After the Sino-Japanese War, what kind of political system to establish in China has been a focus of debate in modern China's national construction issues. From 1903 to 1907, after the ideological debate between revolutionaries and reformists, revolutionary ideas were widely disseminated. The establishment of a bourgeois republic directly became the goal of national political construction after the Revolution of 1911. However, judging from the practice of the Communist Party of China in the early Republic of China, not only did it experience two restorations, but the basic spirit of the Communist Party and the government was never truly implemented. The reasons for the failure of the Communist Party of China in the early Republic of China are quite complicated. A complete explanation would have to span hundreds of years of history and integrate social, political, economic, cultural and other factors. If we only look at the political reality at that time, the revolutionaries were consistent in the anti-Manchu revolution's goal of establishing a communist country, but they had different opinions on what kind of communist country to establish and how to establish it. * On the issue of peace, there is a lack of consistent and systematic theory. When the revolution came, the revolutionaries could not quickly organize a unified force on the issue of establishing a new political power, so they quickly split after the establishment of the political power. The establishment of a constitution is not credible, nor can peace be achieved with peace. All of these make the newly established Republic of China inevitably faced with difficulties in practice.

First of all, the people have no idea whether the newly established Republic of China will implement a constitutional monarchy or a political system. After the outbreak of the Revolution of 1911, revolutionaries quickly united with constitutionalists in various provinces to establish military governments, and representatives from various provinces jointly organized new governments and other matters were put on the agenda. Judging from the situation at that time, people still had two attitudes towards the nature of the new regime: constitutional monarchy and political harmony. The revolutionaries are the initiators and organizers of this new movement. In terms of the nature of the new regime, overthrowing the monarchy and establishing a republic is its undoubted goal. Many observers were surprised by the peculiarity of the Chinese revolution. How the monarchy that had been implemented in China for more than two thousand years collapsed overnight, and how a new republic of China could be established overnight. Although the reasons are complex, the major change in the position of the constitutionalists in the provincial consultative bureaus during this revolutionary process is undoubtedly a very key reason. One month after the revolution, Cheng Dequan, the governor of Jiangsu, and Tang Shouqian, the governor of Zhejiang, called the governor of Shanghai, Chen Qimei, and proposed that representatives from various provinces go to Shanghai to discuss the organization of an interim central government. The telegram stated at the beginning: "Since the Wuhan Uprising, all provinces have responded, and politics and politics have become recognized by public opinion across the country." Therefore, as far as independent provinces are concerned, the establishment of a revolution and government has become a general trend, which will inevitably affect Others are waiting to see the attitude of each province. On December 2, 1911, the Provincial Governor's Office Representative Conference resolved on the "Organizational Outline of the Provisional Government of the Republic of China", establishing in legal form the birth of the Communist Party and the government and the demise of the autocratic monarchy. After the North-South peace talks officially began, in addition to discussing the armistice issue, the two sides mainly debated the issue of state system, that is, whether to implement a constitutional monarchy or a democratic and peaceful peace in China. As for the revolutionaries, they have not made any concessions on the issue of state affairs. If the political consciousness of establishing a communist party and government is not reached, there will be no possibility of negotiation. Based on the facts at that time, the rapid establishment of the Kuomintang and the Kuomintang government was not only related to Yuan Shikai's own political speculation, but also the main reason was that a considerable number of constitutionalists turned to the Kuomintang and Kuomintang. As for why the constitutionalists quickly turned to support the Nationalist War, the general view is that part of them were extremely disappointed with the Qing government, and part of them was that the constitutionalists saw that the situation was like this. If they clung to the monarchy and the constitution, they would probably lose their place in the new regime in the future. . In fact, the establishment of the Nanjing Provisional Government showed that the constitutional monarchy plan was unlikely to be realized, and that democracy and political system had become a fact in China. The reality is that some important figures among the constitutionalists who still had hope for the constitutional monarchy, such as Zhang Jian, Liang Qichao and others, had to change their attitudes in order to seek to participate in the construction of the new regime. As the public opinion body of each province, the members of the Consultative Bureau are generally well-known people in society. They turn to sympathize with and support the revolution, and its impact on people's psychology can be imagined. When Sun Yat-sen and Yuan Shikai were handing over power, Liang Qichao published the famous "Principles for the Founding of China", affirming the significance of the Revolution of 1911 and proposing a plan for building a communist and political system. In this article, he once again emphasized that although the establishment of a federal government is inevitable, China's national conditions and customs are different from those of the United States. The federal government of the United States cannot be adopted, and a strong central government must be built; The United States' system of separation of powers is not suitable for China. China should imitate the British-style party cabinet. The writing of the "Principles for the Founding of China" marked Liang Qichao's transformation into a supporter of the Communist Party of China, and also became an important symbol of the constitutionalists' turn to support the Communist Party of China. It had a great influence at the time.

Despite this, we must not draw the conclusion that Japan and Japan have become the only political choice at this time. Take the negotiations between the North and the South at that time. Although the establishment of a communist republic was a non-negotiable goal for the revolutionaries, it was only a direct result of the revolutionary anti-manipulation movement. How firm the revolutionaries believed in democracy and the political system was still worth mentioning. Suspect. In addition to the political bargaining between the North and the South, there are also different opinions in the ideological circles on the understanding of democracy and the monarchy.

In the early days of the revolution, when the revolutionaries tried to suggest that Yuan Shikai "use the qualifications of Napoleon and Washington to build the achievements of Napoleon and Washington," Yuan Shikai was unmoved and sent his representatives to strongly state that the Communist Party and the political system were not suitable for China's national conditions. , retaining the Qing Dynasty and limiting the power of the monarch is the best guarantee to maintain the unity of the empire. A monarchy like the United Kingdom is the most stable government and a symbol of clean government. It is not credible that Yuan Shikai was in favor of a constitutional monarchy, but it is worth noting that his vision was consistent with that of a considerable number of conservative constitutionalists. After the Wuchang Uprising, Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao planned the overall situation, and the main purpose was still within the scope of constitutional monarchy. Liang Qichao said in a letter to Xu Fusu, "If the constitution is implemented and all political power is transferred to the Congress, the emperor will be nothing more than a useless person who sits on the cadres. The country's situation is established, and it has nothing to do with the big plan. How can he be abused in his future? ? "[1]

The constitutional monarchy is still regarded as the norm by him, but the name has changed slightly, and it is called the "Xujun ***he" system. It was not until the peace talks between the North and the South that Liang Qichao had no choice but to give up his ideal of constitutional monarchy and formally broke with Kang Youwei. The ultra-conservative constitutionalists, represented by Kang Youwei, strongly opposed the implementation of peace. There are other well-known and knowledgeable social sages and conservative constitutionalists who believe that constitutional monarchy is the most ideal political system, and Yan Fu is one of them. He wrote in a letter to the British "Times" reporter Morrison: "In my humble opinion, one thing is certain, that is, if they act rashly and go too far, China will enter a bad period from now on and become a The cause of the turmoil in the entire world. To put it bluntly, according to the current situation, China is not suitable for having a completely different and new form of government like the United States. The temperament and environment of the Chinese people will require at least 30 years of variation and assimilation. To make them suitable for the establishment of the Republic of China, which had been vigorously advocated by a few thoughtless revolutionaries such as Sun Yat-sen and others, but was rejected by anyone with a modicum of common sense. Therefore, according to civilization. According to the law of evolution, the best situation is to establish a higher-level government than the current one, that is, to retain the monarchy but subject to appropriate constitutional constraints. We should try to make this structure more flexible than in the past so that it can adapt to the environment and develop and progress. The regent could be deposed and, if expedient, the young emperor could be forced to abdicate and an adult member of the royal family be selected to take his place."

[2] Yuan Shikai, Kang Youwei, and Yan Fu belonged to different social groups, and their views were so close. It is not difficult to see that the monarchy system has a profound social foundation. The two restorations of the imperial system after the Republic of China cannot but be said to be related to this.

Secondly, the leaders and practitioners in the early Republic of China did not have a full and rational understanding of whether the newly established Communist Party and government would implement a presidential system or a cabinet system. The Communist Party and the government were established, and the issue of the form of government aroused debate again. The organizational form of the future national government is a very important and extremely complex issue. According to the program of the early revolutionaries, a strong military government should be established first, and then through military government and political training, constitutional government should finally be realized. At this time, there is no question of the presidential system and the cabinet system in the constitution. However, at this time, the revolutionaries had already put aside the revolutionary program. Even the constitutionalists were eager to realize the rapid realization of democracy and constitutionalism, and had no idea of ??the necessary process from autocracy to democracy and constitutionalism. Under the circumstances at that time, if constitutional monarchy was not considered, there were only two alternative political systems: an American-style presidential system and a French-style responsible cabinet system. Judging from the program of the revolutionary faction since the Tongmenghui, they basically accepted Sun Yat-sen's earlier view, that is, after the success of the revolution, a communist party and a government based on the United States will be established. However, when the revolutionary military government was established, disagreements arose within the revolutionary faction over the form of government organization, surrounding the presidential system and the cabinet system. Song Jiaoren proposed that the future form of government adopt a cabinet system. Sun Yat-sen firmly opposed it and advocated following the example of the United States in implementing a presidential system. It seemed at the time that the implementation of a presidential system would be more likely to win the approval of the majority of members of the Tongmenghui and would be in line with the wishes of the majority of people from other social strata and political factions. After the Wuchang Uprising, the "Notice on Organizing a National Conference", which advocated that "the system of the United States of America should be a model for our country in the future", received widespread response. Its 18 founders were Zhang Qian, Tang Shouqian, Yu Youren, Gao Mengdan and other influential people. The people are proof [3]. In order to maintain unity, Song Jiaoren and other opposition parties had to give up their ideas and stipulated in the "Provisional Government Organization Outline" that the Republic of China implement a presidential system. However, when Yuan Shikai became the provisional president in 1912, the revolutionaries hoped to use the law to restrain Yuan Shikai, so they made major changes to the organizational form of the government in the "Provisional Constitution" and transformed the American-style presidential system that the Nanjing Provisional Government had begun to implement. It is a French-style responsible cabinet system, and the president enjoys only virtual power.

The "Provisional Constitution"

stipulates that the "Republic of China" will implement a responsible cabinet system. The choice of this political system has obvious factors of "legislation based on people". The members of the Tongmenghui obviously lacked trust in Yuan Shikai, but they had to make concessions due to the huge disparity in power, so they had to make concessions while trying to take precautions. The first preventive measure was legislative reform, and the League members' majority in the Senate also provided convenient conditions for this policy. This is the reason why Sun Yat-sen and others had to violate the taboo of "legislating according to people" and resolutely change the political system. Judging from the motives of the revolutionaries, they certainly hoped to use the law to prevent Yuan Shikai from taking power and ensure the realization of the Republic of China.

However, this also set a bad precedent politically. That is, the establishment of the form of government organization was based on the understanding and motivations of the drafters of the Constitution at the time, which greatly weakened the authority of the form of government organization. From a deeper level, the statute is the fundamental law of the country and is related to the country's basic system. It should be carefully adopted based on national conditions, public opinion and social development trends, and should not be changed based on the temporary change of the top chief executive. The country is not a testing ground for politicians, and the political system does not allow for repeated chess games. Moreover, limiting the Yuan family's autocratic power must be backed by considerable political and military strength. It is nothing more than a childish idea to just ask the other side to abide by a piece of paper. Since there is no general political understanding of the form of political and political system, it is not a big deal to change the form of the country's political system at will. After Yuan Shikai came to power, he first changed the cabinet system to a presidential system, and then gave the president absolute power and implemented a lifelong tenure. This was not enough to arouse people's vigilance.

Finally, the "Provisional Constitution"

changed the already implemented presidential system to a cabinet system, resulting in defects in the national power structure system and the lack of corresponding political resource support for system operation. The content of the constitution can be changed at any time, but it is not easy to change the established system. The Nanjing Provisional Senate changed the presidential system to a cabinet system. While giving the cabinet administrative powers, it retained some of the powers enjoyed by the head of state under the presidential system. This resulted in unclear powers of the Presidential Office and the State Council, confusing the boundaries between the presidential system and the responsible cabinet system, and confusing the presidential system and the responsible cabinet system. The provisional government plan became a deformed political system. The "Provisional Law" reestablishes the "prime minister" in addition to the president, which is a sign of changing the presidential system to a cabinet system. However, this cabinet system is not complete. First, after the restructuring, it was not possible to determine which of the presidential office and the State Council was the highest administrative power center. This resulted in a government structure in which there were two administrative centers at the same time in the country. In the early Republic of China, there was a "war between the government and the government." " is an example of the above-mentioned structural defects of the government; the second is the failure to properly handle the relationship between legislation and administration when planning the structure of the government [4]. The most significant feature of the provisional statute is that it gives the legislative branch, the Senate, broad powers. However, when using legislative power to constrain executive power, it does not fully take into account the power boundaries between the various power agencies under the separation of powers system. This is mainly reflected in the setting of the "right of consent", that is, the provisional president's appointment of state ministers must obtain the consent of the Senate. In this way, the personnel power that should originally belong to the administrative side has been transferred to the legislative side to a considerable extent. The Western responsible cabinet system not only stipulates that the parliament can use a "vote of no confidence" in the government to force the collapse of the cabinet, but also stipulates that the executive head can exercise executive power completely independently and has the power to dissolve the National Assembly in accordance with the law and reopen the National Assembly within a time limit when necessary. The setting of the "right of consent" in the "Provisional Law" makes the actual power allocation of the government inconsistent with the theory of separation of powers and checks and balances advocated by the revolutionaries themselves. Not only does this not have the effect of restraining the executive head, but it gives people leverage and triggers fierce arguments from the opposition. They believe that this not only results in an abnormal power structure, which is difficult to establish in legal terms, but also makes the government lose the nature of an independent agency and cannot perform its functions. the performance it deserves.

Moreover, judging from the reasons why the revolutionaries changed the government system, they did not weigh the pros and cons of different representative government systems. They only saw the advantages of the cabinet system but failed to see the disadvantages and disadvantages of the cabinet system. insufficient. Song Jiaoren and the senators of the Nanjing Provisional Senate did not really have a thorough understanding of the national situation and current situation during the constitutional reform. The main reason why they advocated the responsible cabinet system was very clear: "If the cabinet is not good, it can be replaced, and the president can replace it." If it is not good, there will be no way to change it, and it will shake the foundation of the country. This is why we do not adopt a presidential system but a cabinet system." [5]

Obviously they are considering how to establish the system from a negative standpoint. , without considering from a positive and constructive standpoint what kind of political form is more suitable for China's stability and development. Even if we examine it from a negative standpoint, the views of Song Jiaoren and others may not be reasonable. A change in president may shake the country's foundation, but frequent changes in cabinets will not shake the country's foundation. Song Jiaoren's ideas took France's responsible cabinet system as a model. However, France was precisely the country with the most turbulent political situation among Western representative countries at that time. Judging from the practice of the responsible cabinet system in the early Republic of China, the idea of ??choosing a responsible cabinet system to avoid national instability is almost utopian. In the early years of the Republic of China, the cabinet started with Tang Shaoyi. Within six months, the prime minister changed three times, and the responsible cabinet system was never truly established.

More importantly, the framers of the "Provisional Law" changed the presidential system to a responsible cabinet system, but it seems that they did not fully consider the implementation conditions of the cabinet system. The responsible cabinet system is premised on the corresponding development of party politics. A mature responsible cabinet should be a party cabinet. The leaders of the political parties with a majority of seats in the parliament will come forward to form the cabinet. The change of the cabinet actually reflects the growth and decline of the party power in the parliament. change. Cabinet politics can only get on the right track when a country forms a relatively stable party competition mechanism. Judging from the development of political parties in China in the early years of the Republic of China, on the one hand, most Chinese people did not know what a political party was, and on the other hand, various associations and political parties among the intelligentsia were surging, and countless small parties were established. It was only when the confrontation between the two major political parties, the Chinese Kuomintang (mainly members of the Tongmenghui) and the Progressive Party (mainly composed of constitutionalists), took shape in the National Assembly that the atomic political party structure began to change.

But even so, China's party politics is still very immature. There are many contradictions within the parties and a lack of common political beliefs; externally, there is no spirit of tolerance for other parties and a broad social foundation. In this party system, it is impossible for the responsible cabinet system to function properly. “The conceptual ideals or special conditions required by the cabinet system almost do not exist in China” [6]. The presidential system and the cabinet system have their own advantages and disadvantages. The framers of the "Provisional Constitution" faced a dilemma when planning the political system: when considering the immediate, it is difficult to plan for the long term; when thinking about this, it is difficult to consider other aspects. In order to restrict Yuan Shikai, they chose the responsible cabinet system. However, they are really unable to create a head of state who rules from the top, so they have to seek a balance between the two political systems, hoping to take the best of both and discard the shortcomings. As a result, the political system and political system established by the Republic of China after Sun Yat-sen became a deformed political system that saw its disadvantages before reaping its benefits.

As mentioned above, the difficulties in the practice of the Communist Party of China in the early Republic of China were caused by many reasons. The above analysis is only a conclusion based on the reality at that time. Based on the entire process of modern China's political modernization, the reasons for the failure of political systems and political systems in practice have profound social backgrounds. Starting from the early Westernization Movement, Chinese intellectuals have understood Western culture from a specific perspective of how to save the nation. They noticed a certain aspect of the Western social system and responded to it. From a political perspective, the intellectual community paid attention to Western parliamentary systems in the early days, and later turned to constitutional monarchy and democratic peace. What they paid attention to was not the restrictions and constraints on government power behind these two systems, but the solution to China's problems. The utility of the problem. Therefore, when it comes to learning from the political systems of Western countries, most Chinese people have not fully considered the internal conditions required for foreign political systems to take root in China. After the founding of the Republic of China, Western political systems and political systems were copied, the Constitution was promulgated, and parliaments, cabinets, and courts were established. However, the necessary social, cultural, and psychological conditions for democracy and the country were not It cannot be copied overnight. The advanced political system is always ahead of the backward political culture. There is a huge gap between a small number of conscious elites and the vast unenlightened masses, which puts the political system and politics established by the Revolution of 1911 into a dilemma [7] . Judging from the political practice in the early Republic of China, democracy and constitutionalism lacked the support of modern legal culture, and "constitutionalism" was separated from the "constitution". The "Temporary Constitution" has an obvious "people-based" flavor, which violates the true spirit of constitutional government. However, the various political forces on the political stage have never truly relied on the Constitution to achieve balance of power and checks and balances. Traditional political authority still maintains the operation of politics, and the Constitution has become a dead letter in the political strife. Drastic social changes eliminated old political systems, while newly introduced systems were unable to be truly established and operate effectively due to lack of supporting conditions. Therefore, once faced with a turbulent situation, "the Western-style democratic system immediately proved to be too Western, too new and too weak to bear the heavy responsibility entrusted by the revolutionaries" [8], so that any political force can easily subvert it .