young marshal spring and autumn

In the first battle between Hunan and Hubei, Zhao Hengti, governor of Hunan, lost his troops and abandoned the land.He is also a different person, regardless of his merits and demerits, as far as his calligraphy is concerned, he is very prominent among celebrities in modern history.The evaluation of him in history is that "the traditional skills are profound, the masters are orderly, the context is clear, and the rules are well-regulated, especially the official script, which is calm and agile, and bold and quiet."In the living room of Chiang Ching-kuo’s Qihai “President’s Mansion” in the official history, Zhang Daqian’s ink paintings and couplets written by Zhao Hengti hang on the walls.

Military incompetence does not mean political naivety.In the early years of the Republic of China, when he served as the governor of Hunan, he wanted to make a constitution and promote Hunan's autonomy. To put it bluntly, he wanted to pull the banner of public opinion into a tiger skin and prevent warlords from other provinces from getting involved in Hunan in order to protect themselves.In fact, this purpose does not violate the fundamental interests of the people of Hunan. Comparing the troops from the northern and southern provinces fighting over and over again, it is only in the name of unity. In fact, life and property are at stake. How can the people of Hunan say what they want on their own land?So even though Zhao Hengti practiced democracy in the name of bribery, the people of Hunan finally acquiesced in his actions.

Objectively speaking, no matter how unfair Zhao Hengti's "self-government and constitution-making" is, once he puts on the "self-government" hat, it will indeed create a great obstacle to the attempts of the north and the south to get involved in Hunan.In the official history, Wu Peifu in the north occupied Yueyang later, and could attack Changsha in the south at any time. That was just a matter of destroying the dynasty, but why didn't he do it?On the one hand, it was to leave a buffer between Zhao Hengtizuo and Sun Yat-sen in Guangdong. On the other hand, there is no denying that the autonomy of Hunan Province and Zhao's democratically elected governor status were legal obstacles that Wu Peifu could not easily bypass.In the south, Sun Yat-sen wanted to unify the whole of China with the Northern Expedition by force, but he could only persuade Zhao Hengti to join his camp by coaxing him, instead of rashly using force in Hunan.When Zhao Hengti disagreed, Sun Yat-sen had no choice but to detour to Jiangxi for the Northern Expedition.

When he was defeated and held accountable, he didn't think about the situation and said instead: "In this battle, not only did self-government fail to be brought into full play, but the army was lost!" The so-called "Hunan people governing Hunan" also lost the possibility of exact implementation.Zhao Hengti originally wanted to use Hubei as a buffer zone so that the Beiyang system would not easily get involved in Hunan, but he didn't expect that stealing chickens would not be a counterfeit, and he directly introduced the People's Army into his own gate.In this Battle of Hunan and Hubei, Zhao Hengti spent a total of more than 100 million yuan in military expenditures, and more than 2 soldiers were killed or injured.Moreover, man-made disasters are always followed by natural disasters. Hunan suffered from floods and droughts for two consecutive years, and millions of hungry people in various counties flowed into major cities such as Changsha and Hengyang.

Zhao Hengti seems to be a person who attaches great importance to "procedures". He will never do anything hard without creating a "basic of public opinion".But for him, whether it is procedures or public opinion, they are still all for his own use, and basically have nothing to do with the so-called democratic spirit.At the beginning of the Hunan-Hubei War, Zhao Hengti still did not forget to report to the Hunan Provincial Council at this time, and officially published a message to the Provincial Council, saying: "... Hunan and Hubei are originally a family, and the people of Hubei are urgently asking for help." In order to respect the public opinion and to take into account the friendship of the neighbors, our province convened a military meeting to decide to aid Hubei..." Zhao Hengti's words were not unreasonable, but if you think about it carefully, there is no shadow of self-government of the provinces?The people of Hunan ruled Hunan, and the people of Hubei ruled Hubei, which should have been the affairs of their respective provinces. If the Hunan army intervened in Hubei affairs by force, it would be a complete warlord melee. What about inter-provincial autonomy?Zhao Hengti lost his moral advantage entirely because of a momentary greed, and he overthrew his legally sound thinking.

Zhao Hengti's thoughts were all about how to rectify the Hunan Army that had just been hit hard, and he didn't care about the life and death of the common people!The provincial constitution originally stipulated that people have the right to receive disaster relief, but Zhao Hengti canceled the daily relief of two beans per person for the starving people at this time, and used porridge mixed with bran to deal with it.There was a lot of complaints for a while, especially the students launched a large-scale demonstration.The provincial constitution also stipulated that the people have the right to demonstrate, but Zhao Hengti came up with a strange trick: let the soldiers take to the streets to beat the students on the grounds that the students insulted the soldiers!Qiu Baye and his men were ordered to spread out and intercept the students who disbanded after the parade everywhere, beating the students so that they had nowhere to hide.Even though the students did not dare to go out to the streets the next day, the soldiers went to the school to fight instead.This time it was really a scholar who met a soldier, and there was no reason to talk about it, so he had to suspend classes to avoid disaster.The students were beaten for three days in a row, which not only broke the heads of those young people, but also the thoughts of fighting for rights with the Constitution and peace in those heads.In the official history, the younger generation in Hunan, represented by Grandpa Mao, was able to embark on a more radical revolutionary road. I am afraid it has something to do with this stick!

How can Zhang Hanqing, who is always concerned about the situation in central Hunan, miss this golden opportunity!

Yueyang is the gateway to the north and south of Hunan, and it is very close to Changsha.The 4th Division and the 7th Division of the People's Army divided into two groups, went south along the Guangdong-Han Railway, even conquered Yueyang County, Xinqiang, and defeated the main force of Song Hegeng, the first Hunan Division, in the north of the Miluo River.The Hubei Yangtze River Navy, protected by the "Jiangning" and "Jiangping", also entered the Xiangjiang River and captured the Xiangyin Fortress.The People's Army united with the Lu Diping Department of the Second Division of the Hunan Army in a stalemate at Jietoupu, Chuanshanping, and the intersection.

Zhao Hengti called for Hunan's self-government one after another, saying that Zhang Hanqing "disregarded public opinion and wanted to abandon 'autonomy' with private soldiers?" When he was approaching the city, he also wanted to show his justice by running for governor.Because the time is running out, a new idea was thrown out: the quick constitution, saying: "The self-government law has been discussed by everyone. I am a soldier, so I don't have much research. But because of the speed, I have to be a little bit reluctant. Everyone (running for parliamentarians) We must sacrifice according to our own opinions.” He submitted the “Outline of Preparing for the Self-Government Law” he formulated directly to the old provincial assembly for resolution, and simply canceled the election of new provincial councilors, allowing the old provincial assembly, which had expired, to prepare the provincial constitution As a result, many people from other factions who were eager to enter the provincial assembly were excluded.Sure enough, the old provincial assembly successfully elected Zhao Hengti as the new interim governor, and he immediately announced the "Draft Constitution of Hunan Province."It stipulates that: Hunan is an autonomous province of the Republic of China, and the provincial autonomy belongs to all the people of the province.In addition, protection of people's lives and private property, freedom of speech and publication, assembly and association, belief, migration, etc., the right to vote and be elected, and the right to request disaster relief are all available, and there are also regulations on the obligations of education, taxation, and military service. "People are equal under the law".The promulgation of the draft constitution of Hunan Province was the first of its kind in the province of the whole country, and it was the first provincial draft constitution promulgated by all the provinces in the country.

It was after the Hunan-Hubei War and the beating of students that Zhao Hengti became an official elected governor and issued an official provincial constitution.By the time of this official "election", we can basically see its true level of "democracy".Because members from Tan Yankai's faction and Lin Zhiyu's faction formed another election group to join the competition, the behavior of Zhao Hengti's faction was even more appalling.At that time, buying and grabbing votes became popular, and it was no longer the general concept of so-called vote-gathering.Various election venues in Changsha publicly put up posters, stating the price of "one ticket for snacks, two tickets for meals, four tickets for wine, ten tickets for one yuan" to solicit votes for their side.There are also places where voting has not yet started, and there are already more than 8000 ballots in the ballot box.The votes of the following counties are basically controlled by the squires, and which faction needs to buy the votes from the squires who have the votes. .When it came time to officially vote, there were even violent fights, incidents of fighting, snatching of ballot boxes, and smashing of ballot boxes happened frequently, and even in Anhua County, there was an incident of the regimental defense bureau armed to seize the ballots, which is really unheard of.Therefore, the various corporations in the provincial capital proposed that such an election was "a special stain on self-government" and demanded that it be abolished and re-elected.Even the old provincial councils have sent telegrams across the country challenging the election results.

But Zhao Hengti couldn't wait any longer. He was in a hurry to become the "popularly elected" governor, so he forced the randomly elected provincial council to come out quickly. In January 1922, a new provincial assembly was established, of which the members of the Zhao faction accounted for two-thirds, which basically cleared the obstacles to electing the old Zhao Hengti as the governor.But the common people are not so easily fooled. Just before the election of the governor, there was a strong wave of rebellion against Zhao inside and outside Hunan Province.By the day when the governor was officially elected, more than 2 people demonstrated on the streets of Changsha.However, the unarmed people cannot stop the determined martial artist. Zhao Hengti was finally elected by the Provincial Assembly with an "absolute majority" to become the officially elected governor of Hunan Province.

On the day of Governor Zhao's inauguration ceremony, firecrackers and cannons were fired, and it turned out that the People's Army had already attacked the city of Changsha.

In order to smash Zhao Hengti's legal signboard of "Xiang Province Autonomy", Zhang Hanqing not only accused Zhao Hengti of making the constitution illegal, but also publicly declared that he was ready to give up the concept of inter-provincial autonomy originally initiated by himself, and instead Take Sun Yat-sen's Three People's Principles as the justification for the crusade.However, Zhao Hengti was about to hold on to the life-saving straw of self-government, so he sent a telegram to the whole country, saying: "...Fuwuxiang entrusts his orders under the banner of the provincial constitution, and before the establishment of the national constitution, he will not be interfered by any party. It has long been a metaphor for the people of the country. Even though the provincial constitution has imperfections, it is not difficult to propose amendments according to legal procedures. Today, it is abandoned with a piece of telegram, and it is returned to the Fengren who first advocated the constitution. This is my sincerity. It's a great misfortune..." His words can be regarded as grasping Zhang Hanqing's vitals.Zhao Hengti named his army the "Protection Army" and marched out of the city to fight.When the two armies confront each other, they want to "chasing thieves" while shouting "protect the constitution".To paraphrase the young marshal's words, political power can only grow out of the barrel of a gun.

At the critical moment of the confrontation between the two armies, Zhu Yaohua, one of Zhao's subordinates, rebelled and marched straight into Changsha, almost capturing Zhao Hengti alive.Lao Zhao fled to Zhuzhou, no longer caring about self-government or not.When his foothold was not stable, he fled south to Hengyang again, busy like a fish slipping through the net.

In this battle, Yu Xue was loyal to his relatives and took the arrows, and his troops were invincible. He ran for 11 days and traveled 600 miles, but his fighting spirit remained undiminished.If it weren't for the fact that the Guangdong-Han Railway had been delayed for more than 400 kilometers from Shaoguan to Zhuzhou due to complex terrain and difficult engineering, it would not have been difficult for Yu Xuezhong's department to go all out to Hengyang.Even so, Zhao Hengti was scared out of his wits, and rushed to the field in Hengyang to electrify.