A Comparative Study Of Li Yuanhong And Cheng Dequan In The 1911 Revolution

Li Yuanhong and Cheng Dequan were both influential men in the Revolution of1911.They were all the creators of the Republic of China.Before the outbreak of Wuchang Uprising,Li Yuanhong was a high-ranking general officer of the Hubei New Army and Cheng Dequan was a true responsible governor of Jiangsu.They were all senior officers who laid down their lives for the Qing government.So how had they gone from the important officials of Qing government to the founding fathers of Republic of China? The author had found the answer from their early experiences and ideological tendencies.Namely,as the members coming from civilians,they had already embraced the political tendency of “constitutional monarchy” before the outbreak of the revolution along with progress of the national crisis and the effects of the Eastward Dissemination of Western Sciences and established good relationships with local constitutionalism leaders.Hence,after the revolution broke out,they have given up their “constitutional monarchy” posture and turned to the “constitutional republic” immediately since they failed to try to save the Qing Emperor.They espoused the revolution and made outstanding contributions to the foundation of Republic of China.This article inspected and analyzed Li Yuanhong and Cheng Dequan during the Revolution of 1911 from the aspects of their functions in the Revolution of 1911,their countermeasures for the anti-Qing secret societies and their attitudes shift in the Second Revolution and the compared the similarities and differences between them.As the supreme leaders of Wuchang and Suzhou,Li and Cheng represented two models of the Revolution of 1911 in varying degrees respectively,namely,the violent revolution model in Wuchang and the peaceful recovery model in Suzhou.These two models supplied each other,jointly contributed to the victory of the Revolution of1911 in the whole country and played an important role in the establishment of Republic of China.As for their countermeasures for anti-Qing secret societies,why did Cheng get the trust of Suzhou people after Xi Chenghui Event?And why did Li receive a great reputation decline after Zhang Fang Incident? The author analyzed and investigated this question from the points of their class origins,counselors and strengths.During the Second Revolution,in order to maintain the hard-won democratic republic system,both Li and Cheng advocated to solve the Song Jiaoren Assassination Case and the Great Loan Case through legal actions and opposed this revolution.However,due to the weak power of the centrists represented by them.They didn’t have the ability to shape the political situation.Li Yuanhong once resisted Yuan Shikai’s claim to be a king after the Second Revolution,sparing no efforts to boycotted the forceful unification of the Northern Warlords and turning to road of industries salvation.He never abandoned the banner of democratic republic all his life.Although Cheng Dequan followed the Buddhism,he never felt regret about his revolution choose in 1911 and had engaged in public charity with a merciful heart of Buddhist.On the 106 th anniversary of the Revolution of 1911,the historical achievements from these two great men who conformed to the trend of history and promoted the success of the 1911 Revolution should not be forgot.