Returned to Chongqing from Dushiqiao

Sunday, 31 December

I woke up in the morning. Ma Chaojun visited me. At 10.00 I and Ma Chaojun accompanied Sun Fo to the Sun Yat-sen Cultural Centre in Beibei. The construction fee was merely some 13,000 dollars, but now its value exceeded 50,000 dollars. I, Lou Tongsun, Yao Chuanfa (姚傳法), He Sui and Peng Chunshi (彭醇士) invited Sun Fo and others to have lunch. Then we went to have a walk at Beibei Park. Sun Fo joked that the Commoners’ Park should be renamed Public Park because there should not be such divisions as commoners and nobles. The weather today was really wonderful. There were many women in the park. A girl was reading a love letter under the bamboo trees. I joked that as old men we could only read love letters in the toilet because firstly it was quiet, and secondly we could destroy the letters easily. We should be extremely envious that those young boys and girls could read love letters in the park. On hearing that, all were laughing, because many of them had such experience.

At 3.30 p.m. we left Beibei straight for Chongqing. At 4.30 we went to the Round House. At 6.30 we had dinner at Wang Chonghui’s residence. Wang Chonghui told me and Sun Fo that General Chiang discussed the Sino-Soviet Commercial Treaty with him on Friday evening. Chiang said that the American-Japanese Commercial Treaty would be abolished by twenty-sixth of next month. From that time onwards with regard to economic sanctions to Japan we hoped that the United States would be able to do so. Therefore the news of the approval of the Sino-Soviet Commercial Treaty could not be leaked out at the moment, so that the enemy could make all types of unfavourable propaganda against us, thus affecting the attitude of those American congressmen who feared the Soviet Union. So General Chiang immediately asked Mr. Ye Chucang to go to Dushiqiao to try his best to stop us from passing the bill. We said when Ye Chucang arrived the bill had been passed but we kept it a secret. We would make it public after the expiry of the American-Japanese Commercial Treaty and we thought that it was apt to do so. Therefore I urged Wang Chonghui to call the Head of the Civil Service, Wei Huai (魏懷), to delay the approval procedures and document exchanges. Wei Huai agreed to do so. We also talked to Wang Chonghui with regard to the funding of Dai Defu. He said this time when Dai Defu received the Turkish Minister in Hong Kong it went quite well. The Turkish Minister mentioned this to Wang Chonghui twice. He had relayed this to the General so he could try to raise the reception fee for Dai Defu. After dinner we went to the Round House all together. We stayed for a while. At 10.30 we went to the new hotel for foreign guests for the appointment of President H.H. Kung. It happened that they were having dinner so we stayed briefly and then returned to my home. When we talked about the constitution, Wang Chonghui thought that during this period of time all the power should be concentrated on one person. Therefore General Chiang was not courteous and took it completely. This was the right way to go. To raise the issue of constitution seemed to cope with the requests of various parties. With regard to the draft of the constitution his opinions were in two points, which were the same as mine. 1) For governmental policies like those with regard to the charters on education and economy, they were not appropriate to be regulated in the constitution. I said I originally had such a suggestion therefore I strived hard for this, but C.H. Wu and Liang Hancao and others were influenced by the constitutions of Germany and Poland, therefore they insisted on retaining this so it could not be deleted. Now the fact proved that the constitutions of Germany and Poland did not work, so if we suggested deleting such a clause it might be hopeful, but we could not suggest it in the Legislative Yuan because they would be unwilling to have major revisions to those clauses drafted by themselves. 2) The clause on surveillance and sanction had too many regulations, which poses difficulties to administrators. In putting it into implementation there was a fear that the clause would become an obstacle. I also strongly agreed with it. They left after 11.30 after they wished each other a Happy New Year.