CHINA'S CAPACITY FOR REPRE-| SENTATIVE GOVERNMENT.
(Daily Press, 4th April.)
It has perhaps been too quickly assumed
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
apealed
(April 6, 1901.
to the towns. The me he protection of their own lawa, and in the
that Asiatics are incapable of rising to the gain admis means alone could any man backbone of the Changhai Settlements.
summoning the first Parliament deserving | Empire exist than these residents in the the name. What distinguished it from its “Foreign Settlement," who, secured in the predecessors was that for the
those absence of any desire to withdraw them days were ruled by their great guilds from their natural allegiance, form the through whose
to the franchise of the Both find an appreciative seconder in Lau borough. The guilds of England were in KUNG-YI, the Viceroy of the Province, to many respects similar to those of China. whose squud commonsense the little that Like those of China there was a sort of has been done to bring the reactionary enregistered compact that in return for party in China to a sense of its blunders is certain trading and internal privileges they due. These residents then have taken the were to give their support to the king's go-couragious course of openly calling a meet- vernment, assist him in levying his taxes, ing of their fellow residents to discuss the and not interfere with his judgments. position of the Empire; and it is instructive When however summoned to Parliament and hopeful to note the result. The meet- they found themselves abetted by the powering was conducted on the most orderly lines, ful faction of the nobles, and had for the a chairman appointed, and the utmost or- first time leisure to look round them, they der prevailed. The ocasion of the meeting discovered that both froin numbers and was to protest against the fatal measures from wealth, they held in their own hands being taken by the more reactionary party to the key of the position. The Commons of hand over to a foreign Power the territory England never afterwards forgot the lesson, of Manchuria. The disastrous results of and the House of Commons scon found that the policy of that party which had al- in the possession of the purse-strings they ready lost to China Port Arthur, Weihai- could effectually control both noble and wei, Kiaochau, and other portions of their King.
native land were pointed out, and the ne- Now one or two little incidents seem to show that a glimpse of something of the leading to the partition of the entire Em- cessary effect of the proposed surrender in sort has commenced to dawn ou China. pire were made the ground of dutiful ex- Curiously in China it was not the noble postulation to the Emperor, his Court, and nor the bureaucracy that made the first the Viceroys of the Great Provinces. appeal to the people. China has never suf- That such a meeting should be called ig a fered, as did England, from the encroach-sufficient sign of the time, but that it should ments of the Crown. Iler sufferings have be addressed by its Chairman in terms arisen from a more dangerous, because showing a wide knowledge of the subject at more insidious power, that of an all-pervad- | issue, which would have come with credit not stand alone, but has to yield and adapt it- ing and irresponsible bureaucracy. If the from the mouth of an European statesmen self to its neighbours in order that the whole Crown in HENBY III.'s time in England had of the first order, and that the protest should may present an united front. Unfortunately sought to oppress the nobility, the converse have been unaccompanied by any expression in Ireland the same misunderstanding of has happened in Chin, where the bureau- of disloyalty or a desire to embarrass, is the fundamentals exists. That there are cracy have sought to extingush the Crown, indicative that there does exist "at
conception of Representative Government, and that no materials exist among thein on which a parliament could be founded. The only institution of this nature, the Diet in Japan, it is true, has hardly proved a suc cess, yet when contrasted with the many efforts in Europe from time to time to fami liarise the various peoples with the intrinsic perfection of a limited monarchy tempered by representative institutions, it cannot be said to have proved a failure. There are, in fact in Europe, many states provided with assemblies of the most liberal kind, where the principles of representative Government have by no means become so practically assimilated as in the Island Empire of Japan. We may on this connection p. int more especially to the dual, or rather multi- form, Empire of Austrin, where amid every circumstance making for success, and under the presidency of a sovereign who has thrown himself heart and soul into the con- stitutional movement, the various elements of which the ELipire consists have refused coalesce even in the most primitive de- tails. Austria is not alone in the inability of certain of its constituents to assimilate the true principle underlying all constitu- tional Government, namely that each consti- tuent must in turn understand that it does
lo
elements leading up to an incipient under and finding its occupant ill disposed to yield of the Chinese polity a very
standing of these principles appears from his prerogative have not scrupled to call to time to time even in so apparently unpro- their assistance all the powers of anarchy mising a field as China. In certain direc- and even rebellion. Hence the Emperor tions the system of co-operation has in China and the people have found a common inter- been well understood, and nowhere has the est. The first symptom of this common feel organisation of the guilds been carried to ing came from the small band of reformers" greater perfection or exercised more in- whom the Emperor summoned round him, fluence. Although this influence has too and his determination to throw himself on frequently been on the side of repression, his people was in many respects alike in its and often of alliance with the government inception to Earl SIMON's determination to when it sought to gain some end more than make his appeal to the Commons of Eng. usually oppressive to the nation at large, land, Without knowing enough of the at times the guilds have come between the constitutional history of England to under administration and the people at large, and stand precedent and its warning, instinct has prevented the commission of some great here pointed out to the Chinese people where political crime. This is ordinally the at- their best interests were concerned, and an titude of the guild when some local magis-appeal to the Emperor has been the natural trate attempts to go beyond the ordinary result. The Emperor led the way, and hal limits; when the organisation of the guild he been unhampered would by this time have and its position as the exponent of public found his people well on the road to a peace- opinion generally prevails to prevent the ful revolution. Unfortunately England, intended act of oppression coming off. In who from her own experience should have general politics the guilds from their re-known better, actually was foremost in the stricted horizons have never attempted to interfere with the government and a sort of a tacit truce seems to have existed, that in consideration of their remaining unmolested they should steer clear of any interference in the higher spheres of legislation.
.
Like everything else in China, the growth of the guilds has been in a measure stunted. With a capacity for expansion, and of play- ing a useful part in the administration they have remained an insignificant element; and the probable reason is the absence in China of any aristocratic body which might have formed the nucleus of & rallying ground where the first strivings of the nation would find an asylum.~ It was the fact that HENRY III, had been seeking to extend the regal power the COM the nobles as well
suppression of the new movement; and backed up with her influence the Palace intrigue, which hut for the part taken by Japan would have ended in the murder of the Emperor, and the immediate return of the Empire to Barbarism. But the people of China have not forgotten their Emperor, and their instinct has had a curious ex- position in a little incident t that occurred on the 15th ult. t Shanghai. The modified amount of f personal protection there afforded by the civic institutions of the place has led to the prevalence of gener- ally wider views on the part of the Chinese residents, who feel secure in uttering their political sentiments in a manner unknown elsewhere, even here in Hongkong. It is characteristic of the nation that although
ability for rule, and an indication that the inain want of the nation is now to be left to work out untrammelled its own transformation. There is little doubt that if once the general body of the Empire could be approached its first aim would be to rid itself of the incubus of its corrupt bureaucracy; and if the efforts of the for- eign Powers could be turned towards this end rather than in propping up the evil influences of Hsianfu, the return of China within the limits of civilisation would be a work to be as easily accomplished as the rebirth of Japan.
BRITAIN, GERMANY, AND RUSSIA.
(Daily Press, 30th March.) The German Emperor last January, on receipt of the news that his grandmother, Queen VICTORIA, was dangerously ill, hurried over to England, and was present at her death and funeral. There had always been an undercurrent of admiration amongst Englishmen for the Kaiser, who with all his faults was possessed of those two quali- ties most dear to Englishmen, personal pluck and independence of character; and when to this was joined the feeling of a common grief, all the foundation required to induce a feeling of personal friendship was laid. The personal affection of the rulers of the two countries had led to more intimate family relations, and as almost the only method of publicly showing the strictly private nature of these ties each monarch had conferred on the other those honorary distinctions which still are held to be within the personal gift of the head of the State. Following up the
~ monaity that led to the pro is the com- the want is felt of a general reform, this | King conferred on the Empero
cour
Earl SIMON feeling ia unaccompanied by any feeling of tesy rank of Field Marshal, and the per- making his appeal to the Commons, and disaffection. No more loyal subjects of the sonal courtesy was seconded by the whole
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.