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1898. Beijing. A group of scholars tried
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to remake an empire that had run
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for more than two hundred years
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one imperial edict at a time.
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They had a young emperor behind them,
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and a great deal of paper.
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One hundred and three days later,
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it was all undone.
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This episode does not go back over
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what happened before. It stays inside those
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hundred and three days: what they actually
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did, and why they lost.
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The man who led them was called
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Kang Youwei. The war with Japan had
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been lost, Taiwan ceded, and two hundred
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million taels of silver paid in indemnity
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we have covered that in earlier episodes.
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One line is enough here: this reform
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was not conjured from nothing.
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It was forced by defeat.
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Kang passed the provincial exams only after
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several attempts, and took the highest degree
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at thirty-six. His books are, academically,
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contested. Scholars Liao Ping and Qian Mu
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have argued that his reading of the
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New Text classics forced the evidence
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he liked to cast Confucius as a
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precursor of institutional reform, to give reform
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a theoretical root. That is an academic
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judgment, and it is a separate matter
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from the role he played in 1898.
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One thing, though, is not disputed:
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he could move a room, and he
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had nerve. A man who failed the
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examinations repeatedly, then rewrote the meaning of
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the sage's texts to suit a programme,
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had a certain audacity.
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In 1895 he drafted a ten-thousand-word memorial overnight
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and gathered examination candidates to petition against
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the peace and for reform.
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It came to be called the " Gongche
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Shangshu" memorial. To be precise: that memorial
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never actually reached Guangxu.
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It circulated among the literati and became
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a gesture. Checking the attendance register,
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Mao Haijian (A Textual Study of the
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Events of the 1898 Reform) puts the
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actual number of signatories at around eighty.
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Both accounts stand; neither is privileged here.
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In June 1898, Guangxu received Kang Youwei in
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audience. The emperor was twenty-seven; he had
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reigned twenty-four years, but real power had
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remained with Cixi all along — we have
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covered that, so it gets one clause
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here. After the audience, Kang did not
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get into the Grand Council.
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The Manchu grandees would not have it.
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What he did get was a privilege:
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the right to memorialise directly, bypassing the
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ministries and reaching the emperor himself.
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That was the opening.
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From then on, reform edicts could bypass
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the regular bureaucratic ladder and come straight
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from the emperor's brush.
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On 11 June, Guangxu issued the edict " Mingding
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Guoshi" — establishing the national policy.
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The reform had formally begun.
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From that day, over the hundred and
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three days, the court issued well over
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a hundred edicts: abolish the eight-legged essay,
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open schools, train a new army,
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set up bureaus of agriculture, industry and
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commerce, allow commoners to publish newspapers.
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It was the first time in two
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thousand years that anyone had tried to
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refit the whole system at the institutional
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level. But the more edicts there were,
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the clearer the problem became.
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An edict is not the same thing
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as power. Those below could decline to
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carry it out, could delay, could comply
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in form and not in substance.
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The provincial governors-general of the day
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men like Zhang Zhidong and Liu Kunyi
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mostly watched and waited.
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Edicts flew out of Beijing; the provinces
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stayed quiet. This was what many at
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the time had not thought through:
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an order on paper only becomes real
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when someone carries it and pushes it.
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Yet only days before Kang's audience,
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Cixi had already issued three decrees of
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her own. First: dismiss Weng Tonghe,
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the emperor's tutor. Second: officials of the
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second rank and above must present themselves
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at the Summer Palace to thank the
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empress dowager for their appointments.
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Third: Ronglu becomes governor-general of Zhili,
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commanding the Beiyang forces.
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On their face these were routine arrangements.
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In substance they returned the power of
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appointment — and the troops — firmly to Cixi's
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hands. The decisive point of a reform
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was never how fine the edicts read.
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It was who could appoint whom,
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and who held the soldiers.
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On that, Guangxu's side had already lost
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ground.
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Kang went further. He proposed a Bureau
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of Institutions, with twelve specialised sub-bureaus beneath
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it, which would bypass the Six Ministries
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and draft regulations and drive the new
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policies directly for the emperor.
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To Kang this was efficiency.
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To the entire court it was the
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dismantling of a ministerial system that had
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stood for centuries. The Six Ministries,
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the Grand Council, the governors-general — all of
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them were the ones being routed around.
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So the opposition was not simply conservatism.
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It was material interest.
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The bureau was never established.
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But the mere proposal had already turned
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the whole officialdom against them.
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Of the hundred and three days,
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exactly one thing survived: the Imperial University.
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On 3 July 1898 its charter was approved.
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Sun Jianai became its first director of
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studies; W. A. P.
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Martin served as head instructor in Western
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learning. Its site was the Hejia Princess
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Mansion on Jingshan East Street — the area of today's
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55 Shatan Houjie in Beijing's Dongcheng District.
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The charter drafted by Liang Qichao called
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it "the model for the schools of
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all the provinces. " After the coup,
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every other decree was annulled.
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This school alone was kept.
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It became the predecessor of Peking University.
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Walk down Shatan Houjie today and those
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old buildings are still standing, with a
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heritage plaque marking the site associated with
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Peking University's Red Building.
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It is the one reform of 1898
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still alive.
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To see who was alienated, look at
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where power actually lay.
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The Manchu grandees were the first group
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made uncomfortable. Abolishing sinecure offices, drawing in
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military authority, requiring bannermen to earn their
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own living — every cut pointed at their
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livelihood. Ronglu was the key figure among
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them. He held the Beiyang troops,
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and he had Cixi's confidence.
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The reformers wanted to go around him;
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they could not go around the guns
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he held. Then there were the unbending
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conservatives — men like Gangyi and Xu Tong
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who simply despised these "wild scholars" and
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held that the ancestors' institutions could not
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be changed. These people did not have
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to end up on the other side.
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It is a pity that the reformers'
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manner left them no way down.
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Start with the cut of offices.
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What was cut was not only bureaus,
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but the people inside them.
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Remove one official and behind him stands
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a household, disciples, old associates.
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These people were not necessarily enemies.
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They could have been won over,
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placated, absorbed slowly. Reform in most dynasties
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settled the old guard first and pushed
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the new measures afterwards.
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The reformers chose the fastest route:
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one clean cut. Before they had worked
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out where these people would go,
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they had already taken away their posts.
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The officials who were cut went straight
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to the Summer Palace to complain.
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And so the opposition was delivered to
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the other side by the reformers' own
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hands.
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Then there is Kang Youwei himself,
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and how he appeared at court.
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Weng Tonghe's diary records that Kang was
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"exceedingly wild" in company — he left no
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room in argument, and even Weng,
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the emperor's own tutor, was talked back
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to. He gave little thought to tactics.
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Grand Council members such as Sun Jianai
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and Ronglu were men who could have
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been managed; he made enemies of them
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without need. It is recorded that he
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even told Guangxu: do not abolish the
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old offices, only add new appointments.
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The words were right.
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The manner pushed people away.
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A man who wanted to do great
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things turned everyone who could have helped
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into people on the other side.
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That is not a story about the
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enemy being too strong; it is about
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being too hurried. Too hurried to remember
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that whether a reform succeeds often depends
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less on how right your thinking is
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than on how many people you can
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hold together.
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Money. Reform needed schools, a new army,
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new enterprises. Every one of them burned
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silver. Qing annual revenue in these years
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is estimated by scholars at roughly eighty-three
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to eighty-nine million taels of silver:
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land-poll tax over twenty million, salt tax
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over ten million, likin internal transit dues
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over ten million, and maritime customs seventeen
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to twenty-three million. (Source: scholarly estimates such
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as Peng Yuxin, A Fiscal History of
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the Qing.)But after 1895 the Qing was
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already carrying heavy foreign debt.
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Between 1894 and 1898, new foreign borrowing for indemnities and
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loans accumulated to roughly three hundred and
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fifty million taels. (Source: compilations of Qing
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fiscal materials.)By 1899, servicing that debt
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principal and interest — took close to thirty
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percent of government revenue.
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Guangxu also tried to raise money from
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the public. In 1898 the government issued a
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public bond of one hundred million taels.
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It sold about one million before the
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issue was halted. Credit is also a
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resource of reform. When a bond will
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not sell, it means the court's capacity
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to borrow from its own people is
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gone.
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The reformers did not live in the
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palace. Most of them lived in the
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guild-hall quarter outside Xuanwu Gate.
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Kang Youwei lived at the Nanhai guild
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hall, on Mishi Hutong; Tan Sitong at
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the Liuyang guild hall, on Beibanjie Hutong;
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Liang Qichao at the Xinhui guild hall,
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on Fenliuli Street. A few alleys apart,
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within walking distance. Argument, drafting, night visits
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all of it happened under these lamps.
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Nearby were the Guangheju restaurant, the Heniantang
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pharmacy, the courtyards of Fayuan Temple:
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where they ate, bought medicine, and walked
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off their moods. Most of these guild
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halls no longer stand, or have become
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private housing. At the Liuyang guild hall
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site on Beibanjie Hutong a heritage plaque
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still stands, marking that Tan Sitong once
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lived here.
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The reformers held edicts.
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The other side held something else
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troops, authority, and decades of accumulated weight.
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Where was the opening?
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Guangxu grew desperate, and sent a secret
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edict to Kang Youwei and Tan Sitong:
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the situation is critical, find a way,
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quickly. Tan Sitong thought of a desperate
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move: go to Yuan Shikai.
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We have covered Yuan — the troops he
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trained at Xiaozhan were the most presentable
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modern force of the day.
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One night Tan went to see Yuan
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and asked him to bring his troops
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up, surround the Summer Palace, and protect
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the emperor. What passed that night,
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no one can fully reconstruct.
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The surviving accounts do not agree:
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Yuan's own diary reads one way,
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Liang Qichao's account another.
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The version that spread widest is this:
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Yuan went straight to Ronglu and informed,
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and that triggered the coup.
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Treating that as settled fact is what
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many popular history programmes do.
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But scholars have disputed it throughout.
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Mao Haijian and other revisionists point out
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that Cixi and Ronglu had already been
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positioning themselves — Ronglu had already moved Nie
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Shicheng's and Dong Fuxiang's troops toward Beijing,
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which was not something that happened overnight.
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Even if Yuan had done nothing,
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that move would probably have gone ahead
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anyway.
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On 21 September 1898, Cixi resumed the regency and
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placed Guangxu under confinement at Yingtai.
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The reform, one hundred and three days
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long, was over. Tan Sitong, Kang Guangren,
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Lin Xu, Yang Shenxiu, Yang Rui and
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Liu Guangdi — six men — were executed at
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Caishikou. Tan could have left.
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He did not. Liang Qichao records that
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he was chivalrous by nature, careless with
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money and loyal to friends, generous to
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the point of extravagance.
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When someone urged him to flee before
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the end, he left a line:
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" Reform in every country has come through
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bloodshed; in China none has yet been
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heard of who shed blood for reform,
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and that is why the nation does
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not flourish. " That was not a speech.
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It was where his mind was before
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he died. Caishikou is where the six
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were killed; the Qing execution ground was
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here. Go there today and you will
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find a metro station, a shopping district,
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and the old Heniantang pharmacy sign.
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Nothing of the execution ground remains
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even the archway that witnessed countless beheadings
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has been pulled down.
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Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao escaped
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one to Japan, the other by a
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long route overseas. Kang raised money among
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overseas Chinese in the name of "rescuing
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the emperor, " and the response was large.
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But Feng Ziyou's Reminiscences of the Revolution
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and related accounts record that a good
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part of these sums went to his
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own housing and expenses, and that he
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lived rather grandly: a man in exile
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keeping a fine house and travelling in
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style, set against the stated aim of
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saving his sovereign — a jarring contrast.
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It should also be said that he
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kept publishing newspapers abroad and maintained the
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Protect the Emperor Society, carrying the reformist
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case to a wider audience.
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Back to the question at the start:
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why did this reform fail?
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The answer is not in the words
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"the enemy was too strong. "
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It is this: the thinking was right,
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the path was rushed; the edicts were
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many, the people were not secured;
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there were friends available, and they were
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pushed into being enemies.
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Watching any reform today, the rule has
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not changed: first count who is on
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our side, and who we have pushed
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to the other. Who holds the guns,
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who holds the money, who holds the
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appointments — those three are more solid than
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a hundred edicts.