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The Shantung Question

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 May 2017

Charles Burke Elliott
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Extract

In the great Province of Shantung lies the little village of Chefoo, the birthplace of Confucius, to which hundreds of thousands of Chinese make an annual pilgrimage. It is what Mecca is to the Mohammedan, Jerusalem to the Christian. Shantung is the Chinese sacred province, the place to be protected from foreign intrusion.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Journal of International Law , Volume 13 , Issue 4 , October 1919 , pp. 687 - 737
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of International Law 1919

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References

1 Hearings before the Senate Committee on foreign affairs. Statements of Dr. J. C. Ferguson, T. F. Millard, and C. F. Williams.

2 Senate Hearings, p. 549.

3 Ibid., pp. 531, 532.

4 Ibid., pp. 182, 531.

5 Statement of Ferguson,, J. C. Dr. official adviser to the President of China, to the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Senate Hearings, etc., pp. 565–6.Google Scholar

6 Included in the Report of the Committee, Sept. 10, 1919.

7 See also Congressional Record of Aug. 26, 1919.

7a See an article by J. T. Addison on The Value of Japanese Promises, in The New Republic, Sept. 17, 1919. Mr. Addison says: “Since the facts in this brief summary are all vouched for by Japan, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that Japan seldom, if ever, keeps important international promises. In telling America so frequently that she does keep her promises, she is relying not on historical facts, but solely on our national ignorance of Far Eastern politics.”

8 Art. 118.

9 Art. 119.

10 Art. 120.

11 Arts. 135, 136.

12 Art. 153.

13 Art. 144.

14 Art. 134.

15 Art. 128.

16 Art. 129.

17 Arts. 130, 132.

18 Art. 130.

19 Art. 133.

20 Dr. E. J. Dillon (The Eclipse of Russia, Chap. XIII) gives an interesting account of the way in which the Kaiser secured this promise as narrated to him by Count Witte. Count Mouravieff, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, told Witte that the German Emperor and the Czar at that time arranged between themselves for the seizure of Kiaochow by Germany and Port Arthur by Russia.

21 Prefatory Note to Dr. Tyau’s The Legal Obligations Arising out of Treaty Relations between China and Other States (1917).

22 Rockhill’s Treaties and Conventions With or Concerning China and Korea, 1894–1904; also printed in Senate Hearings, pp. 583–590.

23 “The translation of the Chinese text of the Treaty explicitly states that Germany promises forever—the two Chinese characters are Yung Yuan, which mean forever—promises forever never to transfer this lease to any other power.” J. C. Ferguson, Senate Hearings, p. 583.

24 Hornbeck, Contemporary Politics in the Far East, p. 298.

25 Hornbeck, Contemporary Politics in the Far East, p. 229.

25a Thayer’s Life and Letters of John Hay: Vol. 2, p. 242.Google Scholar “I was instructed,” says Dr. Andrew D. White, “to secure, if possible, the assent of the German Government, which after various conferences at the Foreign Office and communications with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, some more, some less satisfactory, I was at last able to do. The assent was given very guardedly, but not the less effectively. Its terms were that Germany, having been from the first in favor of equal rights to all nations in the trade of China would gladly acquiesce in the proposed declaration if the other powers concerned would do so. The Emperor William himself was even more open and direct than his minister. At a dinner to the Ambassadors, in the spring of 1900, he spoke to me very fully on the subject, and in a conversation which I have referred to elsewhere, assured me of his complete and hearty concurrence in the American policy, declaring. ‘We must stand together for the open door.’” Autobiography, Vol. 2, p. 158.

26 See Secretary Hay’s circular of July 3, 1900, the Root-Takahira Agreement of November 30, 1908, the Lansing-Ishii Agreement of November 6, 1917, the Anglo-Japanese Alliance Treaty of August 12, 1905, and July 3, 1911, the Franco-Japanese Arrangement of July 10, 1907, and the Convention between Japan and Russia of July 30, 1907.

27 Japan in Action, by Jeremiah W. Jenks, N. Am. Rev., Sept., 1919.

28 Millard, Democracy and the Eastern Question, p. 99.

29 Millard, Democracy and the Eastern Question, App., pp. 382–394. This official statement is printed in full in Senate Hearings, pp. 600–606.

29a For a critical study of these treaties see George Bronson Rea’s Pamphlet entitled Analysis of the China-Japanese Treaties; Hombeck’s Contemporary Politics in the Far East, Chap. XVII; Millard’s Our Eastern Question, Chaps. VIII and IX; Putnam Weale’s The Fight for the Republic of China, Chaps. VI and VII.

30 Senate Hearings, p. 528.

31 Ibid., p. 578.

32 Senate Hearings, p. 528.

33 Ibid., p. 579.

34 Cong. Record, July 25, 1919, p. 3304.

35 Senate Hearings, p. 193.

36 Ibid., p. 219.

37 Statement by Dr. J. W. Jenks, in the article entitled Japan in Action, N. Am. Rev., Sept., 1919.

38 Senate Hearings, p. 225.

39 Ibid., etc., pp. 223–224.

40 These dispatches were published by the revolutionary government of Russia.

40a Millard, Democracy and the Eastern Question, p. 82.

41 Hornbeck, Contemporary Politics in the Far East, p. 324.

42 Millard, Democracy and the Eastern Question, Appendix, p. 402.

43 Printed in full in Hearings of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, pp. 600–606.

44 Senate Hearings, pp. 520, 521. Prof. E. T. Williams, one of the American experts, gave the Senate Committee a statement in detail of what occurred in connection with the presentation of the Japanese demands. Senate Hearings, pp. 617–621.

45 Statements of President Wilson to Senate Committee, August 19, 1919, Hearings, etc., Pt. 10, pp. 520–524.

46 The statement of Viscount Uchida of August 2nd and that of President Wilson of August 6th appeared in the New York Times of August 7, 1919.

47 In reply to Mr. Matsuoka, the Chinese technical delegate, Mr. Cai-Chi Quo, issued a statement which shows very well the Chinese attitude toward Japan. Said Mr. Quo: “Frankly, China would prefer to have Germany in Shantung instead of Japan, if that were the only alternative, because Shantung is far removed from Germany, while in the hands of the Japanese there is added danger to China on account of Japan*#x2019;s already strongly fortified possessions in Corea and South Manchuria.—New York Times, Sept. 3, 1919. Mr. Matsuoka also states that the Shantung railway will be under Sino-Japanese management. But that is no gain for China, because the Shantung railway was under the joint ChineseGerman management and many Chinese were employed in the railway service, whereas now they have been almost entirely replaced by Japanese. If an international settlement is to be for the interests of all nations, as Mr. Matsuoka claims, it is well to bear in mind that only recently the American Standard Oil Company was compelled to sell out its premises in Tsingtao. We may also call attention to how Japan is operating in Manchuria against the open door policy and how in recent years in Manchuria American and European business firms had to close up their business. Just now she is trying to exclude that region and Mongolia from the new international consortium.—New York Herald, Sept. 6, 1919.

48 Senate Hearings, pp. 559–565. The territory selected “includes all the wharves and other port facilities, all of the railway terminals, the cable terminals, the central telegraph, telephone and post offices, the customs together with all the best business and governmental sites in Tsingtao.” Dr. J. W. Jenks, N. A. Rev., Sept., 1919, p. 321.