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In the spring of 1957, Mao Zedong initiated a “bait and switch” tactic, calling on non-party members first, then party members to help with the party’s rectification, encouraging everyone to give feedback to the party. After these opinions were raised (the bait was taken), Mao immediately turned the “party rectification” into the Anti-Rightist Campaign, publicly attacking those who dared to criticize the party, both inside and outside the party, sweeping away those who spoke candidly (Mao’s “prey”).
The highest-ranking rightist within the party that Mao Zedong brought down was Sha Wenheng, the governor of Zhejiang Province.
Today, based on the article “The Biggest Rightist in the CCP” by Tieliu, I will discuss with you the true reasons why Sha Wenheng was labeled the number one rightist within the CCP.
On September 2, 1957, the CCP issued the “Directive on Dealing Seriously with Rightists within the Party,” officially kicking off the Anti-Rightist Movement within the party. Soon after, Zhejiang Province had a “significant achievement” in its internal anti-rightist campaign, targeting a group known as the “Sha, Yang, Peng, Sun Anti-Party Coalition.” Sha was Sha Wenheng, Yang was Deputy Governor Yang Siyi, Peng was the Chief Prosecutor of the Zhejiang Provincial Prosecutor’s Office Peng Ruilin, and Sun was the Minister of Finance and Trade of the Zhejiang Provincial Party Committee Sun Zhanglu.
On December 13, 1957, the Second Session of the Second CCP Zhejiang Provincial Congress passed a resolution to expel Sha, Yang, Peng, and Sun, the anti-party and anti-socialist rightists, from the party. These four individuals became the first provincial-level rightists within the CCP nationwide. During the Second Session of the Second CCP Zhejiang Provincial Congress held from December 9 to 13, Mao Zedong stayed in Hangzhou and personally oversaw the proceedings. On December 17, 18, and 23, Mao convened meetings three times with relevant personnel to discuss and amend the “work report” of Jiang Hua, the first secretary of the Zhejiang Provincial Party Committee.
Following Mao’s instructions, on December 28, under the theme “Adhering to the Correct Party Line and Striving for Comprehensive Victory in the Rectification Movement on All Fronts,” the “work report” by Jiang Hua was published in the People’s Daily. This made Jiang Hua’s “work report” an important document in guiding the nationwide anti-rightist movement within the party.
As a result, Sha, Yang, Peng, and Sun in Zhejiang Province were overthrown, becoming a “symbolic event of the nationwide anti-rightist struggle within the party” initiated by Mao. However, after the end of the Cultural Revolution, Sha, Yang, Peng, and Sun were all rehabilitated by the CCP. The rehabilitation documents stated that the four individuals “did not have issues of being anti-party, anti-socialist, engaging in regional factionalism, or participating in any ‘common anti-party’ activities.”
Since Sha Wenheng did not have issues of being anti-party or anti-socialist, why was he labeled a rightist in 1957? There are four main reasons:
Before the CCP seized power in 1949, it repeatedly emphasized striving for establishing a “free, democratic, and prosperous” new China. However, once the CCP took power, it sidelined the ideals of “freedom, democracy, and prosperity” and launched numerous bloody and brutal political movements. What they truly aimed to establish was the most authoritarian, dictatorial, and totalitarian regime in human history.
During the Chengdu Conference in March 1958, Mao stated, “Rather than you being a dictator, it’s better if I am the dictator,” and he used the first example of Jiang Hua, the First Secretary of the Zhejiang Provincial Party Committee, and Governor Sha Wenheng from Zhejiang Province. Mao said, “Now, there are examples in various provinces: is it Jiang Hua being a dictator or Sha Wenheng being a dictator? Guangdong, Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang, Qinghai, Gansu, Anhui, Shandong, and other places have encountered this issue.” He also mentioned two situations, one involving a counter-party group, where Guangdong, Guangxi, Anhui, Zhejiang, Shandong, Xinjiang, Gansu, and Qinghai provinces wanted to overthrow leadership and take charge themselves. The other situation, like in Sichuan, was about rightist activities. Mao also stated that regionalists were essentially rightists, representing the bourgeoisie within the party.
However, in 1957 in Zhejiang Province, was Governor Sha Wenheng trying to overthrow the leadership of the First Secretary of the Provincial Party Committee Jiang Hua and take control himself? This was completely baseless. It was a delusion of Mao’s own creation; it was mere fabrication. Sha Wenheng only made some suggestions at party meetings about issues like “the party and government being undistinguished,” “substituting the party for the government,” and “lacking party democracy,” calling for appropriate division of labor between the party and government, expanding internal party democracy, and opposing the practice of substituting the party for the government.
Was Sha Wenheng engaging in regionalism? No. Sha Wenheng and Yang Siyi were both natives of Zhejiang, but in the decades before the CCP came to power, they had never worked together. Peng Ruilin and Sun Zhanglu were also not from Zhejiang, so the concept of a Zhejiang regional faction involving them was irrelevant.
Mao sought to establish dictatorship at the highest level of the CCP. Locally, for senior officials closely aligned with him, he supported their “dictatorship,” but for local officials who sought some democracy within the party, with appropriate division of responsibilities between the party and government, he viewed them as potential power grabbers and haphazardly labeled them as anti-party bourgeois rightists.
Before the CCP seized power in 1949, there was a sixteen-character guideline for underground party members: “conceal, build strength covertly, accumulate power, wait for the opportunity.” Based on this, a large number of CCP underground party members were sent to infiltrate crucial departments of the Kuomintang party, government, military, and police, risking their lives and making significant contributions to the CCP’s seizure of power.
Before 1949, Sha Wenheng had long been involved in leading the CCP’s underground party work, serving as the Minister of Propaganda for the Jiangsu Provincial Party Committee, Acting Secretary of the Provincial Party Committee, Secretary of the Military Committee, Director of Construction for the Central Bureau in Shanghai, Minister of Propaganda and United Front in the Shanghai Bureau, and Deputy Secretary of the Counter-Indoctrination Committee in the Shanghai Bureau, leading underground party work in cities such as Nanjing, Hangzhou, Wuxi, Xuzhou, and Shanghai, playing important roles in the CCP’s victory in battles like the Battle of Huaihai, the capture of Nanjing, Shanghai, and more.
At the moment when the CCP occupied Nanjing, the capital of the Republic of China in 1949 and was about to seize national power, a new sixteen-character guideline was formulated for underground party members: “downgrade, control usage, digest locally, gradually eliminate.” After the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, Sha Wenheng successively served as the Minister of Propaganda and United Front of the Jiangsu Provincial Committee, Vice Chairman of the Zhejiang Provincial Government and Director of the Education Department, and in December 1954, he was appointed Governor of Zhejiang Province and concurrently Secretary of the United Front of the Provincial Party Committee.
As a governor with a formal provincial-level rank, according to CCP convention, Sha Wenheng should have concurrently held the position of Deputy Secretary of the Provincial Party Committee, but he was not. In August 1955, the Secretariat of the CCP Zhejiang Provincial Committee was established, becoming the highest core leadership body in Zhejiang Province. However, Sha Wenheng was not a secretary in the Secretariat. His scope of work gradually narrowed down, and he had to follow decisions made by deputy secretary-level secretaries in the Provincial Party Committee, lower in rank than him, on both major and minor matters. Eventually, Sha Wenheng was sidelined completely and only responsible for receiving foreign guests.
In the mid-late 1950s, Mao visited Hangzhou several times, but the provincial committee did not inform Sha Wenheng during these visits. By 1957, during the anti-rightist campaign within the party, Sha Wenheng was labeled a rightist, removed from his governor position, expelled from the party, following the entire process of the “downgrade, control usage, digest locally, gradually eliminate” directive.
Sha Wenheng was born in 1908 in Shacun Village, Tangxi Township, Yinxian County, Zhejiang Province, where he entered the Fourth Normal School in Ningbo, Zhejiang, before transferring to a first-class commercial school. In April 1925, he joined the CCP. In January 1928, he enrolled in the East Asia Joint School in Shanghai. In July 1929, he went to study at the Marx School in Moscow, Soviet Union. In February 1932, he traveled to Tokyo, Japan, and enrolled in the Railway School of Japan, also studying at the Central University of Japan.
Before the establishment of the CCP, he managed periodicals like “Establishment News,” “Cultural Front,” “Daily Translation,” as well as secret party publications like “Truth” and “Party Life.” He personally wrote numerous articles on current events, politics, economics, and international affairs. Alongside Sun Yefang, Secretary of the Communist Party Jiangsu Provincial Committee, he established the Shanghai Social Study Institute.
As a scholar, Sha Wenheng was well-versed in classical Chinese poetry and literature, proficient in Russian and Japanese. He excelled in calligraphy, poetry, had a profound knowledge of ancient Chinese history, and wrote 14 manuscripts, including “Discoveries of the Yin Ruins.” In his later years, he authored a book titled “Research on China’s Slave System.”
In the political movements following the establishment of the PRC, intellectuals, especially senior intellectuals, were key targets for persecution.
The Anti-Rightist Movement in 1957 was a disaster for Chinese intellectuals. Initially, it targeted high-level intellectuals within democratic parties, followed by non-partisan intellectuals and then CCP internal senior intellectuals. Mao frequently visited Hangzhou, making Sha Wenheng, a high-ranking intellectual within the CCP, the focus of his attention.
In 1938, Liu Xiao, the Secretary of the Jiangsu Provincial Party Committee, received a telegram from Zhou Enlai in Yan’an asking for information on the performance, social connections, and political views of actress Jiang Qing (Lan Ping) in Shanghai, seeking the Jiangsu Provincial Party Committee’s opinion on whether Jiang Qing was suitable to marry Mao Zedong.
In the 1930s, the Jiangsu Provincial Party Committee effectively managed underground party operations in parts of Shanghai, Jiangsu, and Anhui. As the Minister of Propaganda for the Jiangsu Provincial Party Committee, Sha Wenheng was a key leader in Shanghai’s literary and artistic circles. He was well acquainted with Jiang Qing. After Liu Xiao learned about Jiang Qing’s circumstances from him, he wrote a telegram in the name of the Jiangsu Provincial Party Committee to Yan’an.
This telegram, besides detailing Jiang Qing’s romantic affairs in Shanghai, also specifically mentioned Jiang Qing’s association with Cui Wanqiu (from Shandong, who studied in Japan for ten years and later became a prominent figure in the KMT, working at the supplement of the Shanghai Evening News, where Jiang Qing was promoted, before becoming a key figure in the Kuomintang). The conclusion of the telegram was that Mao was not suitable to marry Jiang Qing.
This telegram fell into the hands of Kang Sheng, the Minister of the Central Intelligence Department. Kang Sheng was a strong advocate for Mao’s marriage to Jiang Qing and did not submit the telegram. However, Kang Sheng informed Jiang Qing about the contents of the telegram. From that moment, Jiang Qing harbored resentment toward Liu Xiao, Sha Wenheng, and others.
In the 1930s, Pan Hannian, Yang Fan, and Sha Wenheng were all leaders of the CCP’s underground party in Shanghai’s literary and artistic circles and knew Jiang Qing well.
In 1955, the Deputy Mayor of Shanghai, Pan Hannian, and the Deputy Chief of Public Security of Shanghai, Yang Fan, were successively arrested, both cases connected to their knowledge about Jiang Qing. After the arrests of Pan and Yang, Jiang Qing went to Shanghai and instructed Huang Chibo, the Chief of the Shanghai Public Security Bureau, to “thoroughly investigate the ‘black lines’ in the Shanghai literary and artistic circles in the 1930s,” naming a list of individuals, including Sha Wenheng.
After the reevaluation following the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the CCP in 1978, during the anti-rightist campaign of 1957 and the anti-rightist re-education in 1958, a total of 552,973 rightists were identified nationwide, with 552,877 of them being corrected, and 96 not being corrected.
The CCP authorities did not admit to wrongdoings in the anti-rightist movement, claiming it was “expanded” instead. Considering the 96 individuals who were not corrected, it equated to an “expansion” of 5,700 times! Even after enlarging it 5700 times, they still wouldn’t admit to being entirely wrong? In reality, the entire anti-rightist movement was flawed.
From the rehabilitation decision of individuals like Sha Wenheng by the CCP, it is evident that Mao Zedong, the CCP Central Committee, and the Zhejiang Provincial Committee labeled individuals like Sha Wenheng as rightists not based on logical reasoning, but on whims and baseless accusations. Where did these whims and baseless accusations come from?
They originated from the “communist specter” that Marx mentioned at the beginning of the “Communist Manifesto.” The “specter” has been translated as “monster,” “evil spirit,” or “demon.” In essence, the Anti-Rightist Movement of 1957 was a campaign orchestrated under the influence of a malevolent force destroying China’s cultural elite.
That concludes today’s program. Thank you for watching, and until next time.
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“The Century Truth” Program Production Team
Editor-in-Charge: Li Hao#
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