RE-INVENTING THE MODERN CHINESE POLICE FORCE

The first effort in organizing a modern police force in China took place in 1898 during the Hundred Days Reform. By 1901, orders were issued by the imperial court to governors and viceroys to establish “police brigades” in each province.Footnote ⁷ Viceroy Yuan Shikai immediately saw the benefits of the Western or Japanese model of the police system and brought it into practice in Beijing and Tianjin in 1902. The model “provided a means of formally centralizing or integrating the political system, bypassing locally entrenched officials to connect directly with the vast, scattered, rural population of China.”Footnote ⁸ In Guangdong, a Central Police Bureau (Xunzheng Zongju 巡政總局) was established in Guangzhou in January 1903 and policemen began to patrol the city the following March.Footnote ⁹ By 1906, Guangzhou had twenty-eight precinct stations and in the same year, various Guangdong counties began to establish their first police forces.Footnote ¹⁰ Some positive perceptions were found in the municipal police forces when they were newly established. Beijing achieved a well-trained police force, and by the second and third decades of the twentieth century, the city earned the distinction of being “one of the best-policed cities in the world.”Footnote ¹¹ Tianjin's new police successfully brought law and order to the city, and its police academy became the training center for police personnel throughout north China.Footnote ¹² In Sichuan, the Chengdu police force also found acceptance within large sectors of the community and built a reputation for self-discipline and public service.Footnote ¹³

The big cities of Beijing, Tianjin and Chengdu offer examples of success but those at the county level provide a different story. Kristin Stapleton tells us that “the ‘official mind’ had not yet been fully seduced by the new Western principles of centralization – specialization and professionalization of low-level bureaucrats and close surveillance… .”Footnote ¹⁴ County magistrates made decisions outside the legal boundary of the central government. Although magistrates formulated rules to control policemen, these rules were not consistently implemented. Policemen who were not permitted to make an arrest or search for stolen goods without a warrant were sometimes rewarded for their hard work in the form of warrants which might be used as means of extortion. According to Ch'ü T'ung-tzu, this practice was not unusual.Footnote ¹⁵ Police reports of thirty-one counties in Sichuan in 1908 claimed that only eight counties were judged to have fairly acceptable forces. The others either had too few policemen or were seriously undisciplined. They kept prostitutes, falsely accused people of crimes in order to extort money and many merely served as bodyguards for the county magistrate.Footnote ¹⁶ These statements and examples suggest that the county governments in the Qing dynasty were not quite ready for a modern police system.

The absence of the principles of centralization and the approval of extortion were perplexing problems for modernization, and the collection of customary fees was also a Chinese traditional administrative practice that was very different from the Western model. In the Qing dynasty, customary fees were collected to help cover administrative expenses. Many Qing essayists were opposed to their collection because they were immoral and harmful to the commoners. Other writers maintained that salary paid to government officials was inadequate so they had no choice but to collect customary fees. The problem about customary fees was their ambiguity. They were not properly distinguished from corruption and were neither formally approved nor prohibited.Footnote ¹⁷ As we shall see later, this old Chinese problem was carried forward to Republican Zhongshan.

While the concept of modern police forces in Yuan Shikai's time was closely related to reforming local governments and local society, the Nationalist government's concept of a modern police system was rather different. They required the police forces to consider themselves part of a nationwide police system; they were an instrument of national ruling power. They were the state, at least as far as governing the street and neighborhood were concerned.Footnote ¹⁸ Now back in Guangdong, the authorities made a considerable effort to build a reputation for self-discipline and public service. They named the police “the police of the people” (renmin de jingcha 人民的警察).Footnote ¹⁹ Along with their duty to guarantee public security, the police were also entrusted with the task of encouraging citizens' morality. Police cadets were expected to become “tutors of society” (shehui daoshi 社會導師).Footnote ²⁰

To make an ideal modern police force, against the old practice of court officers who extorted and collected customary fees, the Nationalist authorities were aware that it was important to pay policemen regularly and adequately.Footnote ²¹ When salaries were low due to budgetary problems, the police chief had to remind policemen to pay attention to discipline,Footnote ²² implying that the collection of customary fees and extortion were not allowed. The Wang Jingwei government too was aware that police discipline and salary were closely related. While visiting the Guangdong Police Academy (Guangdong Jingguan Xuexiao 廣東警官學校) in Guangzhou in 1941, the secretary of the Executive Yuan, Chen Chunpu 陳春圃 (1900–1966) told the cadets that the government was in “extraordinary times” (feichang shiqi 非常時期) when the fiscal budget was extremely tight so that their salary had to be limited. Chen reminded the cadets that the police force was the government department that had the most interaction with civilians. For the sake of people's livelihoods, it was most crucial for policemen not to act like Qing officials who were corrupt and oppressed the public.Footnote ²³

In order to ensure the quality of policemen, the Nationalist government required constables to be recruited from ordinary upright families, and they had to have a minimum of six years of primary school education. Recruits ranged between twenty-three and twenty-six years of age and were at least five feet two inches tall and physically and mentally healthy. They had to undergo a six-month training program offered by the Police Academy (Jingshi Jiaoliansuo 警士教練所) supported by the county or municipal government. Police cadets were taught Republican law, policemen's appropriate manners, administrative and judiciary procedures, public health practices and so on, and had to pass an exam before becoming police constables.Footnote ²⁴

So the plans and targets were set, but what was the making of a modern police force like in a Republican county such as Zhongshan?

Like the big cities of Beijing, Chengdu and Guangzhou, Zhongshan established its own police force at a very early date. The number of police stations and policemen suggest that it was expanding rather rapidly over the years. In 1906, the Guangdong provincial government required all counties to establish their own police forces. By 1910, Zhongshan had eleven police stations and 150 policemen. Among these police stations, seven were located in Shiqi town (Shiqizhen 石岐鎮), the county capital. The other four were located each in one town. Villages did not have police stations.Footnote ²⁵ By 1934, there were forty-five police stations all over Zhongshan with 950 constables and sergeants.Footnote ²⁶ In 1947, there were thirty-five police stations and ninety-seven precinct stations,Footnote ²⁷ and figures in 1948 show that there were 1,013 policemen.Footnote ²⁸

Sergeants in Zhongshan were well trained. They were normally promoted from outstanding constables who would first become trainee-sergeants in the Guangdong Police Academy (Guangdongsheng Jingcha Xuexiao 廣東省警察學校), in Guangzhou before they passed another examination.Footnote ²⁹ Trained sergeants were assigned to various Guangdong counties and cities depending on the funds available for policing and the need for sergeants in the locality.Footnote ³⁰ For instance, in 1948, after graduating from the Academy, eight non-Zhongshanese sergeants were transferred to work in one of the Zhongshan police stations.Footnote ³¹

Some highly educated inspectors of police were found in Zhongshan too. Out of four inspectors employed in the Zhongshan police headquarters in Shiqi in 1945, two graduated from military academies and two were university graduates. One of them was inspector Yu Bingnan 余炳楠, age thirty-four. Yu was a Zhongshanese and had graduated from St. John's University in Shanghai with a Bachelor's Degree in Engineering. Before working as an inspector in Zhongshan, he had been teaching in a high school in Macau.Footnote ³² The other inspector was Yang Ruisheng 楊瑞生, then aged thirty, who graduated from Wuchang Huazhong University (Wuchang Huazhong Daxue 武昌華中大學) in Hubei and had been working in the Product Inspection Bureau (Shangpin Jianyanju 商品檢驗局) of Hankou.Footnote ³³ Besides these inspectors, Gao Bao 高苞, 34, the head of Shaxi Police Station (Shaxi Jingchaju 沙溪警察局), earned a Bachelor's degree in Politics from Guangzhou University before returning to Zhongshan.Footnote ³⁴

However, in the rush to expand its police forces, the Zhongshan authorities set aside some of the training requirements imposed by Nanjing. Supplementary evidence suggests that constable training in Zhongshan did not last for six months. During the nine months between September 1931 and June 1932, there were three batches of graduates from the Zhongshan police academy, so it might be inferred that each batch of cadets was trained for only three months.Footnote ³⁵ Age requirements were also not met. There were policemen in Zhongshan who were as young as sixteen years old. Jiangweitou precinct station (Jiangweitou Jingsuo 江尾頭警所), for example, had two sergeants, aged thirty-two and twenty-nine years old, but there were nineteen constables who were aged between sixteen and forty.Footnote ³⁶ Huangpu precinct station (Huangpu Jingsuo 黃圃警所) had two sergeants, aged forty and forty-one, but fourteen constables between twenty and forty-five years old.Footnote ³⁷ Besides being a model county where there was a rapid need to expand its police forces, there were other possible reasons to explain these half-measures. First, full-course training was too expensive for the county. Magistrate Huang Suju 黃素居 mentioned that due to budgetary problems, some constables in various precinct stations in Zhongshan were not trained at all.Footnote ³⁸ As we shall see later in this article, the budget was so tight in some police stations that paying salaries was unaffordable. A possible reason for precinct stations to recruit under-aged policemen is that the county lacked Zhongshanese men of working age. This is not surprising because around one-seventh of the Zhongshan population, all of whom were adult males, had gone overseas. Police offices that had to compete with both the domestic and overseas job markets would find it difficult to recruit the best people. Furthermore, according to the Guangdong Police Academy, the fiscal budget was tight and they were unable to offer attractive salaries for the most suitable police candidates.Footnote ³⁹ If that was not a nationwide phenomenon, it was at least a provincial problem.

After the Nanjing government was established in 1928, they gradually standardized the structure of local governments. Like other counties, the Zhongshan County Public Security Bureau (Zhongshanxian Gong'anju 中山縣公安局) was incorporated into one of the four bureaus directly under the supervision of the county magistrate. Below the Public Security Bureau, there were five departments each assigned specific duties.Footnote ⁴⁰

The government structure was designed in such a way that a vast variety of law enforcement and public work was assigned to the Public Security Bureau. This suggests that the government was allowing policemen to permeate society and play a prominent and influential role in the everyday life of the common people. In practice, policemen not only patrolled the streets, maintained social order and prevented crime, but since the Health Department was under the Bureau, they also managed sanitary problems, licensed Western and traditional Chinese doctors, and monitored epidemic prevention. To investigate and arrest opium users was also their particular duty. Furthermore, the policemen in the Administration Department of the Bureau were responsible for fire prevention, enforcing business regulations and closing unlicensed businesses. No wonder, then, when a rickshaw puller in Beijing was asked what the national government was, he responded, “the public security bureau.”Footnote ⁴¹

After a few months of training, if there was any, that is, the Zhongshanese police constables, some of whom were under age, were given enormous powers and responsibility. The local government was clear that they had to invite people of “good quality” in the first place. In 1932, magistrate Tang Xiaoyi issued a decree to village offices ordering them to recommend one or two eligible people to attend the entrance examination for the Zhongshan police academy.Footnote ⁴² This was followed by a sequence of police training that was intensively designed to teach policemen the proper way of coping with everyday matters on the streets. Magistrate Yang Ziyi prepared a list that he named the Police Services Guidelines (Jingcha fuwu xuzhi 警察服務須知) in 1936.Footnote ⁴³ For the first time, standards that taught Zhongshanese policemen to perform and serve as civil servants were formally recorded on paper. The Guidelines required policemen not only to stop any threats to public order in the form of criminal activities but also to act as a moral example. It reminded policemen that corruption and unnecessary use of violence were serious offenses. Policemen were instructed to be kind, ideally, and to give help whenever they could. To show kindness, as the Guideline requires, policemen should answer civilians' inquiries politely. If policemen found rowdies on the streets, policemen should quiet them courteously.

Nanjing successfully unified the structure at various levels of government. The roles and targets of government departments were also brought into line. From central to local, the authorities had common expectations of what was needed to maintain a modern police force. New standards for police were created, policemen in training were taught not only to maintain public order but also to work as civil servants for the people and, above all else, to act as moral exemplars. Nevertheless, hidden anxiety was there in the county. Training for Zhongshan policemen was shorter than the time period required by the central government; some policemen were not trained at all; and some did not meet the age requirements. With this first glimpse, we are seeing the fact that the problems found in the Qing police administrative system as stated by Kristin Stapleton were also found in Republican Zhongshan, that is, the effort to standardize police administration succeeded in forcing localities to adopt centrally-drafted regulations and terminology but did not result in direct central supervision of the local police.Footnote ⁴⁴

LAWS AND REGULATIONS AGAINST LAW-BREAKING AND MISBEHAVING POLICEMEN

To make a police force that was modern, the Zhongshan government exerted itself both in eliminating undisciplined policemen and corruption, and in preventing the solicitation of bribes. At times when they believed it was necessary, Zhongshan even went beyond the Republican code in imposing punishments against law-breaking policemen despite the anomalous fact that Zhongshan produced their own Police Reward and Punishment Ordinances (Jingcha shangfa zhuan zhang 警察賞罰專章) which were much more lenient than those stipulated in the Republican code.

A careful look at the Republican code tells us that preventing government officers from committing crimes was a great concern for the state. Nanjing compiled a set of laws on the crime of malfeasance (duzhi zui 瀆職罪) in Chapter Four of the criminal code. The chapter targeted corruption and abuse of authority committed by government officers. For instance, Article 121 stated that government officers who were guilty of asking for or receiving bribes connected with the performance of duties for which they were responsible could be sentenced to a maximum of seven years' imprisonment.Footnote ⁴⁵ Government officers who were found guilty of receiving bribes for not performing their duties faced a maximum of ten years' imprisonment (Article 122).Footnote ⁴⁶ Other chapters of the criminal code tell us that for the same crime, punishments imposed on government officers were heavier than on civilians, thereby placing stricter control on the former. In Article 162 of Chapter Eight (concerning the crime of escaping from legal custody, taotuo zui 逃脫罪) of the criminal code, anyone who assisted an arrested person to escape was subject to a maximum penalty of three years' imprisonment.Footnote ⁴⁷ But if the person who illegally released the criminal was a government officer, the maximum penalty was seven years' imprisonment (Article 163).Footnote ⁴⁸ Officers who harbored opium dealing and gambling were subject to half as much again of the relevant punishment than a common offender. Maltreatment of suspects or criminals was also outlawed. Officers guilty of these crimes were sentenced to a maximum of seven years' imprisonment (Articles 125 and 126).Footnote ⁴⁹

One thing is certain: Zhongshan was aware of the existence of policemen who were misbehaving or even breaking the law. In a written statement, police sergeants wrote: “… the police force has to interact very closely with civilians; any police misconduct would be immediately felt by them. As a result, rules and regulations against policemen who committed crimes had to be implemented properly, preventing civilians from being harmed.”Footnote ⁵⁰ Regarding the behavior of policemen, in 1936, the county government issued a prohibitory edict on twenty-five things that the police should not do. There were also regulations for recording demerits for their wrongdoings, even if the demerit system more often encouraged professional comportment than it prevented abuse. Aside from one edict that required policemen not to hit people with their truncheons, the other edicts emphasized the appearance of the policemen, requiring them, for instance, to wear tidy uniforms with hats tilted, and to bathe and cut their fingernails frequently. When on duty, policemen should not eat, drink or smoke and should not lean against walls, nor play with truncheons as if they were toys.Footnote ⁵¹

The Zhongshan government produced the Police Reward and Punishment Ordinances for the Zhongshan police forces. Whereas the Republican code imposed stricter punishments on government officers than on civilians who committed the same crime, punishments specified for Zhongshanese policemen were actually ridiculously more lenient. The Ordinances stated that policemen were subject to three types of punishment depending on the heinousness of the offense. In the most serious circumstances, they would either be taken to the judiciary or military tribunal for trial, or they would be dismissed. If policemen committed less serious crimes, they would have a demerit recorded against them. For minor faults, they would receive a reprimand.

Article 11 of the Ordinances stated that a policeman who committed heinous crimes including receiving bribes, extortion, theft, involvement with known gangsters, rape, trafficking of humans and the injury of another person not for the purpose of self-defense would be given an “exceptionally serious” demerit (yichang daguo 異常大過), when in effect that meant little more than imposing a fine of two silver dollars if the offender were a police constable. A police sergeant committing the same crimes would be fined four silver dollars.Footnote ⁵² The final sentence of Article 11 declared that only if a policeman committed a crime that was more serious than those stated in the articles, the policeman would be dismissed or sent to the judiciary or the military tribunal for trial.Footnote ⁵³ According to the Republican code, however, offenders of these crimes would be subject to at least seven years' imprisonment. The inconsistencies between the legal code and the local ordinances reflected serious coordination problems between the central and local governments over legislation. Such problems seem ridiculous, but more importantly, they actually reveal the uneven progress of the idea of modernization and the idea of discipline in Chinese criminal codes and in the minds of local authority.

If the Zhongshan government worked according to the Police Reward and Punishment Ordinances in handling crimes committed by policemen, then it was giving a loose rein to those who might inflict harm on civilians. However, as we have seen earlier, the authorities had given much consideration to the discipline of local policemen. One example can tell us that actual punishments were not only more severe than those stated in the Ordinance but they were harsher than punishments specified in the Republican code. In one incident that occurred in 1948, a gang of people headed by a policeman named Cai Sanzai 蔡三仔 was found guilty of robbing the house of a retired overseas worker. Cai and his gang were arrested and Cai was sentenced to death. Executioners were sent to his home village to make a positive identification of him. Cai was executed on the spot.Footnote ⁵⁴ The local government claimed that by imposing severe punishment on law-breaking policemen, they could admonish the police forces and other government officers, in a demonstration of their fate if they committed such crimes.

It is doubtful whether sentencing Cai Sanzai to death was lawful. The Republican code did not state the level of punishment a policeman should bear if he committed robbery. Article 134 of the criminal code states that if a government officer abused his authority in committing a crime not listed in any of the articles in the criminal code, his punishment would be half as heavy again as that for a criminal who was not a government officer. In the context of the law regarding the particular offense described above, Cai would not have suffered more than seven and a half years' imprisonment (Article 320 states that the maximum penalty for a robber was five years' imprisonment or a fine of 500 yuan).

Here, the local ordinance, the state's law and the punishments actually implemented were all inconsistent. In order to maintain a disciplined police force by executing a policeman who committed an atrocious crime, the Zhongshan magistrate imposed a punishment far beyond the severity approved by the Republican code. Again, the local authorities were given a free hand to make decisions and in this case, decisions that were against the law. This is another consequence of a county government rushing to establish a disciplined police force with inadequate consideration of a number of other factors, including consistency in the formulation and implementation of laws and regulations.

UNIFYING POLICE SURCHARGES, SURCHARGE ARREARS AND OFFICIAL REMEDIES

At the time Zhongshan was proclaimed the model county, the local government had up to then depended mainly on private donations to support the police forces. However, seeking such donations was not easy, and they were insufficient to maintain a well-trained and well-equipped police force. As a result, in 1930, magistrate Huang Suju proposed a police surcharge (jing fei 警費). Huang proposed that the owner of every mu of land in the county pay thirty cents, shop owners pay 15 percent of the amount of their rent, while residents of houses pay between ten and thirty cents, depending on the size of their house.Footnote ⁵⁵ By the time the first Zhongshan government's financial budget was prepared for the 1929/30 fiscal year, surcharge items for financing the Zhongshan police forces were already included in the budget.Footnote ⁵⁶ Surcharges that supported the Zhongshan police forces yielded an income of 84,000 yuan while the total expenses of all the police stations were 74,000 yuan.Footnote ⁵⁷ Information tells us that in 1934 the Zhongshan police forces were still financed through these surcharges.Footnote ⁵⁸

The police gross annual revenue of 84,000 yuan was collected only with much difficulty. As we shall see later, police assistance and protection were services demanded by civilians, but their willingness to pay for these services was another matter. Tax and surcharge arrearage was a knotty problem for the local government. Collecting the police surcharge was a difficult task, and probably one of the assignments that policemen were the most unwilling to perform. In 1930 when Huang Suju first standardized police surcharges, the police bureau did not wish to undertake the collections themselves. They claimed that sending troops into villages might frighten villagers and cause public resentment. The police bureau called for a meeting with representatives of various villages hoping that they could help. However, with the same worries of frightening villagers, these representatives declined to comply with the authorities' request.Footnote ⁵⁹ In the end, the police bureau had to take charge of collecting the surcharge from all households, shops and landowners.

In order to keep their profile as low as possible, the police bureau instructed precinct stations to send only one office assistant into the villages. But two months after their first attempts, the police bureau realized that surcharge collection by lone office assistants was yielding far less than the expected receipts. The police bureau had to offer rewards to these assistants: for every one hundred yuan they collected, they could keep eight yuan for themselves.Footnote ⁶⁰

In 1936, changes in the police surcharge were made when the Guangdong provincial government decided to eliminate all legal and illegal surcharges imposed by county authorities. Taxes were restricted to twenty-four types, and the power to collect tax was reserved to the provincial government, which in turn would redistribute funds to various counties. In the four years between 1937 and 1941, the provincial government eliminated over six thousand types of surcharges in various counties.Footnote ⁶¹ Regarding surcharges for the police, the provincial government introduced a standardized one that was similar to that suggested by Huang Suju in 1930. Twenty percent of the amount of the rental payments from shops was collected as “shop-keepers' surcharge for the police” (dianhu jingfei 店戶警費).Footnote ⁶² Households and landowners no longer paid the police surcharge. However, the following incidents tell us that the reduced number of surcharge payers did not ease its collection.

After the reform, arrearage remained a serious problem, which was to continue during the Japanese occupation. For instance, in 1941, local authorities were still attempting to collect business and profit taxes overdue from 1939, two years previously.Footnote ⁶³ After the war, surcharge collection was still proving difficult, and the Zhongshan magistrate and the police bureau received a number of complaints from precinct stations and tax offices (Shuijuanchu 稅捐處).

The Haizhou precinct station in Xiaolan town (Xiaolanzhen Haizhou Fensuo 小欖鎮海洲分所) provides an example. In January 1946, the police chief in Haizhou petitioned the Zhongshan Police Bureau hoping to borrow from them 150,000 fabi 法幣 to make ends meet because their financial condition was so bad that they were unable to pay the policemen's salaries.Footnote ⁶⁴ Whether they succeeded is not known, but another petition they sent to the Police Bureau suggests that their financial condition remained as poor two months later. In March 1946, Haizhou wrote to claim that due to financial difficulties, they had had to dismiss five policemen.Footnote ⁶⁵ Later, a meeting was held among the Police Bureau, the Haizhou station and village heads regarding the seriousness of surcharge arrears.Footnote ⁶⁶ In the meeting, the Haizhou station could only urge the Police Bureau to order villagers to pay their overdue surcharges.Footnote ⁶⁷ It seems that nothing else could be done.

A similar example occurred in Qianshan town (Qianshanzhen 前山鎮) in southern Zhongshan. In January 1947, the Qianshan precinct station wrote to the Zhongshan Police Bureau requesting them to order villagers to pay their surcharges for the police forces. The precinct station claimed that surcharges due between June 1946 and January 1947 had not been received.Footnote ⁶⁸

According to Frank Yee, the Republican government did not provide sufficient financial support for police forces, and as a result at the village level all over China it was very common for the local police to be given a free hand to raise enough money for the support of their force through levying extra taxes and surcharges.Footnote ⁶⁹ Frank Yee was only partially correct. As far as the available information tells us, the provincial government allocated some funds to county police bureaus, but with limited funding, precinct stations in towns and villages had to cover their own expenses. For instance, in 1948, each Guangdong county police bureau was allocated 136,190 yuan.Footnote ⁷⁰ However, with prices rising ten times in half a year, the budget of 136,190 yuan was hardly enough for 1.2 dan 擔 of rice, at 115,000 yuan per dan.Footnote ⁷¹ As a result, Zhongshan precinct stations were, as usual, financing their expenses through collecting the “shopkeepers' surcharge for the police” in their respective localities. Nevertheless, the following cases show that even at times when surcharge collection shortfalls were so serious that precinct stations were facing severe financial difficulties, there were limits on the collection of extra surcharges. Contrary to Frank Yee's claims, these police were not allowed their old freedom to raise money. Nor did they attempt to collect extra surcharges without the approval of the county magistrate and police chief.

The Shaxi precinct station (Shaxi Jingsuo 沙溪警所), like the Haizhou case discussed earlier, was in financial trouble because of the difficulties in collecting the surcharges. Each retail shop, depending on revenue, was supposed to pay between one hundred and three hundred fabi as a surcharge for the police. However, the police chief of Shaxi claimed that many of these businesses did not fulfill their tax obligation. In April 1946, the precinct station petitioned the Zhongshan magistrate and the commissioner of the Zhongshan Police Bureau, explaining their financial difficulties. The police chief asked permission to collect a surcharge from the Shaxi periodic market and also from the pier. He suggested that each person who entered the periodic market and anyone crossing the river pay five fabi and for each pig carried through these two places a forty fabi surcharge be levied for the Police Station.Footnote ⁷² We do not know the outcome, but a few days after he petitioned, the magistrate replied, promising to investigate their financial condition and that he would consider approving their request if necessary.

So, the traditional administrative practices found in the police system in the Qing dynasty, of the sort Kristin Stapleton notes, were still found in the Republican period. Magistrates were given a fairly free hand to fund the police. They would be the ones who made the final decision on whether a police station could collect customary fees. Not only that, but the police bureaus were also given the freedom to provide incentives to tax collectors by allowing them to pocket some of the tax collected. However, the problem was a complex one. The development of the police system had been sudden and fragmentary. These difficulties involved not only the inability of the state to monitor closely and to professionalize low-level bureaucrats, as Stapleton claims, but also problems that arose from the state–society relationship of a modernizing government.

In this transitional period between tradition and modernity, the financing of the police forces was difficult for two possible reasons. First, tax collection was inefficient and arduous. Tax collectors, being the policemen themselves, were disciplined to treat civilians in the proper way. Other than politely knocking at the door of every villager and reminding them to fulfill their tax obligations, any aggressive approaches were prohibited. And to eliminate the extractive and coercive powers of tax collectors, the state minimized the number of staff in tax bureaus.Footnote ⁷³ At least, that was how the Nationalist state distinguished themselves from the legendary corrupt officials of the Qing. (It is worth noting that the degree of violence in tax collection in the Qing dynasty should be doubted. This is because tax arrears were also a chronic feature of Qing fiscal administration. If the authorities really were harsh enough, tax arrears should not have been a problem. More importantly, it was good government upon which the dynasty's legitimacy depended.Footnote ⁷⁴) What is crucial here is that the making of a modern police force in Republican Zhongshan did not come along with a well-planned and efficient tax collection system. Second, to the Zhongshanese, like any other Chinese, the imposition of surcharges must not have been new and to some of them, the police and the corresponding surcharges were likely just another extra financial burden without immediate benefits. We should also bear in mind that the surcharge for the police was imposed after it had been financed through donations for two decades. It would not be surprising to find that people were unwilling to pay that surcharge. Furthermore, there was a lack of education provided to citizens regarding their responsibilities and obligations to society, and Zhongshanese taxpayers had not learned to fulfill their tax obligations like any other citizens in the modern world.

THE COLLECTION OF ILLEGAL SURCHARGES AND CONSEQUENT ACCUSATIONS

Although the county magistrate approved the collection of surcharges by precinct stations, counter to the theory of a modern government in which decision-making should be centralized, this does not mean that policemen were given enough freedom to extort from the public. Extortion, especially when accompanied by violence, was strictly prohibited.

In one incident, a policeman from the DoumenFootnote ⁷⁵ precinct station (Doumen Jingsuo 斗門警所) entered a periodic market hoping to extort money from hawkers in 1947. The policeman asked a hawker named Kuang Ji 鄺紀 to prepay five days of customary fees, which was equivalent to 2,500 fabi. However, the hawker was only willing to give him 500 fabi. The policeman began to strike Kuang Ji with his rifle. Other hawkers ran to help Kuang and drove away the policeman. Twenty minutes later, the policeman returned with a troop of policemen who then beat Kuang Ji and other hawkers. They stopped only after about twenty hawkers were severely injured. A crowd of passersby approached the injured hawkers and tried to help them, but the Head of the Doumen precinct station arrived with another troop of policemen. They beat everyone they saw and arrested a large number of hawkers including ones who were badly wounded.

Reports of the incident soon spread among the public, and over five hundred villagers from two nearby villages began to gather, planning to march into the police station to save the hawkers. After being persuaded by the heads of the villages, the mob abandoned the plan and agreed to send the heads of the two villages as representatives to the county magistrate Sun Qian 孫乾 (1908–1999), and to the county chief prosecutor Lin Chongken 林崇肯 in Shiqi. The prosecutor, accompanied by police sergeants from the Zhongshan Police Bureau, went to Doumen to ascertain the situation.Footnote ⁷⁶ By the time this news was published in the village magazine, these officers from Shiqi were on their way to Doumen, and in the absence of a published follow-up report we do not know whether the villagers' wrongs were redressed with the legal assistance of the county government. Still, this example tells us that although the government was not always able to prevent local police forces from collecting customary fees, the government did not tolerate clearly unlawful acts when they were brought to official attention. Unlike some Qing magistrates who turned a blind eye to extortion, the upper levels of Zhongshan government officials, including the magistrate and the judge, condemned it.

Other government departments aside from the police also illegally collected extra surcharges. As in the Doumen episode above, civilians in the Maowan periodic market (Maowan Xu 茅彎墟) complained about a case which finally commanded serious attention from the government. In Maowan, militiamen employed by the civil affairs division of the village office in Wuyue village 五岳鄉 gathered at the entrance of the market to inspect the identity cards of villagers on one market day in March 1948. A fine of one Macau patacaFootnote ⁷⁷ (the legal tender of Macau) was imposed for every villager who was unable to present identification. Upon payment, a temporary identity card was issued. Those who did not have Macau patacas had to pay in Hong Kong dollars.Footnote ⁷⁸ A villager, Chen Taimian 陳泰棉, who was neither able to present an identity card nor any money to pay to the militiamen, was bullied until Chen left his clothes as guarantee for the money. Some villagers were angered by this and reported the situation to the village police station. As a result, the militiamen were arrested and the head of the civil affairs division was dismissed and sent to trial.Footnote ⁷⁹ This case tells us that the authorities not only forbade police forces from collecting illegal surcharges, but also held the relevant government departments responsible when they did.

An ideal modern Chinese police force was one without policemen like the reviled yamen runners of the Qing, yet these examples tell us that at the bottom of the bureaucratic hierarchy, there persisted abuses of authority by individual policemen even after forty years of development in the police system. Nevertheless, local authorities in Zhongshan showed an eagerness to handle and investigate cases of policemen making illegal demands when civilians lodged complaints. Some rules of modern institutions indeed applied. The Zhongshan police forces and the Zhongshan government were not as disorganized as we thought, and unlike Helen Siu's Xinhui county, the Zhongshan government was far from disintegrating even towards the end of the Republican period. Examples show that precinct stations could not collect surcharges without the consent of the Zhongshan Police Bureau and the magistrate. And violence was not allowed. Precinct stations only applied for permission to collect surcharges under grave financial difficulties, for example when tax arrears delayed for months the payment of policemen's salaries.

It is extremely difficult to determine with any precision the scale of police extortion, corruption and the abuse of authority. We do not know how many such criminal cases were never brought to light and how many civilians instead had put up with them. However, the example below provides further evidence that in the 1930s and 1940s, civilians in Zhongshan did not tolerate crimes committed by policemen or submit to injustice and abuses. At the very least, when they were mistreated to a point they found intolerable, they utilized various channels to make complaints.

A police sergeant, Li Dingyi 李鼎彛 of Nanlang precinct station (Nanlang Jingsuo 南蓢警所), was accused of extortion, and the victim filed a complaint directly with the county magistrate. In 1936, Jian Qiaozhi 簡翹芝 had borrowed one hundred silver dollars from Liang Minghao 梁名灝 to use as traveling expenses to the United States of America. Jian agreed to pay monthly interest of 10 percent and return the money in silver dollars. When he reached America, Jian was denied entry by the immigration office and immediately sent back to China. One month later, Jian repaid his loans to Liang, but what Jian returned was fabi (then the legal tender) and Liang refused to accept the money. Jian refused to return his loan in silver dollars. As a result, Liang reported the case to the Nanlang precinct station hoping that they would make Jian return his loan in silver dollars. However, despite the contract, it was actually illegal to refuse payment in legal tender. The tables were turned on the plaintiff, and so Sergeant Li, who heard Liang's complaint, threatened to have Liang detained unless he was willing to bribe him with 150 fabi. Liang did not wish to be arrested, so he agreed to pay. Liang did not have the money with him and so Sergeant Li led his troop to accompany Liang home to collect the money from Liang's wife. Unfortunately, Liang's wife was not at home and so they all waited outside Liang's home. The crowd of police officers standing in the village attracted the attention of Liang's neighbors and relatives, who soon found out that Li was extorting Liang. Sergeant Li was frightened by Liang's relatives and so he and his troop left the village. The next day, Liang reported the extortion case directly to the county magistrate, Yang Ziyi, who later had Sergeant Li arrested.Footnote ⁸⁰

Although there were similarities between Qing practice and the Republican police system, especially on the negative side, one thing became less “traditional,” that is, how the authorities dealt with accusations against officials. In the Qing dynasty, as Nancy Park tells us, involvement in any legal proceeding was dangerous especially when official misdeeds were involved. The investigative and trial process often involved unwelcome probing into the personal affairs of all the concerned parties, and it was not uncommon for plaintiffs as well as defendants to be questioned under torture. Furthermore, plaintiffs who lacked wealth and status, or connections, were at a severe disadvantage in a legal system that tended to favor the rich or well connected.Footnote ⁸¹ In Republican Zhongshan, as we saw in the previous examples, accusations against officials were dealt with promptly and seriously. Cases of police extortion were investigated, and those who were found guilty were arrested unless they fled. Although we do not know how many cases were not brought to light, at least in the cases shown here, plaintiffs did not have to be questioned under torture, and involvement in legal procedures was no longer dangerous in the way it had been in the Qing dynasty.

Another incident that occurred in June 1936 shows that several policemen had forced civilians to pay bribes. Yet this offense, once exposed, was not tolerated by the local authorities. The bribery incident occurred in Lanbian market (Lanbian Xu 欖邊墟) in a town in eastern Zhongshan during the time when the nationwide currency reform was being enacted.Footnote ⁸² The authorities in each locality in Guangdong were ordered to eliminate the circulation of local notes and require that all transactions were to be made in fabi. This order gave an opportunity for policemen in Zhongshan to extort money from civilians.

A customer went into a grocery store in Lanbian market. Before he bought anything from the store, he put a silver dollar coin on the counter. Immediately, a few policemen, headed by a police sergeant, He Xizhi 何錫之, who were patrolling the streets, ran into the store and claimed that the shopkeeper Ma Yao 馬堯 was accepting currency prohibited by the Nationalist government. Sergeant He pointed his rifle at Ma and claimed that he had to be arrested. Other policemen searched the store for illegal currency. The owner immediately sent his assistant for the village head. The village head arrived soon and began to negotiate with the policemen. Sergeant He told the village head that if Ma was willing to pay a fine of two hundred silver dollars, he would not take him to the police station. After more bargaining, Sergeant He finally accepted ninety fabi and left.

The incident attracted a large crowd of spectators. Many of them were owners of neighboring stores who believed that continued police extortion of the same type could become an extremely serious problem if they did not take action. These merchants called for a meeting that night to discuss the matter. The next day, shopkeepers, together with the village head, went to the police station and reported the incident to the police commissioner, Chen Zhuolun 陳卓倫. They requested the authorities to arrest Sergeant He and return the ninety fabi to Ma Yao. Commissioner Chen was astonished and immediately sent his assistant to the precinct station where Sergeant He was posted. However, by the time the assistant reached the precinct station, He Shizhi had already absconded to avoid punishment.

The head of the precinct station offered to return forty fabi to Ma Yao and asked him not to pursue the matter further. Ma agreed, but when Commissioner Chen Chuolun heard about the offer, he disapproved of the arrangement. Chen believed that the corruption committed by He Shizhi was a very serious crime and if it were not handled properly, the reputation of the Zhongshan police force would be damaged. Prohibiting any private settlement, Chen ordered the case to be brought before the higher authorities.Footnote ⁸³ The case was transferred to the county magistrate. The victim, the village head, and colleagues of He Shizhi were all summoned for questioning. We do not know whether the superior and other colleagues of He Shizhi collaborated with him and covered up his wrongdoing, nor are we told whether He Shizhi was finally arrested. Nevertheless, this incident shows that commissioner Chen had indeed at least upheld the law with a mind to protect the reputation of the local police force.

This incident reveals specific characteristics of local authority in Zhongshan. First, the store-owner's claim that they had to stop police extortion before it became too serious suggests that prior to that incident, extortion cases of similar severity were not common. Second, the effort commissioner Chen made to combat corruption and his success in bringing the case to the county magistrate tells us that the Zhongshan government was far from disintegrating. Third, if civilians were skeptical about the local government, they would not have reported the case to the police commissioner and requested the authorities to deal with the matter. Also note that when the offending sergeant heard he had been exposed, his first impulse was flight, suggesting he knew he would be prosecuted.

SOME POSITIVE PUBLIC PERCEPTIONS OF THE POLICE FORCES

It is noteworthy that in village magazines, civilians offered unprejudiced or at least localized views of the police forces. Their comments were not exclusively or even generally fault-finding. They showed appreciation and expressed gratitude to the police forces because they were kind and efficient in dealing with cases of crime. Some found a few government officers so good that they did not want them to leave their positions. These perceptions show that the disreputable behavior of some of the policemen did not engender universal popular cynicism.

According to police regulations, if they saw domestic animals roaming unattended, it was their responsibility to bring them back to the police station. Indeed, policemen were performing roles for which their training had prepared them, and they were publicly praised. In one case, a policeman on duty walking past a farm saw a cow on the loose. The policeman believed that it was a lost cow and if he had not taken it away, it might have destroyed crops in the fields. The policeman led the cow back to the police station and kept it until the owner claimed it.Footnote ⁸⁴ In another instance, an insane woman often visited Jiangjiabian precinct station (Zhangjiabian Jingsuo 張家邊警所) and interrupted the policemen there. According to the village report, policemen showed sympathy and never blamed her for being troublesome.Footnote ⁸⁵ Whether civilians were highly appreciative of these small matters might be questionable, and we do not know who wrote articles to praise these policemen so lavishly for their patience and for offering help. Yet, in a year-end volume of a village magazine, inhabitants of Shabian village (Shabianxiang 沙邊鄉) jointly wrote an article to thank the local policemen for their hard work in combating crime, and for the peace they brought to the village throughout the year. They also expressed their gratitude to policemen who were willing to work without being properly paid.Footnote ⁸⁶ In another example, chief constable Li Zeping 李澤平 of Dagang village (Dagangxiang 大崗鄉) also gained much popularity in Zhongshan. Li was promoted to the Huangpu precinct station and so had to resign from Dagang. When the news about his resignation became public, the villagers were alarmed. Through the village office in Dagang, they signed a petition to the police bureau in the hope of persuading Li to stay.Footnote ⁸⁷

It was not only policemen from the lower ranks who were publicly praised. The chief constable of Shaxi precinct station, Gao Bao 高苞, was extolled for his achievements: Gao not only arranged for the restoration of street lights in Shaxi after the Japanese occupation but also took special notice of sanitation problems in the Longdu 隆都 area (west of Shiqi, the county capital) and publicized, in various villages, the importance of hygiene. He was also thanked for being aware of the chaos in crowded bus stops along the highways in the district and for arranging for policemen to keep order. He traveled to Hong Kong and arranged meetings with overseas Zhongshanese for the purpose of soliciting donations and eventually obtained funds for making police uniforms.Footnote ⁸⁸ Furthermore, Gao was praised for having launched a successful campaign against rice speculators when there was a food shortage in Zhongshan.Footnote ⁸⁹

For an unknown reason, the Zhongshan Police Bureau decided that Gao Bao was to be replaced by another person as the chief constable. Villagers of Shaxi thought Gao had done tremendous work for the district and believed him supremely capable in the maintenance of public security. As a result, they were displeased with the county police for having Gao replaced. They were anxious that as soon as the redoubtable Gao was dismissed, local bandits might appear again. Local elites, village heads, retired overseas workers, and a number of “educated people” went to the government headquarters of Zhongshan in Shiqi to protest against the arrangement.Footnote ⁹⁰ Official letters written by Gao Bao, and matters he dealt with in his police station in 1948 and 1949, suggest that he was retained in his position up until “liberation,” when he moved to Hong Kong.Footnote ⁹¹

These examples are evidence of some positive relationships between civilians and policemen at various levels of the police hierarchy and of concomitant respect for more distant and higher county government officials. They tell us that the Zhongshanese were sincerely pleased with the local government officials, many of whom they believed had performed their duties properly.