Robert L. Worden and Jane Leung Larson, "A Chinese Reformer in Exile: Kang Youwei and the Chinese Empire Reform Association in North America, 1899-1911" (Brill, 2025)

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Hello everyone, and welcome back to the new books in East Asian Studies, a podcast channel on the new books network. I'm Lipin Chen, your host for today's episode. Today we will be talking to Robert Warden and Jane Leung Larson about their new book, A Chinese Reformer in Exile, Kanye Way, and the Chinese Empire Reform Association in North America, 1899-1911. This book was published by Briel this year in 2025.

A Chinese Reformer in Exile is an encyclopedic reference book, documenting the exile years of Imperial China's most famous reformer, Kanye Way, and the political organization he mobilized in North America and worldwide to transform China's autocratic empire into a constitutional monarchy, or at least that's the hope. Chinese in Canada, the United States, and Mexico formed at least 160 Chinese Empire Reform Association chapters, incorporating schools, newspapers, military academies, women's associations, businesses, and political pressure campaigns. Based on Robert Warden's 1972 Georgetown University page dissertation, a multinational team of historians contribute new insight from half a century of additional scholarship and previously unknown archival materials. This book is open access, you can download the book and every chapter from Briel's website.

So this is a brief instruction about the book, and now that's welcome our guest, Robert and Jane. Welcome to the show. Thank you, Li Bing. All right, so thank you both.

And before we started to talk about this amazing book, and we want to hear from you guys first, introduce your background. So Robert, do you want to begin? Yes, I'd be happy to. My background, professionally speaking, I worked for the Library of Congress in Washington, DC for 34 years as an employee on the research staff of the library.

I'd use the Library of Congress as a graduate student in Washington from 1967 onward. And then after I retired in 2007, and I continued to use the library, so I've got a long history there of doing research. I worked primarily in the Federal Research Division of the Library, and I produced, using my Asian studies background, I produced about 100 reports and various studies and books on mostly on China, but also other Asian countries, such as Japan, Mongolia, Indonesia, India, Bangladesh, and others. So that's what I did for a professional career.

I did a little edge of teaching at Georgetown a couple of times, and I was able to, although I was doing a lot of in-house publishing at the Library of Congress, I was able to do some personal publishing. And after I completed my dissertation, I did publish several articles in journals about, related to my dissertation topic, but then my work at the library kind of took me off in other directions into more contemporary affairs in dealing with China. I got very interested in researching and writing about China in the third world, and particularly about China's relations, PRC relations, and Taiwan relations with Latin American countries. So that was kind of where I was during my professional career.

All right. Thank you, Robert. And especially you mentioned there's a lot of publication. It will be in-house with the library, but also academic publishing as well.

And now we have this amazing book that we are so excited to talk about. But we have another author here with us, James, do you want to talk a little bit about yourself? I'm happy to do so. My background is totally different from Roberts.

I'm half Chinese. My parents are both journalists. My mother is the one who's Chinese. She's a third generation Chinese American.

And she's a second generation. And my father was very interested in her Chinese background, particularly in her father, Tom Leon, my grandfather, who had died by the time my father came into the family. But my grandfather was a student in disciple of Konyou Wei, and he immigrated to the US in 1899 to join an herbal practice of his cousin, but he also became involved in the Bauchung Wei, the Chinese Empire Reform Association, or protects the Emperor's Society. And as a result, he became-he saved his correspondence.

He was very involved between 1899 and 1909, the prime years of Bauchung Wei activity. And my father actually was the one to salvage his material. And these were ultimately all of these letters and so on were donated to UCLA's Asian Library. And I became interested in China early on.

I went to China in 1976, and from then I decided I wanted to work in the China field. So I basically worked for nonprofit organizations, educational organizations, beginning in 1979, and became the founding director of the Northwest Regional China Council associated with the Asia Society. And when I moved to New York, I worked for China Institute and the Committee of 100 until 2013. So through these activities, I met a number of China scholars.

And when my mother was writing a book about her family, Sweet Bamboo, in 1895, she asked me to have the Tom Leon letters translated. And I began doing this with a professor at Portland State University where I was living. And then one of the people I met through the China Council, Doug Lee, was a friend of Robert's and he told me about Robert's dissertation. And that's really what got me involved in really understanding of the letters and figuring out getting involved in the study of the Chinese Empire Reform Association.

And as I began to learn about it, I decided it was appropriate probably for the papers to be published in some form in China. I was able to go in 1990 and met a professor who was involved with Guangdong, Shaqul, and the Social Sciences Academy. And he ultimately got the papers transcribed and published first in 1997. And then it was once again in 2008.

And through all of this, of course, I was making contacts with a number of China scholars, including some of those involved in the book. In China, Junping, China, and Canada, Evelyn Huda Hart in the United States. And I began a blog about Hong Kong scholarship, which is a Google blog. And I've given some papers, written a few articles.

But in 2011, the project to do this book was initiated. All right. Thank you, Jane, for sharing. And especially you mentioned your personal connections with this project.

And I just want to reiterate again, so Jane mentioned the book that her mother was writing this as a sweet bamboo and memoir of a Chinese American family and also the Tang Lian collection. So this is a collection house in UCLA, but you can assess it digitally. So if after today's conversation, you would like to know more or see the archival material self. So UCLA digital archive is where you can find more archival material.

So with that, and Jamie also mentioned a little bit about how you get this project started and how you get to know Robert's work. So I guess question for you, Robert, is how do you start this project, especially as grad students? And how did the inspiration and where did you get things started? Well, it's been a long journey.

And I was an undergraduate student at St. Bonaventery University in Western New York. And I had met my then future wife, Norma Chu, who's Chinese overseas Chinese born in Jamaica. And I've been interested in more in Latin American history, but as I got to know Norma more and more, I got very interested in Chinese history.

And to the extent that we actually at a university had no Asian studies courses, we convinced the history department to jin some of them. And they did. So my junior and senior year's site was able to begin studying more intensively Asian history, particularly China. When it came time to write a Batsworth thesis, I was scoping around for something.

I didn't want to get into more ancient Chinese history. They seemed a little esoteric for me. I didn't want to do anything too modern. So I was looking at what then was one of the most amazing sources still is.

In fact, William Theodore to bury sources of Chinese tradition. And I started reading through that book, actually Norma had a copy of that book, which she loaned to me. I was reading through and I was reading through and I was like, okay, there's this Phil Kangyoue, 100 days of reform. That sounds interesting.

It's not ancient history by any means. It's not modern history either. Not 20th century. I didn't know about his role in 20th century at that point.

I wrote a Batsworth thesis on the conservative reaction to the 100 days of reform. So it kind of gave me some start. Well, then I went on to Georgetown University to work on a masters degree. And I was my mentor when it came to him, well, you know, you have to write a masters thesis.

You know, what have you worked on before? And I said, well, I did this paper and this thesis in undergraduate on Kangyoue. The reaction to the 100 days of reform, conservative reaction. And so he suggested, well, you should look deeper into his ideological background and Kangyoue's ideological background and just where did he come from?

What's the basis of his philosophy to let him become a reformer? So I did. I wrote a masters thesis on that subject on the intellectual background, the Kangyoue. And around that time, I'm thinking, so at 1968 or so now I got my masters in 1969, Kangyoue's grandson, Rumbanglo, had published a biography on Kangyoue, which was very extremely useful in my master's thesis.

So I just done the master's thesis. And, you know, I, gee, I like graduate school. It's kind of fun. I'm learning a lot.

I'm enjoying this. So let's keep going for PhD. And during the summer, after I got my master's degree, I had time, little time off and I've been doing some research at the National Archives and other places on my family genealogy. And I remember a piece in Rumbanglo's book that just mentioned kind of impassing almost not much detail.

The 1905, Kangyoue was in the United States and had visited President Theodore Roosevelt in the White House and wrote him a long, long letter later on. So that's interesting. I'd like to see that letter because Lo didn't have the letter. He only knew about it.

So the journey actually ends up starting at the Library of Congress. They have the Roosevelt Papers. Well, I found a little bit of information that the Kang actually did visit Roosevelt. That's good.

And they said, we wouldn't have any letters like that. The people wrote, he would forward that on to the State Department maybe. Well, that took me to the National Archives. And eventually, I found not only that letter, two other letters that Kang wrote to Roosevelt, numerous telegrams, and then a huge file from the Bureau of Immigration, hundreds of pages of documents about Kangyoue and his efforts to enter the United States.

He was considered a radical by the US government. He had a price on his head in China. So the US government was made a little circumspector, you know, should we let this man in or not? And, you know, basically, the answer was no, we should not let him in to the United States.

He could be a troublemaker. But what happened with that treasure trove of documentation I found, there it said, now we have a dissertation topic, a PhD dissertation topic. I fleshed it out also back at Library Congress by going through, once I had a developed chronology of Kongs travels in Canada, United States, and in Mexico, I went through the newspapers in the cities that I knew he had traveled to. Now, keep in mind, this is the dark ages leaping newspapers.

But at that point, we're mostly on microfilm. You sat in a darkened room with a microfilm reader and you turned the crank slowly, slowly, page by page. I had the dates and I found numerous articles, actually dozens and dozens and dozens of, maybe hundreds of articles on Kangyoue's visit. So this fleshed out the official documentation from the National Archives and then I'm finding the press coverage.

I also began contacting some other people. I was in contact with Rung Bang Lo, he actually was one of the informal readers of my dissertation. And various other people whose names began to come up and I interviewed, ever again, contact with some of the children of people who were Kongyoue's disciples in the United States, members of the Bauchong Way in the United States, became quite interesting. So I produced this doctoral dissertation.

So that's how I got started on this project. Again, I blame it all on my wife getting me interested in Chinese history. She's done an excellent job. We've now been married for 59 years, so we're still learning about China.

And as I mentioned a little earlier, after I went to work at the Library of Congress, I did a little outside publishing and published a few articles on the dissertation topic. And I got driven off in other directions. People were asking me to write on more contemporary affairs and I did that on my own time. And in 1983, I had an unsolicited letter, one might say, from a lady named Louise Leung, is Jane's mother.

She wrote me a letter saying she had just learned about my dissertation, found it very interesting and valuable for work she was doing. And wouldn't I actually consider publishing that? And I responded some months later. I was in the midst of a lot of work at the Library and other projects.

I finally wrote back to Jane's mother and said, well, thank you very much for your interest. But basically I'm saying, no, I'm not planning to publish a dissertation. I've kind of gone off in other directions. Good luck with your project.

Well, the Leung family is perseveres. And at the Association for Asian Studies meeting in Washington DC in 1995, I was staffing the Library of Congress booth at that conference. And a young lady named Jane Leung Larson approached me and basically the same question. I know about your dissertation.

My mother made use of it. And wouldn't you publish that? And I think Jane, I'm so sorry to say this again. I said, not really.

I've got so much else on my plate right now that I hadn't really considered going back to this. Well, Jane is a very perseveering person. And we had some mutual contacts, Douglas Lee, she mentioned another, someone I never heard before, Evans Chan. He also was working on Kanye way and writing an opera and doing some docu-dramas on Kanye way.

He contacted me and we all the rest is history. I think by 2011, Jane finally convinced me, now I'm retired. I should have plenty of time, not really, to get involved in publishing this book. So that's kind of where we are.

And again, it did take us back into the me back into the National Archives and some other archives. And then we had these on discovered or newly discovered archival collections that had been hidden away in Attic and Connecticut. Thank you, Robert for sharing, especially this journey that, you know, from college days and master degree and graduate students research, but all the way also with the different research, the connection and different files of paper you go through and the material that you found. But also, as you mentioned, the Lian family, their persistence, they would like to see this history of research published.

And finally, 2025, we have this book. And so with this, Jane, you have other things to end? Well, I guess I'm sort of the cause of this book. But I wasn't even aware that my mother wrote Robert until he sent me a copy of her letter because he keeps everything.

So that's a wonderful aspect of Robert, which I've discovered as we work together and he's dug up things from the late 60s where he did his original research. Right, so this book is decades in the making through different generations and also, as Jane mentioned earlier, a trans-Pacific network of collaboration with scholars, historians. And so now this book is about Kong-O-Wei. For some of the readers I already hear about Kong-O-Wei, given he was one of the most renowned Chinese reformer back in the Qing dynasty.

But can you just before we talk about the exile, briefly introduce Kong-O-Wei and then who is this person? And why is he one of the most famous reformer in the Qing China and also modern China as well? Well, Kong was born in 1858. He came from a scholarly family, scholar officials.

He was from non-high. And he was trained as a Confucian scholar, as a Confucian scholar to pass the exams. He sort of quickly lost interest in that. But he actually gave up his formal education when he was about 20 and happened to go to Hong Kong and was completely transformed by that experience.

Seeing the positive collaboration of the West and the East, I guess, he began to read widely to be influenced by translations of Western writers. But he also spent a lot of time by himself in meditation and rumination and devising his own theories of this and that, which led him to conceive of Confucius as a reformer, which was a book he wrote with his students later on. He was very open to the world, a word frequently used to describe his cosmopolitan. And he certainly did blend Chinese and Western thought in his work.

He loved to travel. He had curiosity about everything. He saw himself as a very exceptional person, as a sage, as a visionary. And in fact, he wrote China's first utopia, Dottom Shou, a one-world, one language, one people, no nations, completely different from the nationalism that he propagated as a politician.

And as a ching reformer, but he was very self-confident. And he began to write extremely detailed blueprints for reform, always with constitutional monarchy as the end point, basically a constitutional system under the Chinese emperor, but the Chinese emperor wouldn't necessarily have much power. He began memorializing the emperor, the young emperor of Guangzhou, in 1888 when he was 30. But basically had little influence until 1895 when he organized perhaps one of the first rallies of Chinese scholars in Beijing to oppose the signing of the Shimonu-seki Treaty to end the sign of Japanese war.

And he made speeches about his proposals, his detailed proposals for reform in every aspect, economic, educational, military, political. And this was like his first experience as a politician, I think. And that's what we really feature in our book, his ability to mobilize people and to bring a systematic goal of constitutional reform to a broad audience. And after 1895, he became well-known because his ideas, his speech, and so on was publicized in newspapers.

And in the 1890s, in Guangzhou, he established this sort of alternative school, this Confucian Academy, thatched hut among 10,000 trees as the translation, one with Sautang. And that's where he met Tom Liang and Liang Chi-Chao, his most famous student in reform and disciple, where they wrote together Confucius as a reformer, his book. And he cultivated these disciples who would become basically his activist core when he was in exile. And they were happy both in China and outside of China.

So I think he was very successful as someone who was able to organize and galvanize a public and knew how to, was completely confident meeting kings and presidents and speaking to Chinese overseas groups. He first began using the power of a group to organize to influence policy when he organized in his own village in Nanhai, an anti-foot binding organization, which was opposed by a lot of people. This was back in 1883 and eventually came to organize, even in China, these politically oriented organizations in 1895 and 1898. All right.

So, Kanye Wei and specifically as Jamie introduced is the person who is sort of have this early encounter with the West. And this experience led to this kind of change. And he himself being open-minded, cosmopolitan and also relatively progressive want to change China and want to sort of plan out and propose reform for every aspect. And so with that, but not everybody is on board.

Some people are not happy about these changes. And some people even, not just against it, but really want to sort of stop the reform. So, especially, you know, this book is about exile. So why was Khan exile?

And you know, what did exile look like? And how did he, I mean, feel about this? He has all this ideas about China, but cannot carry it out. Yeah.

He's exiled to his way to radical for China at the time. Keeping in mind, China has gone through nearly a century of embarrassment of invasions, opium war, several opium wars, typing rebellion, certainly upsetting the nation. The sign of Japanese war, a tremendous defeat for the Chinese people. And Jane has done a good job of kind of summarizing where he was at as 1898 comes along.

There were certainly other reformers or other progressive men in the Chinese court and in the government, but he was much more radical than the rest of them. He did get the ear of the Guangxi wemper and was appointed to a nominally a secretarial position. But having that entree, then he began to write reform proposals. And this was not just any simple reform.

He really wanted to change the nation, establish it as a, establish a nationality of China, but also to really modernize the government, the court system, the military, academia, begin to promote the idea of giving the people of China a voice. This is still a little premature. But he began to, some of his suggestions in Guangxi wemper was embrace and they were publishing and they started off rather modestly and then as the summer went on. And by the way, the 100 days of reform began on June 11th.

And lasted until September 21st, 1898, it's actually 102 days, but we, everybody calls it 100 days. And as the summer progressed, the reform decrees were getting too radical and they were abolishing signicures, doing away with people's jobs, the Empress Dowager who had kind of receded in some years earlier, she's very upset about all this because she perceives rightly that she's going to lose her power. And so come mid-September, the conservative factions begin to realize they need to save their necks so they rise up, they get some support from military, Yuan Shikai, who the reformers believe was on their side, but Yuan Shikai was on his own side basically. And he did not support them at a critical moment.

Six of the reformers were arrested and summarily decapitated, including Kang Yui's brother. Kang had been warned and Liang Tchob had warned to leap Beijing and they did. Kang Yui escaped through Tianjin on a British ship, got to Shanghai, continued on another British ship to Hong Kong and he now was exiled with a price on his head. Anybody who could capture him and bring him back alive would be amply rewarded.

So he became an exile, not because he wanted to, because he wanted to save his own necklace, he knew he believed a lot about himself. He was very self-assured. He knew that he could return to power someday, he didn't really have much power yet, but he could return to China, he could still enact reform. But now he's out of the country and he's going to be for a long time and I think that leads into from Hong Kong, he spent some time in Japan, then he was off to the new world to Canada.

Alright, so Kang Yui now has priced on his head and out of China and in traveling to different places. And as you mentioned, Hong Kong, Japan and Canada, and this book is about his experience and his journey in North America. And chapter one, this does specifically this particularly starting point in North America where I should specify Canada. So why Canada?

Why starting from Wai-Kon, you know, Shoe's Canada or why he ended up starting from there and Shoe's Canada as the founding place for the Chinese Empire Reform Association? Well I think it shows him because he was already well known. He went, he sailed from Japan to Victoria, BC in Canada in, and arrived April 7, 1899. And even in quarantine, after getting off the ship, he went into quarantine and his name was recognized on his luggage by a man who would become a big activist.

And in the Balhong way, he was actually the Chinese immigration interpreter who organized a welcome delegation on the wharf and then invited him to his home to meet with other Chinese Canadian merchants. So it was people, he was famous when he arrived. He was, I suppose, rather taken aback by this, but he began to, because his plan at that point was to go and he did do this, because he was hoping to go to the US, which he was not allowed to do at that point, but also the United Kingdom to gain military and diplomatic support to overthrow the Empress Dowager and return the emperor to power. But he began meeting with Chinese Canadians as well as with Canadian leaders and had a very good, he was getting a much better sense of the concerns of overseas Chinese.

And he began giving these large public speeches almost immediately after landing, talking about the fact that Guangxi's reforms were needed to strengthen China. And if China was stronger, they could protect the Chinese overseas from all of the discrimination they were facing, but he also talked about the fact that they needed to unite as a group and not fight amongst themselves, stand up for their own rights, and be aware of how they were perceived by the foreigners, which means, you know, clean up their act literally configuratively, one of the projects of the Balhong way at one point in Canada were bath houses. But he also mentioned, and this was something apparently he had talked about it much earlier, was establishing a large Chinese commercial corporation amongst Canadian-American Australian Chinese that would invest in China, in particularly in industry in China. And this really caught the attention of the Vancouver Chinese who were pretty successful entrepreneurs, and they began to talk about it after Kong left British Columbia and proceeded east.

So when he returned to Canada in the summer, and he had failed completely to get British support to topple the Emperor's Dowager, he began meeting with the leaders in Victorian and Vancouver. And in July 1899, founded this dual-purposes organization, which had dual-purposes in the senses that it was both political and business-oriented. And in fact, initially the name was the company to protect the Great Qing Emperor, rather than the association. But it really was the political association, protecting the Emperor's society, Balhong Wei, that rose to the fore very quickly to restore the Emperor so he could carry on his reforms.

And the English name of Chinese Empire Reform Association was actually suggested by the man who persuaded him in the quarantine. So Limangxio and who would become a leader of the Balhong Wei as well. So that's how it got its start. Wow, from the name on the luggage, right?

So this actually tells us that Kong Wei is actually very famous, not just in China, but also in among the overseas Chinese as well. And in this, as Jamie mentioned, shows the client-wise ability to sort of get people together, mobilize people, resources and connections, and giving speeches and then try to sort of get people together and eventually have this association, Balhong Wei. And so now we know how it got started from Canada and also how people got involved in the very beginning, the Victorian in Canada. And later on, Kong again traveled throughout the world and eventually returned to North America.

And chapter three specifically talk about the Balhong Wei network. And as Jamie mentioned, it's kind of this kind of dual layered, it's both political but also business oriented organization. And specifically, how the Balhong Wei network penetrates Chinese community in North America, especially through the efforts of Kong's followers. Okay, well, I will begin really with Kong's moves because he was the one who made the initial moves.

In September of 1899, he actually summoned to Vancouver leaders that he had been in contact with from Portland, Seattle and San Francisco and mobilized them and some of those people remained his longtime followers. And he also sent emissaries from Canada to the United States. And there they gave speeches, founded local chapters. Some of these chapters were founded by local people, of course, many of them were.

But there was this mobilization. He wrote a charter in October for the organization in which basically formalized its transnational nature and set out the goals of mobilizing chapters, publishing newspapers because they wanted to both have propaganda and to educate people about the world and about Chinese issues, a political reform. It mentioned banks and other businesses. Primarily, the idea at that point was businesses in China to counter the foreign control of Chinese businesses.

And it was structured with the president who would be him headquarters. And that would be in Asia, in Hong Kong or Macau or Japan, that would receive donations and distribute them for various activities, as well as all these local chapters. And supposedly all the positions were to be publicly elected, but of course Kong never had to go through an election. And it also specified in the charter that the chapters should hold weekly meetings.

They should read newspapers together, have speeches, groups singing. He wrote songs eventually for the Bauhong way. And then also communicate with other chapters, which they would do through posters and group letters that were sent, duplicated and sent around, as well as these newspapers that were established. So at that point in 1899, I guess there were chapters in the US, Canada, Southeast Asia, Australia and Japan, and it later expanded to Africa, Europe and Latin America.

But in 1900, Kong said his closest disciples to begin proselytizing for the organization Liangchichao and two others, Zhiyun and Liangchitian, who was Liangchichao's cousin. And they traveled the world all over the world and organized chapters, meet speeches. And then of course there were these grassroots local leaders who formed chapters. Yeah, with all this establishing of chapters in different parts of the world, and we can see that the reformer kind of expand and later on we will talk about their different kind of projects as well.

And but specifically in North America or actually specified in Los Angeles. So this is where Kong stayed for two months in 1905, in the spring of 1905, and specifically this two months and lived with Zhiyun and what happened during these two months? And then why is Kong in Los Angeles? Kong came to the United States from Canada in February 1905 and he arrived in Los Angeles on March 15th and he arrived with the case of Ron Kaitis, he really wanted to rest.

And he intended to spend time with his disciple Tom Leung, who lived there. And so the Los Angeles chapter rented him a house across from West Lake Park, which is today at MacArthur Park and with the lake. And it was a place that he felt very comfortable because there was fishing, rowing, there was a grass for him to lie on and write poems, etc. And nearby was Tom Leung, his student.

And another key person who was a neighbor was Homer Lee, who I'll talk about in a second, but Kong really thought LA was the most excellent place in America, he said, because he thought it was compared to what he had seen already, I guess, sort of excelled in material civilization was what he called it, which was basically modern science and industrial development, a good infrastructure, a very pleasant life for the people with excellent scenery, weather, good housing, or industries, mountains, valleys, etc., good transportation. And so he felt that it was epitomized sort of the good life and what China should aspire towards in the future. But there were two issues that came forth that made his trip not so restful. And it was in part spurred by the American press, which was quite avid in covering him at that point, particularly interested in scandals as well, and they like to stir things up.

And there were two issues that came to the fore. One was the Western Military Academy, which is a network of thriving bahong guei military schools that Kong was very much behind, but there were American folks involved as the chief leaders, and they began to compete with each other, and scandals erupted, and the governments became involved, the government, both of the California and New York, as well as the Department of War in the US were wondering whether these schools were training Chinese cadets to train forces on American soil to overthrow the Chinese government, which was illegal. And then the other issue that came to the fore was the Chinese exclusion policy. And there were two honored guests at Kong's Welcome Dinner in LA on March 18th at foreshadow the these two issues.

One was Homer Lee, who was an American, someone who was just barely out of college. He hadn't even graduated from Stanford, but he had convinced Tom Liang and other bahong boy leaders and Kong himself and Liang Chi-Chao when he visited in 1903 that he would be able to lead a military academy and train Chinese members, men, how to be soldiers, basically. So they greeted Kong at the restaurant where the banquet was held with their cadets, carrying their rifles and swords. And the other person was Wang Yap, who was an official who had represented Guangdong and Guang See at the 1904 St.

Louis World's Fair the year before. And the press thought this was really unusual that a chain official would be approving Kong Yui, who was the most one a man in China, but Wang called him the greatest light in the Chinese world today. At any rate, the two issues again, Homer Lee had been involved with the bahong boy since 1900, in fact, when he claimed that he could help in the military restoration of the emperor in an uprising that Kong and others were planning at the time. And he went to Asia, he was funded through the associations in San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Kong might have met him, we don't know, he was meant to have been met. He didn't play any role in this uprising, which failed pretty quickly, but he returned to the US and he remained close to bahong boy leaders. He met the Angchi Chow when he came in 1903 and impressed him. So the Western Military Academy was founded in 1904 and Kong thought it was a wonderful thing.

And when Kong arrived in 1905, it was in 30 American cities by that point with bahong boy branches. So Kong learned that Homer Lee was describing himself as the commander of the Chinese Imperial Army. He wasn't talking about the Western Military Academy, which was the way it was incorporated in California, but Lee was portraying himself as a commander and his students as military forces and another self-titled American general. He was even more of a pretender than Lee and had a much longer background in deception and had been involved in the San Francisco Western Military Academy.

Came to Los Angeles, met Kong, claimed to be the commander of the Chinese Imperial Reform Army, got a lot of press and Kong was put on the spot. He had to make a written statement to claim Lee they had of the military school saying that there was no army. And the two commanders or instructors or whatever they were began to get publicity. They can continue to speak to the press about their own military pretensions and created suspicion, very serious suspicion on the part of these governors in California and New York in the War Department of Violating Neutrality laws.

So the controversy continued as Kong traveled through the US and Kong was forced to dismiss Lee and announce the closure of the Western Military Academy by the end of 1905. So it really had a, there was a very bad result of the American involvement in this project. The other element that came to the fore in Los Angeles was Wong Yap, who had been, he was actually Tom Leon's wife's cousin. So he was a relative of Tom Leon and had been staying with the family in Los Angeles since December 1904 when the World Affairs closed.

And he should have been exempt from exclusion laws, but the Chinese who participated in the St. Louis World's Fair were under 61 special rules limiting their activities in the United States because there was so much fear that they would remain longer than they, you know, after the fair was over. Well, Wong had a right to remain, but the Los Angeles Chinese inspector didn't know this. Wong had been getting a lot of publicity himself, you know, his coverage, you know, he appeared at the greeting dinner for Kong and so on.

And so he came to Tom Leon's home and tried to arrest Wong and it created such a stir and Wong was so resistant that even though the San Francisco Chinese inspector finally told the LA Chinese inspector that Wong was legal, it was really a very embarrassing thing. There were lots of articles in the newspaper. Wong was defiant. He decided to, he said he would seek damages from the US State Department.

He left LA, headed east to DC and there was publicity across the country about his affront and his anger at being almost arrested and questioned. And so Kong obviously heard about this very directly and he'd been intending to meet President Roosevelt from the beginning of his trip to the United States and speak to him about exclusion. And at that time there was great pressure from the US to renew a treaty, the Gresham Yang Treaty of 1894 that barred Chinese workers from the US and restricted immigration very heavily. And the Chinese minister in the US was resisting his pressure, particularly successfully.

And he was also alerting Chinese in the US, you know, how dire the situation was. At the same time, a new minister, US minister to China, William Rock Hill, was on his way to Beijing to pressure the Qing to sign the treaty. And it was happening while Kong was in LA, so Kong, felt he had to take action. And so around May 1st, we're not exactly sure.

A week before he left Los Angeles, Kong telegraphed, Wang Chi-Chao, who was in Japan, editors of the Bauhong-guai newspaper, Shur-Bao in Shanghai, and Bauhong-guai leaders in Hong Kong urging them to send telegrams, organize rallies, do anything they could, and arouse public anger, saying it was a life or death matter, and that the Qing should not sign this treaty. And there was immediate response from the telegram recipients. Wang Chi-Chao sent out a letter to all the Bauhong-guai people, the Shanghai editors, met with the Shanghai Chamber of Commerce. And on May 10th, the Shanghai Chamber of Commerce then declared a boycott, an anti-American boycott, to protest the exclusion policies.

And Kong left LA, and for the rest of his trip, he was involved with exclusion issues, church leaders in St. Louis, and meeting Roosevelt, meeting Chinese, raising funds to support the boycotters, boycotting merchants in China, and so on. So LA was turned out to be quite a very eventful period of time for Kong. Indeed, even though it's only eight weeks.

But as Jane out told us that there's a lot of things happening. Kong really like LA, I think this is great. And I believe the West Lake area he stays pretty high, luxurious, the house and neighborhood and things like that, so it's a good life. But in terms of a political project, here we have a lot of controversy for the military academies.

There are some of the people claim to be the general, I mean, self-appointed, or there's some imposter saying that they have appointment by Kong, and also on the other side, the Chinese exclusion act. So I just want to add some background here. The Chinese exclusion act of 1882, this is a federal law that targeted Chinese people, so prohibited immigration of Chinese laborers. But there are some exemptions, for example, the government officials, or the business merchants, and also students.

So this is where, as Jane mentioned, one gap, the Qing official can still enter officially. But as we know now, even though they have the official permit to enter United States, there's a lot of difficulty and challenges they encounter. So they are being constantly harassed to show their paper, their approval, and they are constantly being surveillance, things like that. So not just for one gap, the Qing official, there are a lot of examples about the Chinese students as well, and other merchants who actually officially is in the exemption class, but still got harassed in a lot of challenge during the Chinese exclusion period.

And I think this is, again, connected to Kong's effort to try to sort of solve the situation. And especially in Chapter 6 and 7, we see Kong and also the Bauhan Wei members. They are very active. They engage in the American politics of Chinese-American community.

They have different projects, different campaign. And can you tell us more about what they do politically, especially in United States politics? Yeah, I'd like to jump in on that one. And Jane, well, first of all, Jane mentioned about the American newspapers.

They really liked to write about Kongui. And they had a lot of misinformation about him. They didn't understand really who he was. He was called a prime minister, a former prime minister, a prince, a potentate, a noble, a sage, all sorts of titles.

In case you have a more perceptive reporter, Mike really gets a hub of it about this trying to restore the Guangxi wamper to his throne. So the newspapers played a kind of important role in his trip to some of the next city he's going to visit as well as they said, Los Angeles, look what he did there. And they would go to St. Louis and on and on.

So the American newspapers played a prominent role in informing people or misinforming people on about Kong, the Bauhong Hui. I'd like to say too that wherever Kong travel in each city or state, he wanted to meet the local American politicians, the mayors, the governors, any kind of official people, the heads of various institutions. He visited factories, even prisons. He visited heads of all sorts of in missionary activities, individuals who had been to China as missionaries came back and trying to support.

They generally supported the whole protection of, I should say, they oppose the Chinese exclusion. Now, Kong also interacted when he got to the Chinatowns throughout the Canada, the United States and Mexico. He, of course, he would meet the elite of Chinatown, the leaders of the Chinatowns. And they were typically the merchants who were fairly well to do.

They were literate. But he also was beginning, I think he's beginning to change sort of thinking. He's meeting these laborers, those who did make it into the United States, who had been there from before 1882, many of them, who already were here, or had been born here and actually had the right to citizenship. But they weren't necessarily literate people.

They were laborers. And I think he began to see the discrimination against them and their suffering. And he began to feel more deeply about that. He also, and this is very interesting, we haven't mentioned at all about the women.

His own daughter, Kong Tung B, also came to the United States. And she and the other, Bauchong leaders formed women's Bauchong Hui chapters. And there were women members and women officers and Kong Tung B was one of those, they published posters with photographs of the members. The women members, it's so interesting in her photograph is on there.

So she herself is a main character in our book. There's many vignettes in our book. We've heard about Wang Yap. There's many, many other such vignettes is why this book got to be encyclopedic.

So there's a lot there. Now the other thing that hasn't been mentioned that certainly gets involved in politics both in the United States and in China, is there's some competitors out there. Sun Yetsen and his people, who are revolutionaries, revolutionists, they want to overthrow the Qing government. Kong wants to keep it and restore the emperor's constitutional matter.

He's one of the followers who want to do away with the whole thing. This appeals to people too, some people. But initially throughout most of this period, Jane and I found that through the letters are being written, the press covering not only the English language press, but the Chinese language press is that the Bauchong Hui was way out in front of organizing people politically in the China towns and these networks that Junping Chen wrote about were in large part where the work of Kong Liangxi-Chao and these other leaders of the Bauchong Hui. And I think too that is, Kong is trying to gain influence for himself.

He's a good self-promoter. And he also had a good companion, a secretary, nominally a secretary, Joe Goshian, who was educated in Great Britain and was fluent in English as I think a charismatic man in his own right. And he did a lot of the speaking. If they needed English language, speak, maybe Kong gave the gist of what he once said, but Joe was the one who would be often speaking to the English language press and represent his PR man.

So to speak. So again, another little vignette, another character who plays a fairly large role in our story. So this, by the time Kong gets to Washington, D.C., and he's been a numerous other city, St. Louis in Chicago, he got to Washington, they made a side trip back to Pittsburgh and back to Washington, went to Baltimore.

He got to Philadelphia, but he's meeting, finally meets with Theodore Roosevelt. And he really puts making a impression because Roosevelt decreed immediately that the so-called Chinese inspectors were the Bureau of Immigration people who were abusing Chinese entrance people entering the United States who were already living here. It's somewhat reminiscent of what's going on today. Roosevelt said, let's put a stop to that.

Keep following the law, inspect these people, but be kind to them, be gentle to them, be respectful of them the way we should be. So Kong certainly influenced Roosevelt. He later wrote this very, very long letter, typed out. Kong bought a typewriter, Joe Goshan, typed out these letters, they go on for 10, 15, 20 pages, they've written, explaining their opposition Chinese exclusion and then later talking about the why, so she should be overthrown and she'd restore the emperors, trying to influence these political figures.

I think that's, I think maybe that addresses some of your questions there, but he certainly, Kong certainly is meeting a wide spectrum of people throughout the United States, both the Chinatown elites, but also the other non-Chinese elites, if you will, of everywhere he traveled to. One day you're negotiating with suppliers. The next, you're installing a shelf in the back room. Running a business means moving in many directions all the time.

TD's new small business banking accounts are built for how your business moves. It's how we're making banking more human. BCBC. So as Robert mentioned that Kong make a point that whatever he traveled, he meet the local leadership, I mean the mayors, the American intellectual, but as well as the people and the leaders in the local Chinese American community as well.

So in a way that to mobilize people, to get people together and also to sort of kind of promote this idea, his reform. And so one thing I also want to add that Robert, you mentioned Professor Chenjongping's book. So for our listeners, if you want to know more about in addition to Kong Yui and also at this period of time, another political organization or effort to kind of topple a Qing dynasty, this is led by Seong-Ya Sun. And they also have a lot of trans-specific connection as well.

So this book by Professor Chenjongping is called Transpecific Reform and Revolution, the Chinese North America, 1898 to 1918. And also interview Professor Chen in New Books Network. So if you want to go to previous episode, I believe that in March 2024, we have an episode for you as well. So with that said, back to Kong Yui.

So in United States, meeting local national leadership and also the community members. And this, he traveled a lot. So outside of United States, another destination that this book also covers is Mexico. So in Mexico, he's also having a lot of different projects.

So can you tell us a little bit more about how the Balanghui network and also their business ventures in the Latin America, specifically Mexico? Sure. The Balanghui had about 25 chapters in Latin America that we've discovered so far, 12 in Mexico, particularly. That was the main country, but also in the Caribbean, in Cuba, in Jamaica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, and Peru.

So there may be others as well. Kong was fascinated by Latin America. And it was a focus of the organization early on between 1901 and 1903, two of Kong's closest disciples, Suqian and the Angchitian, made extensive journeys to the region, both to recruit members, but to check out investment opportunities. Because Kong had seen Latin America as an area fruitful for colonization by Chinese, who could develop the undeveloped lands.

And it wasn't just Mexico that he looked at. He also thought about Brazil, I know, in Latin America, but he saw actual Chinese settlements for people who had little opportunity in their homeland. So investment was an important aspect. And there were euphoric letters sent back from these two disciples, ex-Dolianian accomplishments of the Chinese in these communities, particularly the border town of Torión and Juan Fúnchák or Juan Chuanchák, who was a real go-getter.

He had come to the United States and ended up in Mexico eventually. But he established these large vegetable gardens that grew vegetables for the Mexicans, basically. He managed hotels and he'd even begun planning at that point a China-Mexico-Steamship line. And at this period, before 1911, before 1910, the president Porfirio Dios really was welcoming Chinese investment and settlement.

And Kong was also encouraged by one of his American friends, one of his extraordinary American friends, Charles Flynn, who was a father of the trust. He was called an industrial magnet, but he was an international businessman with whom Kong had lots of contacts throughout his exile. But he had done a lot of business in Latin America and really encouraged Kong to pursue it too. So Kong first went to Mexico right after his trip in the US in December 1905.

And he was hosted by Juan Fúnchák and Toriong, who pretty quickly convinced him to get the Bajangui involved in launching a branch of the banks that the Hawaii Inhong banks that had already been founded in Hong Kong and New York, a branch in Toriong. He also became involved, Kong became involved with Wang's encouragement, buying and selling land, like stir-frying land, because it was so easy to make a quick profit that way in Toriong. And then he also got involved in promoting this a couple of streetcar lines in Toriong, which was a very modern city. And amongst other projects they pursued and completed was a three-story stone building that still stands to house the bank.

It was called, and still is called, Bancocino by the Mexicans. And he went back to Kong, was very active this first trip, and he went back in 1906 and 1907. And as time progressed, particularly in 1907, Kong began to take a less rosy outlook towards his Mexican and the Bajangui enterprises in Mexico because of the huge investments required. I mean, there was a lot of money required, for example, to cement the franchises for the streetcar lines.

And Kong was trying to extract profits from other Bajangui businesses to use. And in 1907, there was the panic of 1907 on Wall Street that began in October. The panic led to a worldwide depression. And this affected Mexico.

The land prices went down a lot. And so eventually, even before 1911, the businesses had to be sold one by one at a loss, including the building. So there was a very tragic ending to all of this that was rather ironic. It was the 1911 Mexican Revolution.

And there was a lot of anti-foreign sentiment against the Chinese who, of course, were pretty prominent in the business world there. And a lot of resentment by the Mexicans under them, working for them, going to their stores, et cetera. And there was a huge massacre in Toriyo. And it was the largest anti-Chinese massacre in North America.

Actually, 303 Chinese were killed in May 1911, including one of Kong's relatives. So this basically ended the enterprise, people like Wanfu, Chuck, and so on. Actually, a lot of people were dead, and people no longer really tried to assert their businesses as much as they had. So it was a rather sad ending.

But Latin America was important. There may have been a women's association there. There probably was. There were 12 chapters in Mexico.

Mexico City was important. Kong met with President D. Haas. So it was an important place for him.

But it became part of his downfall and part of the Baja Hong-wai downfall, frankly. Yeah, as we see that there are so many different business project banks and why not? But later on, they seem to end in a way that not so ideal for Kong and Bauong-wai, especially in Mexico and Latin America. But so these are the projects and some of the adventures Bauong-wai have in Latin America.

But now that's moved back to United States. And specifically in the following chapter, this is specifically chapter eight, chapter nine. There's you guys listed in details about all this kind of business venture they have. They have the banks.

They have the newspaper publishing outlets, translations. They once has the railroads, new ships and why not. Also different companies, for example, about textile, fishing, rice, so on and so forth. And among them, there is a one that is about restaurant in Chicago.

And later on, there are some of the controversy about that restaurant in Chicago. So can you tell us more about these business ventures in United States and specific about this King Joy-Lowe restaurant? Yes. The King Joy-Lowe restaurant was the only commercial corporation business with really extensive records, historical records, not really business records, but historical records that give us an interior view of how these Bauong-wai businesses were run.

And particularly the effect of Kong's micromanaging his oversight, his involvement in trying to move money around. And it was started by Tom Leon, the idea for it for a restaurant, Chinese restaurant, because he wanted to emulate, I guess, the affluence that he saw and that Kong saw some of the Bauong-wai leaders in New York and Chicago who were restaurateurs, who had very successful restaurants and for Chinese, for non-Chinese, particularly. So these were like Chinese American restaurants and they seemed to be very rich men. So it was assumed they had a lot of profit.

But Tom Leon wasn't interested in it as a restaurant project as such. What he was interested in was he saw it as a way to earn money to support students studying abroad in Europe and Japan and the United States, Bauong-wai students. And it was something he had supported for some time, both privately and trying to get the Bauong-wai interested and they were interested in this particular project. So King Joilo opened in December 1906 and at that point and probably for years after, it was considered Chicago's most extravagant Chinese restaurant.

It was in the theater district in the loop rather than Chinatown. It was the first restaurant with apparently like a street level dining and entrance and two stories of dining and it had a very large initial capital stock, at least on paper, $100,000, which was, you know, I think the closest one was $21,000 of another Chinese restaurant in Chicago. And it survived for 20 years. It was managed by the Bauong-wai and the commercial corporation until 1912 and then sold to a consortium of Boston and New York Bauong-wai members of leaders and they finally closed the restaurant in 1926.

It had a very good reputation in Chicago with dignitaries dying there, banquets, wedding and Robert can talk about all of the publicity they put out but it really, its reputation was, it awed with the troubles that it caused for the Bauong-wai, which were unknown to the Chicago press, for example. Tom was in charge, Tom Land was in charge of getting shareholders, getting loans, dispersing support to students and members and the members in Chicago who were successful restaurant tours were the ones in fact who built and managed King Joilo. And Kong initially thought it would only cost $10,000 to open this restaurant. Well in fact it cost using their investments, their share investments, the loans and credit, at least as $18,000, because they did extensive renovations to the building.

They installed state of the art gas engines in the basement to generate power. They had lots of furniture, kitchen equipment, decorations, much of it imported from China. So beginning in the spring 1907, Kong wanted to, he began to want to extract tens of thousands of dollars from King Joilo to put into his Mexican businesses and other Bauong-wai businesses that were needing money. And there were no profits for extraction.

I think at that point, maybe they were making $50 a day in profit, at least that's what was claimed in the documents. But because Kong at that point was involved in so many high-cost startup projects during depression, it really was greatly stressful on him and he began to attack the business managers. Basically, Tom Lian, Wong-Fung-Chok was attacked. He accused them of incompetence, greed and embezzlement.

There was a big scandal because Kong accused Tom of appropriating $80,000 meant for King Joilo. That's basically how he was known until we found out more about him because it was such a big scandal amongst the Bauong-wai people. And Tom Lian basically retreated from the Bauong-Wai in 1909 and published a booklet in January of 1909 in which he duplicated all the correspondents from Kong about King Joilo, including the encouraging letters initially about establishing the restaurant and then going on to these incriminating letters and his responses and along with his defense of his actions and some accounting of transactions. And it didn't help Tom Lian's reputation much.

People like Liang Chi-Chao and Xu Chin were much more condensed by Kong's accusations. But Tom's booklet ended up being one of a group of things, but exposing Kong's autocratic, often contradictory behavior and his chaotic business practices. And because it was publicized by Tom Lian, it was sent out, the booklet was sent out to other members and then along with other business scandals, it would really demoralize Bauong-Wai members, cause them to question the trust they had in Kong and then in the whole organization. Yeah, so the restaurant, the King Joi, low restaurant in Chicago, so it's as Jamie mentioned, they eventually the money and the asset invested in it is a lot of more times than they expected.

And if the readers, the audience you are interested in, in the books, they included one of the first advertisement and then it's in page 589 if you happen to have a book with you and they say this King Joi, low restaurant is the finest Chinese American restaurant in the world. Not just Chicago, not just United States, but it's in the whole world. So you can imagine the scale of kind of luxury and upscale and state-of-the-art equipment for cooking, fine dining and things like that. But again, this is a high-cost project along with other high-cost projects, especially in that difficult economic time.

And eventually there's a lot of controversy and scandal in terms of the financial handling as well. And with that, so we talk about the business ventures and different business projects in Latin America, in United States specifically. And chapter 10, a focus on also around this period, 1906 to 1908, about the political side of Khan's career. And this is generally kind of considered as a very critical period of transition or kang yu wai.

So what happened during this period and what's the transition? Well, I think as you're hearing here that Khan is a very complex individual and he's now moved in, gone through Canada, United States and Mexico, back to the United States, made several trips to all these countries, all three of these countries. And the things are going on in the world too, like the Panic of 1907 is a major setback. And also the revolution, in some sense, they're beginning to get a little more influence.

They're beginning to say, well, these Baufong-way people are all backward. They just want to keep doing the same thing. And I just want to drop back to just mention something a little earlier period. Back around in 1900 when Khan was involved in the potential uprising, he had another scheme.

Baufong had another scheme. The thing we're going to bring over, they brought over to the United States, a young woman named Swajin Chin. And she was going to be educating the United States. She's going to study martial arts.

She was going to become very proficient in foreign information, western information. And then she's going to go back to China and somehow become involved in the Imperial Court, because they knew that she was kind of interested in foreign things. Now, she's interested in foreign cultures was growing. She had photographers coming in.

She met the wife of the US ambassador, was kind of one of her ladies and waiting almost for a time. So the idea that Swajin Chin was going to go back, were we into the court and assassinate? So she is this incredible story that has not been much told until our book here. This whole thing about assassinations is praise on Khan's mind.

He was threatened with death. He escaped several assassinations, attempts himself, which we document in the book. Well, he also was sort of a vengeful person. He knew that the revolutionaries, as soon as people would like to see him depart the scene, maybe assassinate him.

Well, they were come up with a scheme of this assassinate, Sonia Sen. And Khan, actually, when he was in New Hartford, Connecticut, went to the Colk gun factory and actually bought weapons there for himself and for other people. And just as a little side story about Khan Tung-Pi, who was one of the great heroes of our whole story, she was asking, she liked to fire a machine gun. And she did.

And she hit the target every time. They were all worse, downed. I personally, I fired machine guns before it. They are not easy to fire.

And here's this rather petite woman who took one under control and fired it. But so they, and Khan knew he bought armor for himself, even because he was afraid of being assassinated. Now, he's moving into this period, 1906 to 2008. Things are happening in China now, too.

I mentioned so she's taking a little bit of interest in Western ways. And there's movements to begin to enact some constitutional reforms. And of course, the Khan is all in favor of that. To the extent of the change, the name of the Bauhong Hui, to the Diguo Shenzhen Hui, the Imperial Constitutional Association, they still want to protect the emperor.

They want to have Guang Xu restored to the throne. But this opening for constitutionalism is one that's really great. And I think Khan saw himself as someone who is going to be invited back to China. He's the great constitutional scholar, the great reformer.

He can do it. He's the man of the day. Well, he's also encouraging the people he meets, the average Chinese citizens, he meets, I shouldn't call them citizens yet, but they give them a concept of citizenship in China. They begin to develop a sense of nationalism for China and develop political parties.

And he wanted the Constitutional Association to kind of mentor, be a mentor for Chinese citizenship. And around the same time, in Tokyo, Liang Qiuqiao established the the the the the jungle show, the political information society. And they were going to be kind of mentoring and teaching Chinese overseas, who then could go back to China. And they also had chapters within China.

They begin to think about themselves as political people, as citizens of a nation. These are kind of radical ideas. Well, the Qing government wanted no part of of Kong Yui and his group and actually banned the jungun show in night in a skip the day, sometime sometime in 1908. And so around this, the same time, what's Kong doing during this period?

His organizations change names, things begin to fall apart. The revolutionaries are kind of taking control of the business ventures or other failures. Well, he when he's in the Arctic city in 1907, he marries a 17 year old Chinese American girl that he met in Los Angeles several years before and supposedly she became an amateur them. Well, he definitely became an amateur for her.

And so they they marry and they go off to sort of an extended honeymoon to Sweden where he actually has an island in a home in Sweden. And he spends time sure he spends some good days there. So he's kind of he's the micromanager. And yet he leaves he kind of leaves his people behind to go off with his his new young consort.

He already has several other wives and numerous children. It's all documented very carefully in our book. Well, in the midst of this, we come to November 1908. And on November 14th, the Guangzhou emperor dies.

Well, we get into that in some detail. He didn't necessarily die of natural causes. He'd get my drift. He may have been poisoned.

There's autopsy much, much later on. There was some ambiguity about the cause of his death. But so she knew that she was on her death bed as well. And you know, the story goes that she had him assassinated.

She died the next day. And this maybe perhaps go to Ben Conway's return to China. His worst enemy has died. He writes a whole series of telegrams to Theodore Roosevelt about this and that the United States should come to the now we should come and the United States should come and help restore the emperor and bring constitutionalism to China.

But it's also Sunyas since they're rising up in prestige where the scandals of the Western Military Academy, the panic of the 1970s, the Baja Pointe Business kind of don't go downhill. None of that help come in his program where Sunyas now much much more on the ascendant. And so then you finally have the formal dissolution of the Qing Dynasty in February of 1912. And Sunyas and becomes the provisional president of China, Republic of China.

Yeah, as we see that, you know, 1908 as Guangxi Emperor passed away and then things started to become even more complicated. We already have all this kind of controversy and scandal for the business ventures and there's internal conflict within the Baja Pointe as well. And they just changed the name to the constitutional association. But now the whole point or whole goal to protect Emperor now is in question because now Guangxi passed away.

So what happened to Kang Yui and his kind of reform movement in North America after Guangxi passed away? Robert, you mentioned a little bit about businesses where we see that the Singa-san and also the kind of revolutionists, they began to gain more and more attention and also this kind of mobilizing more resources and things like that. But what about Kang and specifically in 1906, is he in 1909 and to 1911? Well, Kang was at that point, he was traveling, he traveled a great deal in 1909.

He spent most of his time in travel, obviously trying to escape all the troubles of the bow, I mean, or the Sienchok Wei at that point. I mean, he was in Egypt, Palestine, India, Salon and all over Europe. He was living mainly in Pannon when he was back when he was settled. But he didn't have much contact except intermittent with Sienchok Wei people.

A lot of it was pretty rancorous communications too. And then in 1910, he was moving between Pannon and Singapore in the straight settlements of avoiding assassins from all sides. There were even people after him from his own party and he moved to Japan in June 1911, or he would stay until he returned to China in 1913. But in Japan, he was able to reunite with Liangchi Cho and that was pretty important.

I don't think they'd seen each other for a very long time. And they became involved in various activities after the Wu-chong uprising that spread off the 1911 Republican Revolution in October, October 10th. But this period was one in which Kong was both seen as a corrupt, he was his legacy basically from this period, judged from this period. It was as a corrupt, self-centered politician, his organization had failed to achieve its aim, so it was a complete failure.

There was no constitutional monarchy or chance of it. There were all these business members losing faith in the reform cause and moving to the revolutionary cause. And then when one looks at what happened in China during this period, just before Wu-chong in October 10th, Kong could be seen as this seminal political organizer, whose constitutional movement really was taking shape inside China, coming to fruition with a lot of his followers actually in power. So it was a complicated situation and a lot of things were happening during this period.

Outside China, this Yan Zhengwei was declining in 1909. The business scandals were not only King Joy-Lo and Tom Liang's booklet that was published, but there was another scandal that was even more inflaming, that involved more people very directly. And it was the Genhua Gung-so, the Genhua Company, which was actually a company started by the Vancouver, the prominent Vancouver Bal-Hung-gui leader, Yae-un, and also involved officials in Guangxi Province, most prominent of whom was Liu Shur-ji, who had been a very staunch Kong supporter, it really stood out for Kong much very early on. And they formed this Genhua Company, it was a natural resources and mining company that was to sort of exploit the resources in Guangxi and be invested in by these overseas Cantonese Chinese, and was seen as a kind of a patriotic project.

And it was initially backed with Kong and they got funds from the Commercial Corporation. And in 1908 and 1909, they sent a delegation with Liu and to the US and Canada to sell shares, and Xinjiang-way members were the ones who were approached, and people thought it was part of Xinjiang-way, but in fact Genhua sort of lost its connection to the Commercial Corporation. And they also began sort of bad-mouthing the Commercial Corporation, and Xinjiang-made members began to sell their Commercial Corporation shares and buy John Bois shares, I think he knew it was more honest. So this created a huge flap, Kong and Leong threatened to take John Bois back under the Commercial Corporation, and Liu Shurji refused to say, you know, we'd formed this company to save the country, not the party.

And that was sort of an anathema to say, and they sold a lot of shares, and they returned to China. Leo Shurji in May 1909 was stabbed to death, and it turned out, I guess, although it was never really resolved in quarter, anything that the murderer was someone who was close to the Bois-long-way or to the Xinjiang-way, and Kong was accused of being behind the assassination, and he had already expressed a lot of hatred towards Leo Shurji. So this really inflamed members, and some of the major people early Bauhang-wui leaders, for example, in San Francisco, defected. Some joined the revolutionaries, others just simply dropped out.

And at this time, Zung-yeh-san returned to North America in 1909. He was finally successful in really fusing in alliance with the Jirguong-tong, or the Chigong-tong, the Secret Society, which was so powerful in almost every Chinese overseas city in North America. And the first chapter of his organization, the Revolutionary Alliance to Mung-wui, was founded in New York City by people who had been leaders in the Bauhang-way, both a man and his wife, who was involved in the Women's Association. Sun came back in 1911 and was able to raise a lot of money for his Guangzhou-ups rising in April of 1911, and remained in the US, and was actually in the US, when the Wu-chong uprising on October 10th took place.

So in terms of what happened in the Chinese overseas Chinese after Wu-chong, there was a lot of people who had not been revolutionary supporters were excited about this, and they saw it as a chance for change at last. And the Xian-chung-wui, the Chinese Empire Reform Association was seen as the enemy. So some of the revolutionary supporters were attacking the Xian-chung-wui buildings, tearing down their flags, and fighting their members, and there were staunch supporters who had been with Kong from the beginning, who remained with the organization. And it's absolutely true that some institutions such as the newspaper in San Francisco, which was at that point called Shurji Aja-Bao, or World Journal, stood up for the Reformers and so on.

But it lasted until 1969, and rose again, actually, during the Cold War period in a very powerful way. But inside China, things were quite different before Wu-chong. The scandal had not reached there. It wasn't part of what was going on there.

Instead, the constitutional reforms of the Qing government were beginning to take effect. And there was a lot of organizational capacity, a lot of leadership capacity that the constitutional reformers had gained from the past decade of activism. So they were ready to assume power when they could. And the first thing that happened was in October 1909, there were provincial assemblies that met for the first time all over China.

And at that point, the Qing constitutional plan was to implement a parliament by 1917 in a constitution. But the people in the assemblies, most of them were constitutionalists. They wanted a parliament much sooner. They were very avid, very interested in lots of national issues, as well as local issues, but primarily national issues.

And they were quite concerned about the long timeline for change. Between the two provincial assembly sessions in 1909 and 1910, the legislators actually formed their own organization. And it carried on what had really been gone by Kong in 1908, which was a constitutional petition that called for a variety of parliament, equality of Manchus and Han, and a variety of other elements of reform. And so they had three petitions in 1910, each one gathering more and more signatures.

And in 1910, up to Qing princes, Zaitau in particular, who was a half-brother of Wang Xu, came to the US and Canada on missions sent by the Qing, not related to the Bauhong way or anything, but they were approached with more petitions, constitutional commissions demanding parliament by members of the Xinjiang way in New York and Chicago and so on. And then in October of 1910, another really important thing happened, and that was sort of a proto-parliament. It wasn't really a parliament, but it was called the Zijung Yuan translated as political consultative council. It was half appointed by the court and half actually elected or people that came from the provincial assemblies.

And it was chaired by Prince Poulon, who would actually represent a China at the St. Louis World's Fair in 1904 and was a real reformer, made contact during that time with many Bauhong-way people. And the third constitutional petition from the provincial assembly members was submitted the same day that this political consultative council convened for the first time and they demanded parliament in 1911, supposedly at 25 million signatures, and the political consultative council ended up spending almost the whole session discussing the petition and then endorsing it by acclamation. So it was a huge deal.

It was big news in world newspapers. Poulon called in the court to take action as the council demanded to begin to immediately transition to a situation where they could have an election by 1911. Instead, the court decided to move the parliament date from 1917 to 1913, but they also demanded all the petitioning stop. They started cracking down on the petition movement and this really enraged the constitutionalists and radicalized them.

And some of them began to already say that they were going to become, you know, if provinces started declaring independence, they would take part. So after October 10th, 1911, the surprise which hung uprising that set off the Republican Revolution turned, it was slow to sort of get going, but it basically started a movement as soon as in the United States. And Kong and Liang still hoped to have a constitutional system that was under a monarchy and they called it or Kong called it a titular monarchical republic. So in other words, it would be republic since they knew that a republic was popular, but it would be under a monarch in name only and this might be the emperor who was at that point, I think, Pui, or the most the eldest descendant of, you know, the descendant of Confucius.

And so they attempted a military political coup involving three new army commanders who had been involved with the reform movement much earlier when they were trained in Japan and probably not. Liang Chichao Prince Seitau was also involved because he at that point was in charge of the imperial guards in the Forbidden City. And so it was thought that, you know, he could basically hold Qing reaction at bay. And then they also, of course, were involving the newly empowered provincial and national legislatures who they wanted to install a constitutional representative republic under the symbolic monarchy.

So at any rate, there was actually a mutiny. I won't go into it in much depth, but but October 14th, the commanders refused orders. There were 30,000 troops under their control. They refused orders to march to Wuhan to fight the revolutionaries that had been involved in the Wuchang uprising.

The refused orders, they stayed in Luan Jo, this northern city, and the ideas that they would then march to the Forbidden City. And Seitau would command his troops to support the overthrow of the conservative court. So what happened was that the commander made these demands alongside refusing to move his troops. He made very strong political demands, basically what Kong and Liang had saw it and what was in the petitions, convening a parliament.

They wanted a cabinet that was so-called responsible cabinet with no members of the imperial family, equal treatment of Manchus and Han, amnesty to all political offenders. And the commanders, they threatened a military response if they didn't get a positive response. And the Qing backed out, it seemed to, they apologized, they sent out edicts that apologized and said that reforms would begin. They asked the political consultative council to draft a constitution, and then they gave amnesty to all the political offenders from 1898, including Kong and Liang.

But then in the political consultative council went along with it, they adopted a charter that was in keeping with the Kong and Liang and the commanders ideas. And it appeared that reform had succeeded, but a few days later, the Qing court ended up punishing the disloyal commanders, assassinating one of them. The consultative council disbanded, its members fled to Beijing, chaos descended. And one province after another was declaring independence from the Qing.

The coup was crushed very quickly, but so was the Qing. And a new military government in Wuhan was formed. Initially, constitutionalists were involved, but they were quickly sidelined and later assassinated. And for the rest of his life, Kong could not give up the idea of having a symbolic monarch as a head of a republic.

He felt there was much chaos. And Liang Chichao immediately abandoned this point of view with the inauguration of the republic, and so yes, his president. Thank you, Jing, and specifically talking about Kong's constitutionalist efforts and also different petitions and how this actually the Qing court respond in the beginning seemed to be kind of a cooperating work in favor of their petition proposal, but later on they seem to be hold another story. And to calm your way, still continue to come promote or insist for the symbolic monarchy even under the political framework of the Republic after 1911.

So with this, we all now we all know that no longer Teinan is here after 1911 after it's already being of a drone, and then we have the new republic. And Jamie, you mentioned a little bit about what happened next. The Kong still tried to kind of promote the constitutional idea or at least with the symbolic monarchy as a head. And so with this, Kong actually passed away, actually released that in 1927.

So during this, after the republic was established in 1912, 1911, all the way to his seventh death in 1927. So what happened during this period of time? Well, Kong is as you alluded to, he never gave up, but I think he realized by this time in the 1910s and in 1920s, he now he's kind of an elder statesman. Some of his people did get positions in government, but generally they didn't, they were they were on the outs.

And one might ask what did he think of the republic? Well, Jay mentioned that Jay mentioned that he favored a titular monarchical republic. Well, that's right. In his Dao Tum Shue, the book of great community that he had written many years earlier, that was one of the stages to a one world utopia.

You had the monarchy, you have a constitutional monarchy, eventually you have a monarchical republic, and he believed that if this all went well, you could move into a sort of one world government. You didn't need the monarchy eventually. You have a one world republic. So he was sort of in favor of this.

He spent his time these years in writing. He was living in eventually in Ching Dao. His young wife, his third wife, Ho John Lee died, unfortunately, I think around 1915. He married three more times after that.

So he was active in that regard. In 1917, there was another effort to restore the monarchy and to put the Pui, the shuan dong emperor back on the throne. He had been Guang Shue's successor, a young baby successor. Now he's a very young, still a boy, but to restore him to the throne and Kong initially supported the idea of being realized this isn't going to work out.

But the authorities were suspecting that he was intimately involved in this to the point that he fled and took refuge in the United States consulate in Beijing, which is a little unprecedented. That's one of the research I did looking at department of state papers at the National Archives. There was some consternation about this. Why did they let him in?

They shouldn't have given him refuge. It was the opinion back in Washington. Nothing about this. I've already given him refugees here now.