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Wah Mee massacre
Entrance to the former Wah Mee Club (2007).
Location	Seattle, Washington, United States
Date	February 18, 1983 (PST)
Attack type	mass murder, armed robbery, massacre
Deaths	13
Injured	1
Perpetrator	Kwan Fai "Willie" Mak, Wai-Chiu "Tony" Ng, B. Ng

The Wah Mee massacre was a mulitiple homicide on February 18, 1983, in which Kwan Fai "Willie" Mak, Wai-Chiu "Tony" Ng, and Benjamin Ng gunned down 14 people in the Wah Mee gambling club. Thirteen of their victims lost their lives, but one survived to testify against the three in the high-profile Seattle trial. It remains the deadliest mass murder in the state of Washington's history.

The Wah Mee club operated illegally in a basement space on Maynard Alley South, just south of South King Street in Seattle's Chinatown. The club's regulars included many wealthy restaurant owners, several of whom were among the victims. Security at the club was based in part on a system of passing through multiple successive doors, which had been used in similar Chinatown gambling dens for generations, and had usually been quite effective. Mak and his accomplices defeated the system only because they were known and trusted by the people at the club. Their presumed intent was to leave no witnesses, since club patrons could readily identify them, as, in fact, the one survivor, Wai Y. Chin, did. In fact, Mak had been planning the robbery for weeks, and he enlisted Benjamin Ng, and later Tony Ng.

Aftermath[link]

On February 24, 1983, Benjamin Ng and Willie Mak were charged with 13 counts of aggravated first-degree murder. Benjamin Ng was represented by famed Seattle defense lawyer John Henry Browne. Mak was represented by the Associated Counsel for the Accused lawyer Jim Robinson. The State was represented by William Downing and Robert Lasnik.^[1] Tony Ng became the third suspect, charged in absentia on March 30, 1983 with 13 counts of aggravated first-degree murder.

In August 1983 Benjamin Ng was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison. Two months later, Willie Mak was convicted of murder and sentenced to death.

On June 15, 1984 Tony Ng became the 387th person to be listed on the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list (see FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives, 1980s). He was arrested October 4, 1984 in Calgary, Alberta, Canada by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Tony Ng was acquitted in April 1985 of murder, but convicted of 13 counts of first-degree robbery and a single count of assault with a deadly weapon. Each robbery charge brought a minimum sentence of five years, to be served consecutively.

In February 17, 1987 the Washington State Supreme Court issued a stay of execution a month before Willie Mak's scheduled execution, but on May 2, 1988 the state Supreme Court let Mak's murder conviction stand. However, then on November 10, 1988 Willie Mak's execution was delayed indefinitely by a federal judge. On January 8, 1991 U.S. District Judge William Dwyer overturned Willie Mak's death sentence, saying Mak's attorneys failed to present evidence on their client's background that could have saved his life. On July 16, 1992 The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals refused to reinstate Mak's death sentence.

On November 9, 1994 a King County Superior Court judge denied Mak's bid for a new trial but allowed prosecutors to hold a new sentencing hearing. On February 15, 2002, a King County Superior Court judge scheduled a sentencing hearing for September 2002. On April 29, 2002 a King County Superior Court judge ruled that Mak will not face the death penalty because the 1983 jury wasn't asked to determine how much of a role he had in the crime. On September 6, 2006, a parole board met to determine whether Tony Ng should receive parole on his 12th robbery term. If given parole, he would begin serving his 13th term, and be eligible for parole and potentially freed in 2010. Both former King County Prosecutor Norm Maleng and former Seattle Police Chief Patrick Fitzsimons asked the parole board to deny parole on the 12th count. Relatives who came to the hearing expressed outrage that they were not made aware of previous parole hearings and that Tony Ng was so close to possible release because of it.^[2]

On February 2010, a parole board unanimously decided "now is the time to parole Mr. [Tony] Ng to his final count", which will allow him to be released as early as 2014.^[3]

See also[link]

• List of massacres in Washington

References[link]

1. ^ Mak spared death for Wah Mee killings, Tuesday, April 30, 2002, By Tracy Johnson, Seattle Post-Intelligencer Reporter
2. ^ The Seattle Times: Local News: 23 years haven't erased grief caused by Wah Mee Massacre
3. ^ Wah Mee Massacre prisoner closer to release, Komonews, retrieved on 15-05-2010]

External links[link]

Seattle portal

• "Wah Mee", a detailed history of the club and the massacre by Todd Matthews (PDF)
• Wah Mee Massacre at HistoryLink
• "Massacre @ South King Street" at Mutterings of a Mad Race

Coordinates: 47°35′53″N 122°19′27″W / 47.59806°N 122.32417°W / 47.59806; -122.32417

Communist Party of China 中國共產黨 中国共产党 Zhōngguó Gòngchǎndǎng
The emblem of the Communist Party of China.
General Secretary	Hu Jintao
Standing Committee	Hu Jintao, Wu Bangguo, Wen Jiabao Jia Qinglin, Li Changchun Xi Jinping, Li Keqiang He Guoqiang, Zhou Yongkang
Founded	July, 1921 (1st Party Congress) August 1920 (de facto)
Headquarters	Zhongnanhai, Beijing
Youth wing	Communist Youth League of China Young Pioneers of China
Membership  (2010)	80,269,000
Ideology	De jure Communism Marxism–Leninism De jure Factions * Maoism * Deng Xiaoping Theory * Three Represents * Scientific Development Concept De facto Factions * Conservatism[1] * Consumerism[2] * Nationalism (Chinese)[3] * Liberalism[4] * Social democracy[5]
Political position	De jure: Left to Far-left De facto: Right to Far-left[6]
Website
english.cpc.people.com.cn
Party flag
Politics of the People's Republic of China Political parties Elections

This article contains Chinese text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Chinese characters.

Communist parties
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Related topics  Communism (history)  Marxism-Leninism  Democratic centralism
v t e

The Communist Party of China (CPC), also known as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the founding and ruling political party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Although nominally it exists alongside the United Front,^[7] a coalition of governing political parties, in practice, the CPC is the only party in the PRC,^[8] maintaining a unitary government and centralizing the state, military, and media.^[9] The legal power of the Communist Party is guaranteed by the national constitution.^[9] The current party leader is Hu Jintao, who holds the title of General Secretary of the Communist Party of China. Since becoming an institution of the state, aside from official commitment to communism and Marxism-Leninism, the party also has de facto unrecognized factions including consumerist and neoliberal figures including business people on the right who effectively support capitalism, as well as factions on the left that oppose the right in the party, and other factions.^[10]

The party was founded in July 1921 in Shanghai.^[11][12][13] After a lengthy civil war, the CPC defeated its primary rival, the Kuomintang (KMT), and assumed full control of mainland China by 1949.^[14] The Kuomintang retreated to the island of Taiwan, where it still remains to this day.

The party has fluctuated between periods of reformism and political conservatism throughout its history. Both before and after the founding of the PRC, the CPC's history is defined by various power struggles and ideological battles, including destructive socio-political movements such as the Cultural Revolution. At first a conventional member of the international Communist movement, the CPC broke with its counterpart in the Soviet Union over ideological differences in the 1960s. The Communist Party's ideology was redefined under Deng Xiaoping to incorporate principles of market economics, and the corresponding reforms enabled rapid and sustained economic growth. ^[15]

The CPC is the world's largest political party,^[16] claiming over 80 million members^[17] at the end of 2010 which constitutes about 6.0% of the total population of mainland China. The vast majority of military and civil officials are members of the Party.^[18] Since 1978, the Communist Party has attempted to institutionalize transitions of power and consolidate its internal structure. The modern party stresses unity and avoids public conflict while practicing a pragmatic and open democratic centralism within the party structure.

Organization[link]

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The party's organizational structure was destroyed during the Cultural Revolution and rebuilt afterwards by Deng Xiaoping, who subsequently initiated "Socialism with Chinese characteristics" and brought all state apparatuses back under the rule of the CPC.

Theoretically, the party's highest body is the National Congress of the Communist Party of China, which meets at least once every five years. The primary organs of power in the Communist Party which is detailed in the party constitution include:

• Central Committee, which includes:
  • The General Secretary, which is the highest ranking official within the Party and usually the Chinese paramount leader.
  • The Politburo, presently consisting of 25 full members (including the members of the Politburo Standing Committee); see current members of the Politburo for a complete list.
  • The Politburo Standing Committee, which currently consists of nine members; see current members of the Politburo Standing Committee for a complete list.
  • The Secretariat, the principal administrative mechanism of the CPC, headed by the General Secretary of the Central Committee;
  • The Central Military Commission (a parallel organization of the government institution of the same name);
• The Central Discipline Inspection Commission, which is directly under the National Congress and on the same level with the Central Committee, charged with rooting out corruption and malfeasance among party cadres.

Organizations under the Central Committee[link]

Other central organizations directly under the Party Central Committee include:

• General Office^[19]
• Central Organization Department;
• Central Propaganda Department;
• Central International Liaison Department;
• Central United Front Work Department;
• Central Policy Research Office;
• Central Taiwan Work Office;
• Central External Publicity Office;
• Central Security Office;
• Central Party School;
• People's Daily;
• Seeking Truth From Facts;
• Party History Research Centre;
• Party Research Centre;
• Central Compilation and Translation Bureau.

In addition, there are numerous commissions and leading groups. Usually those commissions and leading groups have jurisdiction on both Party and State apparatus, and include ranking leaders up to the President of the People's Republic of China and the Premier of the State Council. The most important of them are:

• Central Political and Legislative Affairs Commission;
• Central Guidance Commission for Building Spiritual Civilization;
• Central Commission for Comprehensive Management of Social Order;
• State Commission for Public Sector Reform;
• Central Leading Group for Financial Work;
• Central Leading Group for Financial and Economic Affairs;
• Central Leading Group for Taiwan Affairs;
• Central Leading Group for Foreign Affairs;
• Central National Security Leading Group;
• Central Leading Group for Rural Work;
• Central Leading Group for Party Building;
• Central Leading Group for Propaganda and Ideological Work;
• Central Leading Group for Combating Pornography and Illegal Publications;
• Central Leading Group for Preventing and Handling the Problem of Heretical Organizations (related to Falun Gong);
• Central Leading Group for Preserving Stability;
• Central Leading Group for Cultural System Reform;
• Central Leading Group for Hong Kong and Macao Affairs;
• Central Leading Group for Combating Bribery;
• Central Leading Group for Protection of Party Secrets;
• Central Leading Group for Advancing Grass-roots Party Organization and Training Party Members;
• Central Leading Group for Tibet Work;
• Central Leading Group for Xinjiang Work;
• Central Anti-Corruption Guidance Group.

Every five years, the Communist Party of China holds a National Congress. The latest happened on October 19, 2007. Formally, the Congress serves two functions: to approve changes to the Party constitution regarding policy and to elect a Central Committee, about 300 strong. The Central Committee in turn elects the Politburo. In practice, positions within the Central Committee and Politburo are determined before a Party Congress, and the main purpose of the Congress is to announce the party policies and vision for the direction of China in the following few years.

The party's central focus of power is the Politburo Standing Committee. The process for selecting Standing Committee members, as well as Politburo members, occurs behind the scenes in a process parallel to the National Congress. The new power structure is announced obliquely through the positioning of portraits in the People's Daily, the official newspaper of the Party. The number of Standing Committee members varies and has tended to increase over time. The Committee was expanded to nine at the 16th Party National Congress in 2009.

There are two other key organs of political power in the People's Republic of China: the formal government and the People's Liberation Army. The Party's main bodies to oversee the PLA are the Central Military Commission and the General Political Department.

There are, in addition to decision-making roles, advisory committees, including the People's Political Consultative Conference. During the 1980s and 1990s there was a Central Advisory Commission established by Deng Xiaoping which consisted of senior retired leaders, but with their death this has been abolished since 1992.

Factions[link]

The flag of the Communist Party of China

Political theorists have identified two groupings within the Communist Party^[20] leading to a structure which has been called "one party, two factions".^[21] The first is the "elitist coalition" or Shanghai clique which contains mainly officials who have risen from the more prosperous provinces. The second is the "populist coalition", the core of which are the tuanpai, or the "Youth League faction" which consists mainly of officials who have risen from the rural interior, through the Communist Youth League. Minor informal groupings include the reformist Qinghua clique, and the derogatorily termed Crown Prince Party of officials benefiting from nepotism. The interaction between the two main factions is largely complementary with each faction possessing a particular expertise and both committed to the continued rule of the Communist Party and not allowing intra-party factional politics threaten party unity. It has been noted that party and government positions have been assigned to create a very careful balance between these two groupings.

Within his "one party, two factions" model, Li Chen has noted that one should avoid labelling these two groupings with simplistic ideological labels, and that these two groupings do not act in a zero-sum, winner take all fashion. Neither group has the ability or will to dominate the other completely.^[22]

Membership[link]

The party was small at first, but grew intermittently through the 1920s. Twelve voting delegates were seated at the 1st National Congress in 1921, as well as at the 2nd (in 1922), when they represented 195 party members. By 1923, the 420 members were represented by 30 delegates. The 1925 4th Congress had 20 delegates representing 994 members; then real growth kicked in. The 5th Congress (held in April–May 1927 as the KMT was cracking down on communists) comprised 80 voting delegates representing 57,968 members.

It was on October 3, 1928 6th Congress that the now-familiar ‘full’ and ‘alternate’ structure originated, with 84 and 34 delegates, respectively. Membership was estimated at 40,000. In 1945, the 7th Congress had 547 full and 208 alternate delegates representing 1.21 million members, a ratio of one representative per 1,600 members as compared to 1:725 in 1927.

After the Party defeated the Nationalists, participation at National Party Congresses became much less representative. Each of the 1026 full and 107 alternate members represented 9,470 party members (10.73 million in total) at the 1956 8th Congress. Subsequent congresses held the number of participants down despite membership growing to more than 60 million by 2000.^[23]

History[link]

Location of the first Congress of the Chinese Communist Party in July 1921, in Xintiandi, former French Concession, Shanghai. Museum of the First National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party.

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The CPC has its origins in the May Fourth Movement of 1919, where radical political systems like anarchism and Communism gained traction among Chinese intellectuals.^[24] Stalin opposed the Chinese Communist Party in Xinjiang because he wanted to expand Soviet influence in the province.^[25] The CPC's ideologies have significantly evolved since its founding and establishing political power in 1949. Mao's revolution that founded the PRC was nominally based on Marxism-Leninism with a rural focus based on China's social situations at the time. During the 1960s and 1970s, the CPC experienced a significant ideological breakdown with the Communist Party of the Soviet Union under Nikita Khrushchev, and later, Leonid Brezhnev. Since then Mao's peasant revolutionary vision and so-called "continued revolution under the dictatorship of the proletariat" stipulated that class enemies continued to exist even though the socialist revolution seemed to be complete, giving way to the Cultural Revolution. This fusion of ideas became known officially as "Mao Zedong Thought", or Maoism outside of China. It represented a powerful branch of communism that existed in opposition to the Soviet Union's "Marxist revisionism".

Following the death of Mao Zedong in 1976, however, the CPC under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping moved towards Socialism with Chinese characteristics and instituted Chinese economic reform.^[26] In reversing some of Mao's "extreme-leftist" policies, Deng argued that a socialist country and the market economy model were not mutually exclusive. While asserting the political power of the Party itself, the change in policy generated significant economic growth.^[27] The ideology itself, however, came into conflict on both sides of the spectrum with Maoists as well as progressive liberals, culminating with other social factors to cause the 1989 Tiananmen Square Protests. Deng's vision for economic success and a new socialist market model became entrenched in the Party constitution in 1997 as Deng Xiaoping Theory.

Chinese communists celebrate Stalin's birthday, 1949

The "third generation" of leadership under Jiang Zemin, Zhu Rongji, and associates largely continued Deng's progressive economic vision while overseeing the re-emergence of Chinese nationalism in the 1990s. Nationalist sentiment has seemingly also evolved to become informally the part of the Party's guiding doctrine. As part of Jiang's nominal legacy, the CPC ratified the Three Represents into the 2003 revision of the Party Constitution as a "guiding ideology", encouraging the Party to represent "advanced productive forces, the progressive course of China's culture, and the fundamental interests of the people." There are various interpretations of the Three Represents. Most notably, the theory has legitimized the entry of private business owners and quasi-"bourgeoisie" elements into the party.

The insistent road of focusing almost exclusively on economic growth has led to a wide range of serious social problems. The CPC's "fourth generation" of leadership under Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao, after taking power in 2003, attempted reversing such a trend by bringing forth an integrated ideology that tackled both social and economic concerns. This new ideology was known as the creation of a Harmonious Society using the Scientific Development Concept.

The degree of power the Party had on the state has gradually decreased as economic liberalizations progressed. The evolution of CPC ideology has gone through a number of defining changes that it no longer bears much resemblance to its founding principles. Some believe that the large amount of economic liberalization starting from the late 1970s to present, indicates that the CPC has transitioned to endorse economic neoliberalism.^{[28][29][30][31]} The CPC's current policies are fiercely rejected as capitalist by most communists, especially anti-revisionists, and by adherents of the Chinese New Left from within the PRC.

The Communist Party of China comprises a single-party state form of government; however, there are parties other than the CPC within China, which report to the United Front Department of the Communist Party of China and do not act as opposition or independent parties. Since the 1980s, as its commitment to Marxist ideology has appeared to wane, the party has begun to increasingly invoke Chinese nationalism as a legitimizing principle as opposed to the socialist construction for which the party was originally created. The change from socialism to nationalism has pleased the CPC's former enemy, the Kuomintang (KMT), which has warmed its relations with the CPC since 2003.^[32]

Political ideology and stances[link]

Regional corruption and reform[link]

The leaders of the Communist Party of China realize that there are serious problems with political corruption within China and with maintaining the trust of the Chinese people because of it. However, attempts made in closed-door sessions at the Fourth Plenary Session of the 17th Communist Party of China's Central Committee in September 2009 to grapple with these problems produced inconclusive results, although a directive which requires disclosure of investments and property holdings by party and governmental officials was passed.^[33]

Relationship with competing ideologies[link]

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Trotskyists argue that the party was doomed to its present character, that of petty-bourgeois nationalism in the 1920s, because of the near-annihilation of the workers' movement in the KMT betrayal of 1927, which was made possible by Stalin's order that the Communists join with the KMT in a centrist coalition, effectively disarming it, which opportunity the KMT swiftly exploited to defeat the communist revolution.^[34] This slaughter forced the tiny surviving Party to switch from a workers' union- to a peasant, guerilla-based organization, and to seek the aid of the most heterodox sources: from "patriotic capitalists" to the dreaded KMT itself, with which it openly sought to participate in a coalition government, even after the Japanese general surrender in 1945.^[35] Chinese Trotskyists from Chen Duxiu onward have called for a political revolution against what they see as an opportunist, capitalist leadership of the CPC.

Mao Zedong meets with President Nixon, February 29, 1972

Marxists also existed in the Kuomintang party. They viewed the Chinese revolution in different terms than the Communists, claiming that China already went past its feudal stage and in a stagnation period rather than in another mode of production. These Marxists in the Kuomintang opposed the Chinese communist party ideology.^[36]

Maoists and other 'anti-revisionists' viciously attack the changes after Mao Zedong's death, calling them the precise "capitalist road" Mao had pledged to fight during the early existence of the PRC. They do not hold any allegiance to the CPC. An example of a well-known group, until recently armed, that looks to Mao's principles is the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) who the current CPC has publicly opposed. Also, some Maoist groupings attack even some of the shifts and changes that occurred while Mao was still alive and in leadership, like his 1972 welcoming of Richard Nixon (see lesser evil for more on this event). The Chinese New Left, which encompasses these Maoists and other postmodernists is a current within China that seeks to "revert China to the socialist road" – i.e., to return China to the socialist system that existed before Deng Xiaoping's reforms.

Some of the opponents of the Party within the Chinese democracy movement have tended not to argue that a strong Chinese state is inherently bad, but rather that the Communist leadership is corrupt.^{[clarification needed]} The Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 represented a controversial point in criticism of the Chinese Communist Party by Chinese students within China.^[37]

Another school of thought argues that the worst of the abuses took place decades ago, and that the current leaders were not only unconnected with them, but were actually victims of that era. They have also argued that, while the modern Communist Party may be flawed, it is comparatively better than previous regimes, with respect to improving the general standard of living, than any other government that has governed China in the past century and can be seen in a more favourable light compared with most governments of the developing nations. As a result, the CPC has recently taken sweeping measures to regain support from the countryside, with limited success.

In addition, some scholars contend that China has never operated under a decentralized democratic regime in its several thousand years of history, and therefore it can be argued that the present political structure, albeit not up to Western moral or political standards, is the best possible option when compared to the alternatives. A sudden transition to democracy, these experts contend, would result in the economic and political upheaval that occurred in the Soviet Union in the late 1980s, and that by focusing on economic growth, China is setting the stage for a more gradual but sustainable transition to a more politically liberal system. This group sees mainland China as being similar to Franco's Spain in the 1960s, and South Korea during the 1970s when South Korea was run by corrupt, authoritarian regimes. This school of thought also brings together some unlikely political allies. Not only do most intellectuals within the Chinese government follow this school of thinking, but it is also the common belief held amongst pro-free trade liberals in the West.

Many observers from both within and outside of China have argued that the CPC has taken gradual steps towards democracy and transparency, hence arguing that it is best to give it time and room to evolve into a better government that is more responsive to its people rather than forcing an abrupt change with all the deleterious effects such a loss of stability might entail.^[38] However, other observers (like Minxin Pei) question whether these steps are genuine efforts towards democratic reform or disingenuous measures by the CPC to retain power.^[39]

Religion[link]

The CPC is officially atheist, and prohibits party members from holding religious beliefs (though this ban is, in many cases, unenforceable).

The Party's United Front Work Department coordinates with the State Administration for Religious Affairs to manage the country's five officially sanctioned religions. Unregistered religious groups face varying degrees of suppression under the Communist Party.

Current leadership[link]

The Members of the Politburo Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China are:

1. Hu Jintao: CPC General Secretary, PRC President, Chairman of the Central Military Commission.
2. Wu Bangguo: Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress
3. Wen Jiabao: Premier of the State Council of the People's Republic of China
4. Jia Qinglin: Chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference
5. Li Changchun: Chairman of the CPC Central Guidance Commission for Building Spiritual Civilization
6. Xi Jinping: Top-ranked Secretary of CPC Central Secretariat, Vice President of the People's Republic of China, Vice Chairman of the Central Military Commission
7. Li Keqiang: First-ranked Vice Premier of the State Council of the People's Republic of China
8. He Guoqiang: Secretary of Central Commission for Discipline Inspection
9. Zhou Yongkang: Secretary of Political and Legislative Affairs Committee

Members of the Politburo of the CPC Central committee: Wang Lequan, Wang Zhaoguo, Hui Liangyu, Liu Qi, Liu Yunshan, Li Changchun, Wu Yi, Wu Bangguo, Wu Guanzheng, Zhang Lichang, Zhang Dejiang, Luo Gan, Zhou Yongkang, Hu Jintao, Yu Zhengsheng, He Guoqiang, Jia Qinglin, Guo Boxiong, Cao Gangchuan, Zeng Qinghong, Zeng Peiyan, Wen Jiabao.

Alternate member of the Politburo of the CPC Central Committee: Wang Gang

Members of the Secretariat of the CPC Central Committee: Zeng Qinghong, Liu Yunshan, Zhou Yongkang, He Guoqiang, Wang Gang, Xu Caihou, He Yong.

Historical leaders[link]

Between 1921 and 1943 the Communist Party of China was headed by the General Secretary:

• Chen Duxiu, General Secretary 1921–1922 and 1925–1927
• Qu Qiubai, General Secretary 1927–1928
• Xiang Zhongfa, General Secretary 1928–1931
• Li Lisan, acting General Secretary 1929–1930
• Wang Ming, acting General Secretary 1931
• Bo Gu, a.k.a. Qin Bangxian, acting General Secretary 1932–1935
• Zhang Wentian a.k.a. Luo Fu, acting General Secretary 1935–1943

In 1943 the position of Chairman of the Communist Party of China was created.

• Mao Zedong, Chairman 1943–1976
• Hua Guofeng, Chairman 1976–1981
• Hu Yaobang, Chairman 1981–1982

In 1982, the post of Chairman was abolished, and the General Secretary, at this time held by the same man as the post of Chairman, once again became the supreme office of the Party.

• Hu Yaobang, General Secretary 1982–1987
• Zhao Ziyang, General Secretary 1987–1989
• Jiang Zemin, General Secretary 1989–2002
• Hu Jintao, General Secretary since 2002

Funding[link]

Though the CPC charges a limited due on its members for its expenditure, its total amount would be insignificant for the continued operation of this hegemony. The actual ratio of membership dues among the total amount is less than 1/11. While the budget constitutes of limited amount of donations and business operations owned by the party, its majority comes from the grant of national treasury,^[40] the same way that supports the other 8 subordinative registered parties, which making a bizarre exception among modern political parties. However, unlike the governmental departments, there is not even a de jure procedure for legal supervision of such grants as for now. Proposals for reformation has since been put aside untouched.

See also[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Communist Party of China

• Official News of the Communist Party of China
• Official newspaper
• Ninety years since the founding of the CCP – a Trotskyist apraisal
• Join the Party – slideshow by The First Post
• The Communist Party of China—Council on Foreign Relations
• "A Struggle Within the Chinese Communist Party"—Monthly Review article from May 2002
• Partying With Communists in China — slideshow by Life magazine

Nathuram Godse
Nathuram Godse at Mahatma Gandhi's murder trial
Born	(1910-05-19)19 May 1910 Baramati, Pune District, Bombay Presidency, British India (now in Maharashtra, India)
Died	15 November 1949(1949-11-15) (aged 39) Ambala Prison, Punjab Province, Dominion of India (now in Haryana, India)
Cause of death	Execution by hanging
Nationality	Indian
Known for	Assassination of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

Nathuram Vinayak Godse (19 May 1910 – 15 November 1949), was the sole assassin of Mahatma Gandhi—the pre-eminent leader of Indian nationalism in British ruled India and apostle of non-violence—shooting Gandhi in the chest three times at point blank range on 30 January 1948 in New Delhi. Godse, a Hindu nationalist activist from Pune, Maharashtra who resented what he considered was Gandhi's partiality to India's Muslims, plotted the assassination with Narayan Apte and six others. After a trial that lasted over a year, Godse was sentenced to death on 8 November, 1949. Although pleas for commutation were made by India's prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru and by Gandhi's two sons on the grounds that a death sentence would dishonour the legacy of a man opposed to all forms of violence, Godse was hanged a week later.

Early life[link]

Nathuram Vinayak Godse was born in nativity mission center Pune District in a Chitpavan Brahmin family. His father, Vinayak Vamanrao Godse, was a post office employee and his co mother was Lakshmi (near Godavari). At birth, he was named Ramachandra.

Nathuram was given his name because of an unfortunate incident. Before he was born, his parents had three sons and a daughter, with all three boys dying in their infancy. Fearing a curse that targeted male children, young Ramachandra was brought up as a girl for the first few years of his life, including having his nose pierced and being made to wear a nose-ring (nath in Marathi). It was then that he earned the nickname "Nathuram" (literally "Ram with a nose-ring"). After his younger brother was born, they switched to treating him as a boy.^[1]

Godse attended the local school at Baramati through the fifth standard, after which he was sent to live with an aunt in Pune so that he could study at an English-language school. During his school days, he highly respected Gandhi.^[2] In 1930, Nathuram's father was transferred to the town of Ratnagiri.

Political career[link]

Group photo of people accused in the murder of Mohandas Gandhi. Standing (L to R): Shankar Kistaiya, Gopal Godse, Madanlal Pahwa, Digambar Ramchandra Badge. Seated (L to R): Narayan Apte, Vinayak D. Savarkar, Nathuram Godse, Vishnu Karkare

Godse dropped out of high school and became an activist with Hindu nationalist organizations such as the Hindu Mahasabha, and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), although the RSS has claimed he left during the mid-1930s.^[3][4] They were particularly opposed to the separatist politics of the All India Muslim League. Godse started a Marathi newspaper for Hindu Mahasabha called Agrani, which some years later was renamed Hindu Rashtra.

The Hindu Mahasabha had initially backed Gandhi's campaigns of civil disobedience against the British government.

Godse later rejected Gandhi, after he saw Gandhi's repeated sabotage against the interests of Hindus by using the "fasting unto death" tactic on many issues. In Godse's view, Gandhi was giving into Muslim interests in ways that seemed unfair and anti-national. He blamed Gandhi for the Partition of India, which left hundreds of thousands of people dead in the wake of religious unrest.

Godse was against Gandhi's personal teachings of extreme or absolutist non violence. He thought that such non-violent ideology would lead to Hindus losing the will to fight against other religions, which he saw as a matter of self-defense, and thereby becoming permanently enslaved. This has been said to be one of the major reasons behind his decision to kill Gandhi.^{[citation needed]}

Assassination of Mohandas Gandhi[link]

Godse approached Gandhi on January 30, 1948 during the evening prayer. When he bowed, one of the girls flanking and supporting Gandhi, Abha Chattopadhyay, said to him, "Brother, Bapu is already late" and tried to put him off but he pushed her aside and shot Gandhi in the chest three times at point-blank range with a Beretta M 1934 semi-automatic pistol. Gandhi died almost immediately. Godse was attacked and pinned to the ground by the crowd around him and was subsequently arrested when a small group of police officers arrived on the scene a few minutes later.

Trial[link]

Following the assassination of Gandhi, he was put on trial at Peterhoff, Shimla which housed the Punjab High Court.

Execution[link]

On November 8, 1949, Godse was sentenced to death. Among those calling for commutation of the death sentence for the defendants were Jawahar Lal Nehru, as well as Gandhi's two sons, who felt that executing their father's killers would dishonour his memory and legacy which included a staunch opposition to the death penalty. Godse was hanged at Ambala Jail on November 15, 1949,^[5] along with Narayan Apte, a co-conspirator. Savarkar was also charged with conspiracy in the assassination of Gandhi, but was acquitted and subsequently released.

Aftermath[link]

Millions of Indians mourned Gandhi's assassination. The Hindu Mahasabha was vilified and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh was temporarily banned. However, investigators could find no evidence that the RSS bureaucracy had formally sponsored or even knew of Godse's plot. The RSS ban was lifted by Prime Minister Nehru and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel in 1949.

The RSS, to this day, denies any connection with Godse, and disputes the claim that he was a member.^[4]

After the assassination, many criticized^[who?] the Indian government for not doing more to protect Gandhi who, earlier in the week, had been the target of a bomb plot by the same conspirators. Of particular concern was the fact that a Bombay detective had wired the names and descriptions of the assassins along with the fact that they were known to be in Delhi stalking Gandhi. On the other hand, Gandhi had repeatedly refused to cooperate with his own security and had resigned himself to a violent death which he accepted as an inevitable part of his destiny.

In art[link]

The film Hey Ram, made in 2000, also briefly touches upon events related to the assassination. The Marathi language play Me Nathuram Godse Boltoy (Marathi: मी नथुराम गोडसे बोलतोय) ("This is Nathuram Godse Speaking") was also made, but only from Godse's point of view, and failed to uncover the actual events.^[6][7]

Three books based on Nathuram Godse's life were banned by the Indian government:^{[citation needed]}

• Why I assassinated Mahatma Gandhi, published by Surya Bharti, Delhi, India, 2003. ISBN 1-375-09979-6
• May it Please your Honor!, published by Surya Bharti, India, 2003
• Gandhi Vadh aur Main (Gandhi Hatya Aani Me), by Gopal Godse, 1989.

The actor Horst Buchholz portrayed Nathuram Godse in the film Nine Hours to Rama (1963).

See also[link]

• Dev Raj Singh Thakur

Notes[link]

References[link]

1. Elst, Koenraad, Gandhi and Godse - a Review and a Critique, Voice of India, 2001. ISBN 81-85990-71-9
2. Godse, Nathuram, Why I Assassinated Mahatma Gandhi, Surya Bharti, Delhi, India, 2003. OCLC 33991989
3. Godse, Nathuram May it Please Your Honor!, Surya Bharti, India, 2003
4. Khosla, G.D., Murder of the Mahatma and Other Cases from a Judge's Notebook, Jaico Publishing House, 1968. ISBN 0-88253-051-8
5. Malgonkar, Manohar (2008). The Men Who Killed Gandhi, New Delhi: Roli Books, ISBN 978-81-7436-617-7
6. Phadke, Y.D., Nathuramayan
7. Rakshit R. Madapur, "Art of Assassination" 2011

External links[link]

	India portal
	Biography portal

• Godse's Final Speech to the Court
• Nathuram Godse and Gandhism with interviews and links
• Time Magazine's February 2000 interview of Gopal Godse
• Rediff's January 1998 interview of Gopal Godse
• Article discussing pro-Godse play
• Eyewitness to Gandhi assassination
• Eyewitness: Mahatma Gandhi Assassination on YouTube
• First Information Report (FIR) by police
• Why Godse killed Gandhi by Rajeev Srinivasan
• Mi Nathuram Godse Boltoy

James Fenimore Cooper
Portrait by John Wesley Jarvis
Born	(1789-09-15)September 15, 1789 Burlington, New Jersey
Died	September 14, 1851(1851-09-14) (aged 61) Cooperstown, New York
Occupation	Novelist
Genres	Historical fiction
Literary movement	Colonial Realism
Notable work(s)	The Last of the Mohicans

James Fenimore Cooper (September 15, 1789 – September 14, 1851) was a prolific and popular American writer of the early 19th century. He is best remembered as a novelist who wrote numerous sea-stories and the historical novels known as the Leatherstocking Tales, featuring frontiersman Natty Bumppo. Among his most famous works is the Romantic novel The Last of the Mohicans, often regarded as his masterpiece.

Biography[link]

Early life[link]

James Fenimore Cooper was born in Burlington, New Jersey, the son of William and Elizabeth (Fenimore) Cooper. His father was a United States Congressman. Shortly after his first birthday, his family moved to Cooperstown, New York, a community founded by his father.

At the age of 13, Cooper was enrolled at Yale, but he did not obtain a degree, due to his expulsion, apparently for a dangerous prank that involved blowing up another student's door.^[1] Another less dangerous prank consisted of training a donkey to sit in a professor's chair.^[2] He obtained work as a sailor on a merchant vessel, and at 18, joined the United States Navy. He obtained the rank of midshipman before leaving in 1811.

At age 21, he married Susan DeLancey. They had seven children, five of whom lived to adulthood. His daughter, Susan Fenimore Cooper, was a writer on nature, female suffrage, and other topics. She and her father often edited each other’s work.^[3] The writer Paul Fenimore Cooper was a great-grandson of James Cooper.

Writings[link]

He anonymously published his first book, Precaution (1820). He soon issued several others. In 1823, he published The Pioneers; this was the first of the Leatherstocking series, featuring Natty Bumppo, the resourceful American woodsman at home with the Delaware Indians and especially their chief Chingachgook. Cooper's most famous novel, The Last of the Mohicans (1826), became one of the most widely read American novels of the 19th century. The book was written in New York City, where Cooper and his family lived from 1822 to 1826.

In 1826 Cooper moved his family to Europe, where he sought to gain more income from his books as well as provide better education for his children. While overseas, he continued to write. His books published in Paris include The Red Rover and The Water Witch—two of his many sea stories. During his time in Paris, the Cooper family was seen as the center of the small American expatriate community. During this time he developed a friendship with the painter Samuel Morse and French General and American Revolutionary War hero, marquis de Lafayette. ^[4]

In 1832 he entered the lists as a political writer; in a series of letters to the National, a Parisian journal, he defended the United States against a string of charges brought against them by the Revue Britannique. For the rest of his life, he continued skirmishing in print, sometimes for the national interest, sometimes for that of the individual, and not infrequently for both at once.

Otsego Hall, Cooper's ancestral home

This opportunity to make a political confession of faith reflected the political turn he already had taken in his fiction, having attacked European anti-republicanism in The Bravo (1831). Cooper continued this political course in The Heidenmauer (1832) and The Headsman: or the Abbaye of Vigneron (1833). The Bravo depicted Venice as a place where a ruthless oligarchy lurks behind the mask of the "serene republic". All were widely read on both sides of the Atlantic, though The Bravo was a critical failure in the United States.^[5]

In 1833 Cooper returned to the United States and immediately published A Letter to My Countrymen, in which he gave his own version of the controversy and sharply censured his compatriots for their share in it. He followed up with novels and several sets of notes on his travels and experiences in Europe. His Homeward Bound and Home as Found are notable for containing a highly idealized self portrait.

In June 1834, Cooper decided to reopen his ancestral mansion, Otsego Hall, at Cooperstown. It had long been closed and falling into decay; he had been absent from the mansion nearly 16 years. Repairs were begun, and the house was speedily put in order. At first, he wintered in New York City and summered in Cooperstown, but eventually he made Otsego Hall his permanent home.^[6]

Reaction[link]

Photograph by Mathew Brady c. 1850

His books related to current politics and Cooper's self promotion increased the ill feeling between author and public. The Whig press was virulent in its comments about him, and Cooper filed legal actions for libel, winning all his lawsuits.

After concluding his last case in court, Cooper returned to writing with more energy and success than he had had for several years. He wrote a history of the US Navy, and returned to the Leatherstocking series with The Pathfinder, or The Inland Sea (1840) and The Deerslayer (1841) and other novels. He wrote again on maritime themes, including Ned Myers, or A Life Before the Mast, which is of particular interest to naval historians.

Later life[link]

He turned again from pure fiction to the combination of art and controversy in which he had achieved distinction with the Littlepage Manuscripts (1845–1846). His next novel was The Crater, or Vulcan's Peak (1847), in which he attempted to introduce supernatural machinery. Jack Tier (1848) was a remaking of The Red Rover, and The Ways of the Hour was his last completed novel.

Cooper spent the last years of his life back in Cooperstown. He died of dropsy on September 14, 1851, the day before his 62nd birthday. His interment was in Christ Episcopal Churchyard, where his father, William Cooper, was buried. Several well-known writers, politicians, and other public figures honored Cooper's memory with a dinner in February 1852; Washington Irving served as a co-chairman for the event, alongside William Cullen Bryant and Daniel Webster.^[7]

Legacy and criticism[link]

Cooper was honored on a U.S. commemorative stamp, issued in 1940

A stamp of the Soviet Union commemorating Cooper's bicentennial in 1989

Cooper was one of the most popular 19th-century American authors, and his work was admired greatly throughout the world. While on his death bed, the Austrian composer Franz Schubert wanted most to read more of Cooper's novels.^[8] Honoré de Balzac, the French novelist and playwright, admired him greatly^{[citation needed]}. Cooper's stories have been translated into nearly all the languages of Europe and into some of those of Asia.

Cooper's work is read carefully by law and literature scholars such as Nan Goodman, who argues that several of Cooper's novels, particularly The Pioneers and The Pilot, demonstrate an early 19th century American preoccupation with prudence and negligence in a country where property rights were often still in dispute.^[9] However, despite his close association with the period, he also innovated in several ways. Amongst these, Cooper was the first major American Novelist to include African and African American characters. Though these black characters often fell into stereotypical roles, he still used slaves, free Negroes and mulattoes throughout his books.^[10]

Statue in Cooperstown, New York

Furthermore, Cooper was innovative in his use and portrayal of Native Americans, who play central roles in his Leatherstocking tales. However, his treatment of this group is a complex and highlights the tenuous relationship between frontier settlers and Indians.^{[citation needed]} Often, he gives contrasting views of Native characters to emphasize their potential for good, or conversely, their potential for mayhem.^{[citation needed]} In Last of the Mohicans, the stereotypical, nineteenth century view of the native is seen in the character of Magua, who is devoid of almost any redeeming qualities. In comparison, Chingachgook, the last chief of the Mohicans, is portrayed as noble, courageous, and heroic.

Though some scholars may dispute Cooper being classified as a Romantic, Victor Hugo pronounced him greater than the great master of modern romance^{[citation needed]}, and this verdict was echoed by a multitude of less famous readers^[who?], who were satisfied with no title for their favorite less than that of the "American Scott.”^{[citation needed]} The Deerslayer and The Pathfinder were criticized by Mark Twain in a satirical but vicious essay, "Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses" (1895),^[11] which has often been criticized as unfair and distorted.^[12] As scholars Schachterle and Ljungquist write, "Twain's deliberate misreading of Cooper has been devastating....Twain valued economy of style (a possible but not necessary criterion), but such concision simply was not a characteristic of many early nineteenth-century novelists' work. Writing with the expectation that their readers would often read their works aloud, Scott, Dickens, Thackeray, Cooper, and Melville favored a full, sometimes rotund, style that Twain and his fellow Realists a generation later spurned."^[13]

His reputation today rests upon the five Leatherstocking tales and some of the maritime stories. Literary scholar Leslie Fiedler, however, noted that Cooper's "collected works are monumental in their cumulative dullness."^[14]

Cooper was also criticized heavily for his depiction of women characters in his work. James Russell Lowell, Cooper's contemporary and a critic, referred to it poetically in A Fable for Critics, writing, ". . . the women he draws from one model don't vary / All sappy as maples and flat as a prairie."^[15]

Three dining halls at the State University of New York at Oswego are named in Cooper's remembrance (Cooper Hall, The Pathfinder, and Littlepage) because of his temporary residence in Oswego and for setting some of his works there.^[16] The gilded and red tole chandelier hanging in the library of the White House in Washington DC is from the home of James Fenimore Cooper. It was brought there through the efforts of First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy in her great White House restoration.^{[citation needed]} The James Fenimore Cooper Memorial Prize at New York University is awarded annually to an outstanding undergraduate student of journalism. ^[17]

Bibliography[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: James Fenimore Cooper

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: James Fenimore Cooper

Wikisource has original works written by or about: James Fenimore Cooper

• Works by or about James Fenimore Cooper at Internet Archive (scanned books original editions color illustrated)
• Works by James Fenimore Cooper at Project Gutenberg (multiple formats)
• Works by or about James Fenimore Cooper in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• James Fenimore Cooper at Open Library
• James Fenimore Cooper Society Homepage
• James Fenimore Cooper at the Internet Movie Database
•  Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Cooper, James Fenimore". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 
• The Cambridge History of American Literature, Book II, Chapter VI, Fiction I: Brown, Cooper
• "James Fenimore Cooper". Find a Grave. http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=228. Retrieved 2008-03-31. 
• James Fenimore Cooper Society Website
• Essay on Fenimore Cooper: Works in biographical/historical context
• Thomas R. Lounsbury: James Fenimore Cooper. 6th Edition. Boston, Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1886 (American Men of Letters). PDF from the Arno Schmidt Reference Library
• James Fenimore Cooper at C-SPAN's American Writers: A Journey Through History