Subramania Bharati

The dispute over the abolition of the presidency of the People's Republic of China (formerly called Chairman of the PRC in the 1954 Constitution) was a dispute between Mao Zedong, Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party, and some members of the CCP Politburo during the Cultural Revolution over the abolition of the position of the PRC Chairman in the new constitution. This dispute was later interpreted by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) as evidence that Lin Biao had usurped the party and seized power.

Starting from March 1970, during the discussion of the draft constitution, Mao repeatedly proposed abolishing the post of presidchairman, which was opposed by many central leaders including Lin Biao. CCP Central Committee members took this as an opportunity to "persuade" and show their loyalty, which reached a climax at the Lushan Conference in August 1970  and came to an abrupt end with the fall of Chen Boda. After that, Mao's opinion prevailed, and the Second Plenary Session of the 9th CCP Central Committee formed a "basic agreement" on the Draft Amendment to the Constitution on 6 September 1970. While abolishing the post of chairman, the text stipulated that Mao Zedong "is the head of the proletarian dictatorship in our country and the supreme commander of the whole country and the whole army", and Lin Biao "is Chairman Mao's close comrade-in-arms and successor, and the deputy commander of the whole country and the whole army". After Lin Biao's defection, the preparatory work for the 4th National People's Congress was suspended and the process of constitutional amendment was interrupted. In 1975, the new constitution adopted by the 4th National People's Congress formally abolished this position.

The dispute over whether to keep or abolish the chairmanship was a common debate until Mao Zedong's southern tour in August 1971, when he first promoted the dispute that had occurred a year earlier as evidence that Lin Biao had usurped the party and seized power.  After Mao's death, the CCP continued to use this argument. Although the chairmanship issue was not used as evidence of the Lin Biao group during the public trial in 1980, the CCP's official historical materials still insisted that "Lin Biao wanted to be the chairmanship and was eager to seize power".

After the outbreak of the Cultural Revolution in 1966, Chairman Liu Shaoqi was targeted as the number one target due to his serious disagreements with Mao Zedong and quickly lost power. At the 12th Plenary Session in 1968, Liu Shaoqi was removed from all his posts within and outside the party and expelled from the party. The following year, Liu died of illness. After Liu was dismissed, the position of chairman was vacant. The two Vice Chairpersons at the time, Soong Ching-ling and Dong Biwu, served as acting chairpersons, but did not succeed the chairman.^[1]

After the 9th CCP National Congress in 1969, Mao Zedong decided to convene the 4th National People's Congress and draft a new constitution. In March 1970, Premier Zhou Enlai wrote a letter to Mao Zedong to report on the draft constitution. After reading it, Mao issued an instruction to "change the state system and do not have a chairman." Mao explained: "Don't write a chapter about the chairman in the constitution, and I will not be the chairman."  On March 16, the Politburo passed the "Request for Instructions on Amending the Constitution" and submitted it to Mao. In his instruction, Mao once again made it clear that there would be no chairman, but did not explain the reason.^[2]

In response, Lin Biao: 1) advocated the establishment of the post of State Chairman, and Mao Zedong serve as the chairman; 2) the post of Vice State Chairman was optional, and could be single or multiple; and 3) He was not suitable to serve as Vice State Chairman.^[3] On April 12, 1970, Zhou Enlai presided over the discussion of Lin Biao's opinion at the Politburo. "The majority of the Politburo members agreed that Mao should continue to serve as the State Chairman, and Zhou Enlai did not raise any objections to this."^[4] Kang Sheng even proposed that if Mao did not want to serve as the State Chairman, Lin Biao could serve as the chairman. Supporting the establishment of the State Chairman was not only the opinion of the CCP Central Committee members, but also the common opinion of the feedback from the discussion of the draft constitution in various places across the country. Kang Sheng reported that "according to the ardent wishes of the masses, we hope that Chairman Mao will serve as the State Chairman and Vice Chairman Lin will serve as the State Vice Chairman. If neither Chairman Mao nor Vice Chairman Lin will serve as the Chairman, then we don't want to serve. In the end, let Chairman Mao decide."^[3]

In late April, Mao proposed for the third time that there should be no chairman. He said: "Sun Quan persuaded Cao Cao to become emperor. Cao Cao said that Sun Quan wanted to roast him on the fire. I advise you not to think of me as Cao Cao, and you should not think of yourself as Sun Quan." Even at this time, some members of the Politburo still insisted on establishing a chairman. Mao Zedong proposed for the fourth time that there should be no chairman, but he refused to give a reason. In view of Mao's tough attitude, on July 18, Zhou Enlai finally changed his mind, withdrew his opinion, and proposed that the position of chairman could be considered not to be established.^[2]

On the morning of August 13, 1970, Wu Faxian, a member of the Constitution Drafting Group, had a fierce conflict with Kang Sheng and Zhang Chunqiao over whether to include the sentence "Mao Zedong Thought is the guide for all work" in the Constitution. Zhang Chunqiao used Mao Zedong's conversation to imply that Lin Biao was Khrushchev, which attracted the attention of Zhou Enlai and Lin Biao. The conflict between Lin Biao's group and Kang Sheng and Zhang Chunqiao's group escalated.^[5]

A week later, at the preparatory meeting of the Standing Committee of the Second Plenary Session of the 9th CCP Central Committee held in Lushan on August 22, the discussion on the issue of the state chairman heated up again. Knowing that Mao firmly opposed the establishment of the state chairman, the four members of the Politburo Standing Committee, Lin Biao, Zhou Enlai, Kang Sheng, and Chen Boda, once again proposed the establishment of the state chairman. Since Mao refused to give a reason, Zhou Enlai, considering that Mao might be unwilling to engage in foreign affairs activities, proposed that "if the state chairman is established, diplomatic etiquette activities such as receiving foreign envoys in the future can be authorized by the state chairman." Kang Sheng pointed out: "The establishment of a state chairman is the hope of the whole party and the people of the country. We also hoped so when drafting the draft amendment to the Constitution, but we dare not violate the chairman's opinion on not having a chairman of the country. We feel a lot of pressure in this contradiction."^[4]

During the group discussion, Wang Dongxing, Chen Boda, and Wu Faxian took the lead in attacking Zhang Chunqiao, accusing him of "taking advantage of Chairman Mao's great modesty to oppose Chairman Mao." Most of the Central Committee members also joined the group discussion to criticize Zhang Chunqiao for "opposing Chairman Mao," and supported Mao Zedong as the chairman of the country and said that Mao Zedong was a genius.^[5] When the criticism reached its climax, Xu Shiyou and others wrote a letter to Mao Zedong to express their loyalty and demanded that Zhang Chunqiao be exiled to a farm for labor reform.^[6]

Some people not only do not want Chairman Mao to be the chairman of the country, they also do not want Mao Zedong Thought. The people armed with Mao Zedong Thought can see through these bad guys. " Chen Boda continued: "Some counter-revolutionaries jumped for joy when they heard that Chairman Mao would not be the chairman of the country."

On August 25, Mao launched a counterattack and wrote his second big-character poster "My Opinion" to criticize Chen Boda's genius theory and stop the group discussion. Mao accused the Lushan incident of "blowing up Lushan and stopping the earth's rotation." The Lushan Conference marked the end of the debate over the chairmanship. From then on, Mao Zedong regarded himself as "against the tide" and launched the "Criticize Chen and Rectify Work Style" movement, targeting the Central Military Commission Office Group and Ye Qun. The "Criticize Chen" movement continued until the spring of 1971, when the Military Commission Office Group was accused of "deceiving more than 200 Central Committee members" at Lushan and of "attempting a military coup".^[5] In the process of criticizing Chen Boda and the Military Commission Office Group, Mao gradually turned his attention to Lin Biao himself. In December 1970, Mao mentioned in a conversation with Snow that he had opposed the establishment of the presidency six times. "I don't want to be the chairman. I said it six times, and even if I said one sentence each time, that's 60,000 sentences, but they didn't listen. Not even a single word counted, equal to zero. They say they are building me up, but I don't know who they are building up. To put it bluntly, they are building up themselves."^[7]

In August 1971, Mao made a secret tour to the south. During the tour, Mao once again raised the issue of abolishing the chairmanship, which had long been out of debate. He raised it to the level of usurping the party and seizing power for the first time.^[4] He said, "Some people are eager to become the state chairman, to split the party, and to seize power." The surprise attack on Mount Lushan "is based on the principle of establishing a presidency, which is genius." Mao's accusation turned a normal discussion of the state system into a handle for political struggle. When the news reached Beidaihe, Lin Biao, who was recuperating there, was shocked.^[8]

On September 13, Lin Biao escaped and died in a plane crash. When the CCP arranged the crime for Lin Biao, it officially defined "advocating the establishment of a state chairman" as the crime of the Lin Biao group. Later, when the CCP investigated the Lin Biao group case, it was difficult to start with the "genius theory" issue itself. In order to prove that Lin Biao usurped the party and seized power, it strengthened the role of the "state chairman issue" in the Lin Biao case. The special investigation team induced Wu Faxian to confess that Ye Qun once said "If there is no state chairman, where will Lin Biao be placed?" as evidence of Lin Biao's usurpation of the party and power.^[9]

After the special investigation team received Ye Qun's statement from Wu Faxian, they were overjoyed. In 1973, the central government issued a number of documents on Lin Biao's traitorous party group, repeatedly mentioning Ye Qun's statement. Ye Qun's statement was also one of the "evidence" that Lin Biao's "great fleet" participated in the armed coup conspiracy . Cultural Revolution scholars Wang Nianyi and He Shu believe that the issue of the presidency involves the state system, and it is completely understandable that most Politburo members have a strong reaction to major issues involving national affairs. As for the proposal to change the state system such as abolishing the presidency, Mao Zedong should openly explain the reasons and reasons, but he has never given an explanation, and instead accused opponents of conspiracy.^[9]

However, Wu Faxian later said in his memoirs that this was perjury, and that this statement was actually made by Wang Dongxing and Cheng Shiqing, and had nothing to do with Ye Qun.^[10] Qiu Huizuo and Li Zuopeng also accused Wu Faxian of perjury in their memoirs. Given that this statement was untenable, the issue of the State Chairman did not appear in the final indictment. After the Lin Biao incident, the issue of the presidency was linked to the usurpation of power by the party, and no one dared to raise objections. In 1975, the Fourth National People's Congress was held and the new Constitution of the People's Republic of China was adopted, formally amending the Constitution to abolish the positions of the chairman and vice chairman.^[11]