Between the founding of the Chinese Communist Party in 1949 and the outbreak of the Cultural Revolution, Peking University had three presidents: Tang Youtong from April 1949 to September 1951, Ma Yinchu from September 1951 to 1960, and Lu Ping, the subsequent president. Under the rule of the Chinese Communist Party, they were not only unable to maintain the independent spirit of the university and the academic field, but they and their families also reaped the insults and even persecution of the Chinese Communist Party.
Above, Tang Youtong
Academic Achievements
Born in Gansu in 1893, Tang Youtong’s father, Tang Lin, was a late Qing dynasty scholar who devoted his Life to Chinese studies. One day, when Tang was three years old, he suddenly recited “Lamenting the South of the Yangtze River” word for word, to the great amazement of his father. As a result, he began his Education in his father’s teaching hall at an early age.
At the end of 1911, Tang Youtong was admitted to the Tsinghua Academy and graduated in 1916. Because he needed treatment for his trachoma, he was temporarily retained to teach Chinese and was also the chief editor of the Tsinghua Weekly. A year later, he went to the United States to study. During his study in the United States, he first received a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota, and then a master’s degree from Harvard University. During his Time at Harvard, he was known as one of the “Three Great Chinese Students at Harvard”, along with Wu Mi and Chen Yinqian, because of his outstanding talent.
In 1922, Tang returned to China and taught at the Department of Philosophy of Southeast University, the Department of Philosophy of Nankai University, the Department of Philosophy of Peking University, and the Department of Philosophy and Psychological Education of Southwest United University. In 1946, after the victory of the war, Peking University resumed classes in Beiping, and Tang began to serve as the dean of the Faculty of Arts.
In the history of modern Chinese scholarship, Tang is one of the few masters of Chinese studies who can integrate the East and the West, connect the Chinese and the Sanskrit, and meld the ancient and the modern. His masterpieces include A History of Buddhism in the Han, Wei, Jin and North and South Dynasties, A Brief History of Indian Philosophy, Essays on Metaphysics in the Wei and Jin Dynasties, and A History of Buddhism in the Sui and Tang Dynasties, which fill the gap in the academic field of the influence of Buddhism on China from the Han to the Wei, Jin and North and South Dynasties, and then to the Sui and Tang Dynasties.
In 1948, Academia Sinica elected the first class of 81 academicians, among whom 28 were members of the humanities group (including social sciences). Tang Youtong of Peking University, together with Jin Yuelin and Feng Youlan of Tsinghua University, were elected as members of the humanities group of Academia Sinica for their outstanding achievements in philosophical research. His scholarship is evident.
And all of these achievements of Tang Youtong were made before the establishment of the Chinese Communist Party. Tang’s son, the late professor Tang Yijie of Peking University, said in an interview that Tang’s academic achievements were mainly made before 1949, after which he did not write any decent academic works, but only occasionally wrote some small articles of testimony, and spent more time reading books, checking materials, and writing reading journals ……
Giving up the opportunity to stay in the United States and go to Taiwan
In 1947, Tang took advantage of his sabbatical to go to Berkeley University in California to lecture on the history of Chinese Buddhism for a year.
In December 1948, when the Kuomintang was in the midst of a civil war, Chiang Kai-shek sent a plane to Beiping to “rescue scholars from northern China”. Later, Hu Shih, who had left, also wrote to him to persuade him to go south and sent two air tickets, but Tang still chose to stay.
The years after a thought
After the Chinese Communist Party occupied Beiping, Tang was elected by the faculty and students to be the chairman of the Peking University Council (equivalent to the president) for the period from May 1949 to September 1951. Later, Ma Yinchu took over as president, and Peking University moved to Yan Yuan, while Tang served as vice president of Peking University in charge of infrastructure and finance, which was not related to his profession.
In 1954, Tang attended a meeting hosted by the People’s Daily to criticize Hu Shih and suffered a cerebral hemorrhage upon his return; he was bedridden for a long time afterwards and had no new academic achievements. In March 1964, he was hospitalized for a heart attack and died in May at the age of 71.
What Tang probably did not expect was that he would not be spared by the CCP even after his death. After the outbreak of the Cultural Revolution, he was labeled as a “bourgeois reactionary academic authority”. His daughter-in-law, Tang Yijie’s wife, Le Dayun, wrote in one of her articles, “I am really glad from the bottom of my heart that he left this world that he could not understand in 1964.”
Indeed, if Tang had lived through the Cultural Revolution, he would have avoided the fate of being raided and whipped by the Red Guards.
Son Tang Yijie’s Cultural Revolution encounter and self-blame
According to the article “The Fate of Three Generations of Tang Yijie’s Family of Intellectuals under the 2015 Confucian Family Tradition” published in the year of Xinjing Daily on the mainland, Tang Yijie was a junior high school student in the spring of 1943 at the Southwest Union High School when he read “A Journey to the West” written by the American journalist Snow. Although he and his classmates did not know anything about “revolution”, they thought that Yan’an must be very interesting, so they went to Yan’an secretly. After being taken back to Kunming by the director of education, Tang Tong did not blame Tang Yijie, but wrote a letter to the principal with several Parents, “to criticize the United University High School”.
Years later, talking about this experience, Tang Yisuke said, “It was because I did not go into Yan’an that I had the opportunity to study at Peking University and to meet Le Daiyun at Peking University, and we were able to bond together ……”
In 1947, Tang Yisuke enrolled in the philosophy department of Peking University and graduated in 1951, during which he joined the Chinese Communist Party and began to embrace Marxism-Leninism. After graduation, he married his classmate Le Dayun and stayed on to teach at the university. According to Tang Yisuke, “Life gave me the illusion that the door to ‘truth’ was wide open, a flat and straight avenue, and that almost anyone could grasp the truth if you were familiar with the dogmas imported from the former Soviet Union.”
During the 1957 anti-rightist period, Le Dayun was branded as a “far-rightist” and Tang Yijie received a certain shock. After the Cultural Revolution began, Le Dayun became a “rightist” and Tang Yijie a “capitalist gangster,” and was suspended from classes, and in addition to being criticized, he had to work on campus every day, pulling weeds in the square or sweeping the roads. After that, he and Le Dayun and his son Tang Shuang, together with more than 2,000 employees of Peking University, were sent down to work in the Jiangxi Liyu Zhou May 7 Cadre School.
Under the brainwashing of the Chinese Communist Party, Tang and his wife had sincerely supported the Cultural Revolution. According to their recollection, Tang Yijie “sincerely believed that he had made a serious mistake” and was on the opposite side of the revolutionary line; Le Dayun wrote, “We really rejoiced at this ‘revolution’ from the bottom of our hearts. “
However, the reality is cruel. During the Cultural Revolution, Tang Yijie’s collection of Buddhist scriptures was pulled out one copy of each letter for inspection, with no return. At the most embarrassing time of the decade, Tang Yijie sold a set of the Wuyingdian edition of the Quan Tang text given to him by his father for six hundred yuan. Under such circumstances, it was impossible to do any study.
In 1973, a storm of “Anti-Rightist Reversal” arose, and Tang Yijie was worried about being criticized again, just when the relevant departments of Peking University wanted to transfer some faculty members who were “familiar with the ways of Confucius and Mencius” to the “Great Criticism Group of Peking University and Tsinghua University”. “He was “happy” to join the group. Unexpectedly, he fell into the abyss of the “Liang Effect” which had a very bad reputation. In the “Liang Effect” Great Criticism Group, Tang Yijie worked very hard, including the book “Lin Biao and the Way of Confucius and Mencius”, which he and another scholar, Monday Liang, wrote. “Following” and “pandering” became the only choice for the members of the group.
After Mao’s death and the end of the Cultural Revolution, the Gang of Four was arrested and Tang Yijie, who was held hostage by politics, was endlessly censored. In his posthumous book “Three Generations of Us,” he begins by saying that he “cannot forgive himself,” and goes on to tell the details in 12,000 words for the first time, surprising even Le Dayun.
Perhaps because he had seen through the Chinese Communist Party, the “enlightened” Tang Yijie “no longer said those words against his heart” and tried to “restore the backbone of intellectuals”. In Yuan Weishi’s view, the opening of the Chinese Culture Institute in the 1980s marked the awakening of Tang Yijie’s ego. In his later years, Tang Yijie was most involved in the compilation of the Confucian Collection.
In September 2014, Tang Yijie passed away. According to scholar Zhao Baisheng, “Yang Mo’s (son) also wrote Confessions, but it was Tang Yijie who really managed to do so, daring to shake out the loneliness of his family.”
Zhong, Ma Yinchu
The experience of Ma Yinchu, born in 1882, epitomizes that of many intellectuals of that era: studying in a new-style school, studying in the United States, serving in the Nationalist government, teaching at a university, and choosing to serve the Chinese Communist Party after its establishment, only to be tragically criticized. Compared with many intellectuals with similar experiences, Ma Yinchu was fortunate: despite the criticism, he did not suffer much due to his background and influence as a democrat and the scruples of the Chinese Communist Party, so he lived to the age of 99.
Advocating “population control
As an economist, why was Ma Yinchu criticized? It starts with his theory of population control.
In 1951, Ma Yinchu became the president of Peking University, and in 1953, the first census in the history of mainland China was conducted, which showed that the population of China was 60,938,035 as of June 30, 1953, and was estimated to increase by 12 to 13 million people per year, with an increase rate of 20 per 1,000. This census aroused Ma Yinchu’s suspicion that this sampling method could not truly reflect the true growth of the population.
So, Ma Yinchu spent three years on the survey and found that the actual growth rate of China’s population was 22‰ per year, and in some places it was 30‰. Such a high growth rate would likely lead to a Food shortage in China 50 years later. Ma Yinchu wrote his research results in an article entitled “Population Control and Scientific Research” and read it at the Second Session of the First National People’s Congress held in July 1955, but many people expressed their opposition.
In February 1957, at the eleventh (enlarged) session of the Supreme State Council, Ma Yinchu once again expressed his views on the issue of “population control” and put forward the idea of family planning. Ma Yinchu’s ideas were appreciated by Mao Zedong.
In March, at the Third Session of the Second National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, Shao Lizi, who supported Ma Yinchu, made a lengthy speech on family planning. He proposed to amend Article 4 of the Marriage Law, which states that “a man may marry at the age of 20 and a woman at the age of 18,” and advocated raising the marriage age and promoting late marriage. He also advocated that birth control be vigorously promoted in rural areas.
Shao Lizi’s speech was strongly endorsed by Ma Yinchu, who, however, insisted on opposing abortion. He believed that there was a better way than abortion. It is “better for a couple to have only two children, and to reward parents with only two children, while parents with more than two children should be taxed”.
On April 27, Ma Yinchu gave a speech on population at Peking University, and in June, at the Fourth Session of the First National People’s Congress, Ma Yinchu presented his “New Population Theory”. Based on the statistics of population trends in the early 1950s, he judged that high population growth was not conducive to the future development of China. Therefore, he suggested that the government should control the fertility rate.
The “New Population Theory” was criticized
However, the “Anti-Rightist” campaign launched by Mao was in full swing at this time. Ma Yinchu’s “New Population Theory” was also criticized, and some said it was an attack on the Party by the rightists. This overwhelmed Ma Yinchu, who believed that the top echelon of the Communist Party agreed to control the population.
In early 1958, the CPC Central Committee made the strategic decision of the “Comprehensive Great Leap Forward”, hoping to promote industrial and agricultural development. In Mao’s and the CCP’s view, China’s economy would grow by leaps and bounds as long as it took advantage of its large population and mobilized the people, especially the peasants. Mao once said, “Now it seems that it doesn’t matter to engage a population of more than a billion people.” In this way, Ma Yinchu’s advocacy of population control began to be criticized from the top, and encouraging more births replaced population control. For example, Chen Boda, at a conference held by Peking University to celebrate its 60th anniversary, said by name, “Ma Lao is going to do a check on the New Theory of Population.” Liu Shaoqi also criticized Ma Yinchu without naming him when he made a report at the Second Session of the Eighth Chinese Communist Party.
On July 9, when Mao summoned Shao Lizi and others, Shao still wanted Mao to support birth control, but Mao said, “The population problem, which is not serious yet, can reach 800 million before talking about overpopulation.” But then copped a sentence: “But for family planning, should still be implemented.”
In this regard, Ma Yinchu was not convinced, he decided that his theory is correct, so on May 9 and July 24-31 of that year in the “Guangming Daily” published two articles, “talk again about my theory of balance in the ‘regimentation’ theory” and “talk again about the theory of balance and regimentation”.
After the Lushan Conference in 1959, the whole country once again set off a climax of criticism of the right. Zhou Enlai specially asked Ma Yinchu to have a talk, advised Ma Yinchu not to be too stubborn, look at the big picture, or write a review good. However, Ma Yinchu still did not admit that his theory was wrong, but refuted the articles criticizing him one by one, and wrote an article of more than 50,000 words, “My Philosophical Thought and Economic Theory”, and asked the editorial office of the magazine “New Construction” to publish it publicly.
After receiving Ma Yinchu’s manuscript, the magazine did not dare to take the initiative, so it was submitted to the Propaganda Department of the CPC Central Committee and the Central Theory Group for review. Kang Sheng, who was then the head of the Central Theory Group, was known for his ability to “fix people”, and on the one hand, he asked the editorial board to publish Ma Yinchu’s article, and on the other hand, he quickly deployed a comprehensive criticism of him. Not only the newspaper criticism, Peking University also organized a “criticism of Ma” symposium.
One day, Kang Sheng personally to the Peking University symposium site, heard the speakers can not hit the nail on the head, so interrupted others to say: “Ma Yinchu once said that some people say he is a Malthusian, but he disagreed. He said that Malthus was a Marxist and Marx was also a Marxist, while he was a Marxian Marxist. I think it is time to clarify this issue. I think Ma Yinchu’s New Population Theory belongs, without any doubt, to Malthus’s Ma family.”
Under the direct command of Kang Sheng, the siege of Ma Yinchu was set off at Peking University. Large-character posters covered the campus of Peking University, and even Ma Yinchu’s residence, No. 36 Yanangyuan, was plastered with large-character posters. The criticism of the whole university was continuous, the language became more and more violent, and the labels became bigger and bigger. The core of the criticism was that “Ma Yinchu’s new theory is derived from Malthusian population theory, which is a doubt of the superiority of socialism and a contempt for the people”.
Resigning from his job and staying at Home
Under this stormy criticism from all over the country, Ma Yinchu did not compromise. He made his attitude clear in his article: “Although I am nearly 80 years old, I know that I am outnumbered, so I will fight alone until I die in battle, and will never surrender to the critics who use force to subdue but not reason to convince!”
However, Ma Yinchu had to report his resignation as president of Peking University in January 1960, and it was approved. Subsequently, he was removed from the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, leaving only the name of a member of the Standing Committee of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference. In addition, he was deprived of the right to publish articles. Ma Yinchu has been idle at home ever since, and his inner anguish can be imagined.
The uncontrolled population of China grew rapidly within a few years, like a wild horse off the reins. The Chinese Communist Party was forced to propose a “family planning” policy, which proved that Ma’s theory was correct.
Keeping the Bones of the Cultural Revolution
According to an article in the 4th issue of 2009 of the mainland’s “Together in the Same Boat”, after the outbreak of the Cultural Revolution, one of Ma Yinchu’s handymen also wore “Red Guard” armbands and one day suddenly called out to him, “I want to revolt against you”. Although Ma Yinchu was a bit taken by surprise, but no sense of fear, just coldly look at each other, not a word.
This handyman continued to threaten Ma Yinchu: “Ma Yinchu you listen: you are the old cow ghosts and snake gods, from now on you have to listen to my command! If you dare to disobey, I will not spare you.” Ma Yinchu was not moved by it, but continued to do as he pleased.
Conclusion
In 1979, after the end of the Cultural Revolution, the Chinese Communist Party made a formal apology to Ma Yinchu, who became honorary president of Peking University in September of the same year, and died on May 10, 1982. Ma Yinchu’s life passed quietly because a correct theory was not allowed in an authoritarian society.
Next, Lu Ping
Joined Peking University
Born in Changchun, Jilin Province, Lu Ping joined the Chinese Communist Party in 1933 and studied at the Education Department of Peking University from 1934 to 1937. After the establishment of the Chinese Communist Party, he served as a member of the Standing Committee of the CPC Songjiang Provincial Committee and Vice Minister of the Ministry of Railways, etc. From October 1957 to March 1960, he served as Vice President of Peking University, and from November 1957, he was the First Secretary of the Party Committee of Peking University. In 1960, after President Ma Yinchu was criticized and forced to resign, Lu Ping also served as President until June 1966.
An interview with Lu Ying, Lu Ping’s daughter, was published in the China Reading News, in which the criticism of Ma Yinchu was mentioned. It was disclosed that the criticism was personally named by Mao Zedong, and the focus was on Ma Yinchu’s “regimentation” and his population theory. Lu Ping said in the Central Propaganda Department that Ma Yinchu was the president of Peking University and a democrat, so it was inappropriate for the party committee of Peking University to criticize him. For this reason he was also criticized, but in the end there was no university-wide criticism, only in the department by the Peking University Mao Thought Study and Research Association meeting to criticize.
Wang Zeng Yu, who graduated from the history department of Peking University, mentions in his article “Beloved Principal Ma and Pathetic Lu Ping” (from the book “When We Were Young – Memoirs of Alumni of the History Department of Peking University”) such an incident: After Lu Ping came to Peking University to continue the anti-rightist tendency, under the pressure, he added a large number of new delineations “rightists” and pointed the finger at Zou Lufeng, then vice president of Peking University. It turned out that Lu Ping and Zou Lufeng, in order to cooperate with the Great Leap Forward, had sent the graduating class of the law department to organize an investigation team, and the conclusion of the investigation report turned out to be consistent with Peng Dehuai. The anti-Rightist movement began, Lu Ping put the blame for the rightist movement of the investigation team to Zou Lufeng, the result of the hard whole Zou Lufeng suicide.
According to Wang Zeng Yu, they all had ill feelings towards Lu Ping at this stage of Peking University, because he had harmed many innocent people and delayed many people’s studies.
Inhuman abuse during the Cultural Revolution
Lu Ping, who had harmed Peking University students and teachers in the anti-rightist movement, eventually did not escape the Cultural Revolution. On June 1, 1966, after the outbreak of the Cultural Revolution, a large-character poster entitled “What did Song Shuo, Lu Ping and Peng Peiyun do” was posted in the dining hall of Peking University by Nie Yuanzi and seven other people, accusing the three of them, among whom Song Shuo was the deputy minister of the University Department of the Beijing Municipal Committee and Peng Peiyun was the deputy secretary of the Party Committee of Peking University. Once the large-character poster was posted, the whole university was sensationalized.
That night, Lu Ping held a university-wide conference to emphasize the difference between inside and outside. However, soon after, Mao ordered the Central Broadcasting Station to broadcast the full text of the big-character poster, which was behind Mao’s plan to bring down Liu Shaoqi and others. After the broadcast of the big-character poster, Peking University was shocked and the whole country was shocked. Many teachers and students who had taken a wait-and-see attitude toward the big-character poster and many who held opposing views quickly changed their attitude and supported the big-character poster.
Immediately afterwards, the People’s Daily published a commentator’s article, “Hailing a Large Character Poster at Peking University,” claiming that “Peking University, which had been held by Lu Ping, Peng Yun and others for many years, was an important stronghold of the ‘Three Villages’ gang, and a stubborn bastion of their anti-Party and anti-socialist activities. At this point, the fate of Lu and the others was sealed.
According to Lu Ying’s recollection, on the 2nd, which happened to be a Saturday, she and Lu Wei, Lu Zheng, and Lu Yun returned home from school respectively. At this time, outside the courtyard wall of Peking University’s Ice Cellar No. 11, there were three layers of students and people who came to “understand the situation of Peking University”, and many people were angrily chanting the slogan “Down with Lu Ping”. That night, there were also high school students jumped the wall into the courtyard wall mezzanine, banging on the doors and windows towards the wall, shouting “gangster Lu Ping come out”!
The next day, Lu Ping was taken away. Lu Ying revealed that Lu Ping was hung up in the biology building and beaten so badly that he was beaten to the point of incontinence. In addition, he was also not allowed to sleep for many days, and a strong light bulb was used to shine in his eyes. Later, Lu Ping was criticized at a meeting of 100,000 people held at the Workers’ Stadium, with a big sign on his chest and a “jet plane”. In addition to being continuously criticized, Lu Ping had to work on the campus to weed and clean up garbage and other jobs. After that, Lu Ping was sent to Jiangxi farm for two years of labor reform.
Naturally, Lu’s family was also implicated, and his wife became a hardened member who “could not draw the line at counter-revolutionaries” and was isolated and censored. His son Lu Zheng was also criticized by his classmates, and he was “tied up with wire, put into a sack and pulled away in a wagon,” and suffered a concussion. The eldest daughter, Lu Wei, went on a one-month trek to Jiangxian County, Shanxi Province, to join the army, and the second daughter, Lu Ying, went to Yunnan Province to join the army. The family was left with the youngest daughter, Lu Yun, who was 10 years old and was pushed out of school.
After the end of the Cultural Revolution, Lu Ping was “rehabilitated”, but he could not go to Peking University for many years because “I felt bad when I saw Wiming Lake, a place where I was beaten and criticized”.
Conclusion
The experiences of Tang Youtong, Ma Yinchu and Lu Ping, who were the presidents of Peking University, once again tell us that all universities under the rule of the Chinese Communist Party have long lost their independent spirit and have become the vassals of the Chinese Communist Party. The only way to resurrect the spirit of Peking University is to wait until the day of the CCP’s demise!
Recent Comments