session, many delegates suggested that the government requires talent in the 30 to 50 age bracket. Addressing the closing ceremony of the Assembly session, President Chiang pledged action that "can increase our vitality and give impetus to the revolutionary war of counter-offensive and national recovery".
To meet the tasks ahead, the President said, there is a need for "total mobilization" of "physical and mental strength" as well as of "material and financial resources". A task of this magnitude is going to be "total war", he said, calling for "measures in military, political, economic, cultural, social, and other fields."
In total war, the Supreme Commander must have power over the economy and society in addition to his right of military command. President Abraham Lincoln once said during the American civil war: "As commander-in-chief of the army and navy in time of war, I suppose I have a right to take any measures which may best subdue the enemy."
The newly adopted amendment gives President Chiang this right, and the proposed organ will help him to coordinate military and civil affairs. As a matter of fact, the Temporary Provisions of the Constitution are in themselves a set of emergency measures for use in the war against Communism.
The Constitution of the Republic of China was adopted on December 25, 1946, by the constitutional National Assembly held in Nanking. Communists boycotted the convention in spite of a preliminary agreement reached at the Political Consultative Conference held in Chungking in January, 1946. That conference was attended by all political groups and independents to seek settlement of postwar political differences through constitutional rule.
Communist Attacks
Even before the 1946 constitutional convention, the Communists were attacking government troops throughout the country in a desperate bid for national power. They had greatly expanded their illegal military establishment during the war and subsequently received massive military aid from Soviet forces in Manchuria. On July 4, 1947, the government was compelled to order suppression of the Communist rebellion.
"When the National Assembly elected under the Constitution met in Nanking on March 29, 1948, to implement constitutional government at the people's level, the Communist rebellion already was, threatening to destroy China's democratic institutions. The Assembly therefore formulated and enacted the Temporary Provisions Effective During the Period of Communist Rebellion as an attachment to the Constitution. The main purpose was to enable the President to take "emergency measures to avert an imminent danger to the security of the State or of the people" without being subject to the procedural restrictions of the legislature. President Chiang was then elected the first Chief of State under the Constitution.
New Interpretation
At its first session, the National Assembly also resolved that an extraordinary session should be convened before December 25, 1950, to decide whether to continue the Temporary Provisions provided the Period of Communist Rebellion had not terminated previously by Presidential decree. The extraordinary session could not be convened, however. The rebellion had spread and the government had withdrawn to Taiwan.
The second session of the National Assembly, held in Taipei on March 11, 1954, decided that the Temporary Provisions should remain in force until annulled. The decision was necessitated by the fact that only 1,463 delegates out of 2,961 were present. Most of the other delegates had been seized by the Reds on the mainland. A two-thirds quorum for constitutional amendment was unattainable.
When the National Assembly met in Taipei on February 20, 1960, for its third session, the Council of Grand Justices interpreted the meaning of the words "total membership of the National Assembly" to be those delegates "duly elected according to law and able to answer summons to attend the meeting of the Assembly". The decision was made under the doctrine of rebus sic stantibus.
Article 47 of the Constitution stipulates that the President and the Vice President may be elected for a second term and does not explicitly forbid a third term. With a view to assuring the continued leadership of President Chiang in the anti-Communist struggle, the National Assembly third session revised the Temporary Provisions to waive any implication of a third-term ban.
Modernized Chinese armed forces show their might and high morale in Taipei National Day parade. (File photo)
The Temporary Provisions amendment adopted then included two additional clauses concerning the Assembly's rights of initiative and referendum. So far the Assembly has exercised only the rights of election and recall. Article 27 of the Constitution says that the Assembly may exercise rights of initiative and referendum only after these same rights have been exercised in half of the counties and municipalities of the whole country. Such a condition is impracticable in present circumstance. The new clause led to the establishment of the Committee on Constitutional Research and obliged the President to convoke an extraordinary Assembly session to consider Committee recommendations.
Up to President
The extraordinary session was held last February 1-8, immediately before the fourth session of the National Assembly. By its resolution, the initiative-referendum clauses were replaced with these provisions: The National Assembly may make rules to initiate principles of Central Government laws and submit the laws to referendum without being subject to the restriction prescribed in Article 27. The President, when he deems it necessary, may convoke an extraordinary National Assembly session to discuss the initiative and referendum measures.
Since being written into the Constitution in 1948, the Temporary Provisions have been amended three times, including the revision of last February 19, Though part of the Constitution for the time being, they do not have the permanency of regular constitutional articles.
Constitution Intact
President Chiang has maintained that there should be no formal amendment of the Constitution until the mainland is liberated from Communism. Only then will all the people of the country be able to express themselves on changes in the fundamental law, This is the consistent stand taken by the national leader through the years, including 1960, when Article 47 seemed to jeopardize his election to a third term.
Revision of the Temporary Provisions keeps the body of the Constitution intact. The emergency powers granted to the President will be terminated when the provisions expire. As President Chiang declared: "Once the Communist rebellion is suppressed, the President's emergency powers shall be abrogated and resumed by the National Assembly."
The motion to enlarge the President's emergency powers was made by Assemblyman Chang Chih-pen, an elderly constitutional scholar. It was seconded by 1,022 delegates out of 1,437 present at the last Assembly session. They represented strong support from the ruling Kuomintang, the two minority parties —the Young China Party and the Democratic Socialists—and non-partisans. Independent leader Mo Teh-hui was among the first of the seconders.
Since the removal of seat to Taiwan, the Chinese National Government has continued to function under the provisions of the Constitution. Remarkable accomplishments have been recorded in all fields of endeavors; Civil rights are safeguarded and welfare measures assure the best life the Chinese people have ever known. Democratic local self-government has been implemented throughout Taiwan.
The road to constitutionalism has been tortuous. For thousands of years, China was a monarchy. The 1911 Revolution led by Dr. Sun Yat-sen created a republic, the first in Asia. But constitutional government has had to face one trial after another ever since.
In the first years of the Republic, Dr. Sun had to fight Yuan Shih-kai; the northern warlord and President, to protect the Provisional Constitution of 1912. A succession of warlord governments after Yuan made a mockery of constitutional rule.
Kuomintang Tutelage
Dr. Sun attributed China's early democratic failure to premature introduction of parliamentarianism. His revolutionary program called for a three-stage progression: military government, political tutelage, and constitutional rule.
President Chiang, who succeeded Dr. Sun as leader of the Revolution, unified the country after the Northward Expedition of 1926-28. Thereafter the National Government of the Kuomintang governed in a period of political tutelage, training the people to exercise their political rights. The Provisional Constitution adopted by a National Convention in 1931 became the basic law.
Hoping to conclude political tutelage at an early date, the National Government proclaimed a draft constitution on May 5, 1936. A constitutional convention was set for November 12 to formalize the writing of a constitution on the basis of the draft. But it had to be canceled because of Japanese aggression. Constitutional government was compelled to wait until after the eight-year Sino-Japanese war of 1937-45.
The 1946 Political Consultative Conference in which the Communists participated agreed to revise the May 5 draft at a constitutional convention. But the Communists tore the agreement to bits with their all-out insurrection. Finally the convention was held and the Constitution adopted, but only after repeated delays.
Now the National Government, legally elected under the Constitution, is determined to drive out the Chinese Communist regime and restore constitutional rule to the whole of China. Addressing the recent National Assembly session, President Chiang reiterated the government's "firm resolve to take back to the 600 million people on the mainland the Constitution they have entrusted to us".
The battle for a democratic order in China conforms to what seems to be a universal rule: genuine, effective constitutional government seems to be a product of revolution that crystalizes the blood, sweat, and toil of a nation.