893.00/11–1646: Telegram
The Ambassador in China ( Stuart ) to the Secretary of State
[Received November 17—2:17 a.m.]
1892. National Assembly was convened November 15 at 10 a.m. with 1400 delegates present out of 2030. Present were Kmt22 representatives and 7 out of 9 non-partisan delegates to PCC.23 The other 2 refused to attend.
Proceedings consisted solely of election of oldest delegate as chairman, unanimous standing vote of respect to President of National Govt and speech by Gimo24 in which he reviewed history of constitutional assembly and called upon all delegates to draft and adopt a constitution calculated to advance the interests of the people of China. The meeting then adjourned until November 16, with the second session to undertake the work of organization. This meeting was subsequently postponed until November 18. During afternoon November 15 the Youth Party submitted its list of 120 delegates out of which the Gimo would select 100. It is still unclear whether other parties will participate.
Embassy’s Chinese legal adviser, who is delegate to Assembly representing the learned societies, states that a movement has developed in the Hunan delegation, of which he is also a member, to organize other delegations for support of a projected resolution in which the Assembly would declare its competence to draft, adopt and enforce any constitution it chooses and to declare itself absolved from any responsibility in connection with either the May 5 draft or the PCC draft. The legal adviser states that as far as he can determine, this movement is without Kmt inspiration but it seems to Embassy that obviously with the present setup no constitution can be adopted without Kmt approval.
General Chou En-lai25 called last evening to say goodbye indicating that he would put in a request today with General Marshall for transportation to Yenan. He reiterated that he was leaving Tung [Page 544] Pi-wu26 in his stead and expressed the hope that negotiations would not be broken off. Chou made his request to General Marshall this morning and will leave for Yenan November 18 or 19.
- Kuomintang.↩
- Political Consultative Conference.↩
- Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, President of the National Government of the Republic of China; for text of his address, see Department of State, United States Relations With China (Washington, Government Printing Office, 1949), p. 679.↩
- Head of the Chinese Communist delegation at Nanking.↩
- Member of the Chinese Communist Party delegation at Nanking.↩