John Marshall Harlan's Political Memoir

Near the end of his life, John Marshall Harlan wrote a number of biographical essays, presumably at the request of his children. Most of the essays relate to his experiences in the Civil War. The essay reprinted here instead recounts Harlan's political career before he joined the Supreme Court. Although he rarely won any elections and only held a couple of offices, Harlan's political odyssey is significant in that it shows how his social views were formed. Harlan's transformation from a staunch anti‐abolitionist to a civil‐rights advocate can be viewed as a series of reactions against various opponents as he struggled to find his political identity after the collapse of the Whig party in the 1850s.     

The Dissents of John Marshall Harlan I

I want to start by offering you two quotations. Both are from Harlan's famous dissent from Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896, when the rest of the Justices held that it was constitutional to segregate people according to their race. The first quotation is famous; the second is not well-known—in fact, some of you may have never heard it before. Here is the first quotation:     

The Civil War Reminiscences of John Marshall Harlan

Towards the end of his life, John Marshall Harlan wrote a series of essays about various events of his life. Collected together, the documents form the closest thing to an autobiography Harlan was to write. Most of the documents concern Harlan's experiences in the Civil War, and some of them repeat the same stories. Cited often in biographies and articles about Harlan, they have never been published before. The three printed here were chosen not only for their individual interest, but also because, taken together, they form a nearly complete account of Harlan's wartime experiences.     

John Marshall,McCulloch v. Maryland,and the Concept of Constitutional Sovereignty

Scholars have long debated John Marshall's intent in his famous opinion in the case of McCulloch v. Maryland (1819). Despite long-standing disagreement concerning the character of Marshall's nationalism and federalism, interpretations of the opinion typically rely on an incomplete picture of the case. This analysis revisits McCulloch to illustrate his support for national and state sovereignty as defined in the Constitution. It then moves beyond the opinion itself to examine Marshall's defense of McCulloch in a series of newspaper essays he authored in the aftermath of the case. Situated alongside the McCulloch opinion, these essays show that Marshall was as much concerned with defending the sovereignty of the Constitution as he was with adjudicating political authority between national and state governments.     

国民政府与敦巴顿橡胶园会议

1944年召开的敦巴顿橡胶园会议对于联合国的成立具有非常重要的意义,联合国由此才最终从大国分别酝酿与构想阶段,进入共同协商的实质性筹建阶段.由于在敦巴顿橡胶园会议上准备了充分完备的具体筹建方案,并采取了相对务实的外交策略,国民政府实现了与会的基本目标,即确保了中国的大国地位,以此为基础,中国代表团对联合国的筹建也做出了自己的一份贡献.     

中国国民政府与琉球问题

20世纪40年代,中国国民政府曾一度面临解决中、日之间悬而未决的琉球问题的有利时机。但是,由于国民政府内部分歧重重,以及二战后最高当局忙于内战,没有能够在该问题上达成任何政府共识,最终丧失了解决琉球问题的法理权。而且,伴随着东、西方冷战的加剧以及国民政府在国共内战后败退台湾,琉球问题被美国所操纵而成为美、日冲绳问题,从而给海峡两岸的中国人民留下深深的历史遗憾。     

Chiang Kai-shek and the 1947 Reorganization of the National Government

When the Guomindang (GMD) took charge in 1927, it implemented the “political tutelage” system. Participation of other parties in politics was disallowed. But after the Anti-Japanese War (1937–45), under the combined effect of internal and external pressure, the GMD needed to adopt a constitution, reorganize government and establish multi-party participation. The April 1947 governmental reorganization was the starting point of a transformation from a “political tutelage” system to a constitutional system. Though this reorganization introduced many non-GMD members into the government, it did not change the GMD’s one-party dominance. Its desired transformation of China from one-party “political tutelage” into a constitutional democracy still remained limited.