Dark Horse from Kwangsi

A fortnight ago, China's National Assembly overwhelmingly elected Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek President of China. Then they turned to the election of a Vice President. At first, everything was smooth as cream. At the Dragon Gate restaurant, delegates sipped tea with Candidate Sun Fo, whose father was Sun Yatsen, hero of the revolution, and who was second only to the Gimo in Kuomintang prestige. Four other aspirants were equally polite and formal.

Land to the Tillers. But not leathery General Li Tsung-jen, the dark horse from Kwangsi. He broke boldly with the Chinese custom of never praising oneself: "My election would symbolize the triumph of the common people." He boasted of his plebeian origin. As a farm boy he had tended water buffalo, plowed paddy fields, split kindling; so he understood the hardships of the peasants. "Without solving the peoples' livelihood," he declared, "all military ventures are doomed to failure." He urged "land to the tillers," an end to "bureaucratic capital," cleanup of corruption, more capable men in government, frank speaking to the Gimo.

Li was an outsider, not one of the Nanking inner circle like Sun Fo. Though he was famed as the Chinese commander who had smashed two Japanese divisions at the battle of Taierhchuang in 1938, he had had no active field command since V-J day. Obviously, he was not the Gimo's choice. There were roots of distrust reaching back to 1929 when Li led a brief defection of Kwangsi generals. But his strong words made him a rallying point for all the non-Communist dissatisfaction in China--intellectuals, army officers, northerners whose lands had been overrun by the Reds.

Even Kuomintang assemblymen found that they were not so interested in Li's past as in what he was saying about China today: "We must not hide China's sickness . . . What we need in the way of medicine is thoroughgoing reform."

The Strong Flood. Last week, after four rancorous ballots, Li won a clean victory. It had not been an amicable contest: at one point Li had withdrawn, charging that his supporters were being intimidated, had ordered a plane to take him to Peiping. But the Kuomintang high command had bethought itself; the Gimo had sent assurances that he stood for open competition. Scholarly Hu Shih, presiding over the Assembly that day, had reminded them: "The secret ballot is sufficient protection . . ."

When the results were announced (Li: 1,438; Sun Fo: 1,295), assemblymen went wild. They picked up smiling Madame Li, carried her shoulder-high. On the streets, where crowds had listened to the balloting at corner radios, firecrackers popped and crackled in celebration. The cheering throng surged to Li's headquarters, jubilantly hoisted the general aloft. Exulted a delegate: "Very good! We voted against the government!"

Said the new Vice President: "Public opinion is like a strong flood of rising water. No wall can hold it back for long." There was also another lesson: the Gimo's China allowed free elections.

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