Jang Geon-sang (張建相, 19 December 1882 – 14 May 1974) was a politician, independence activist, and unification movement activist of the Korean Empire. His family seat was Indong. His childhood name was Jang Myeong-sang (張明相), his courtesy name was Chanseong (贊成), and his art name was Sohae (宵海).
Born~Died Dec 19, 1882 ~ May 14, 1974Last edited Oct 15, 2026, 2:51 PM
Jang Geon-sang (張建相, 19 December 18821 – 14 May 1974) was a politician, independence activist, and unification movement activist of the Korean Empire. His family seat was Indong. His childhood name was Jang Myeong-sang (張明相), his courtesy name was Chanseong (贊成), and his art name was Sohae (宵海).
Life
Born in Chilgok, Gyeongsang Province, Joseon, he studied in Japan and the United States. In 1916, at the request of Shin Gyu-sik, he went to Shanghai, where he took part in the Dongje-sa and then participated in the establishment of the Shanghai Provisional Government, serving as Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs. Later, however, he left the Provisional Government, and at the end of 1920 he went to Beijing, where he took part in the National Representative Congress and the Korean Communist Party, and, together with figures critical of the Provisional Government's line, organized the Military Unification Conference.
In January 1922 he attended the Congress of the Peoples of the Far East held in Moscow, Soviet Union, and on his return in December he was elected a member of the Korbyuro leadership for the establishment of the Korean Communist Party. In 1923 he returned to Beijing and, together with Kim Seong-suk and others, organized the Changil Party (創一黨). Afterward he worked on the publication and editing of the magazine Revolution, and in October 1926 he became an executive committee member of the Korean Unified Independence Party Promotion Committee.
In 1937 he was arrested by consulate police in Shanghai and then repatriated. He was dispatched to China by the Japanese authorities with the aim of luring Kim Won-bong away. He escaped and went to China, then joined the Korean Nationalist Revolutionary Party. In 1940 he rejoined the Provisional Government and served as a State Councilor of the Provisional Government and as Director of the Department of Education, among other posts. After liberation, in 1946 he left the Provisional Government and, while serving as vice chairman of the and working in bodies such as the Democratic Nationalist United Front, he led the Working People's Party after was assassinated in 1947. In 1948 he took part in the North–South Joint Conference. During the conference, he protested the unilateral decisions of the side and was detained, but he was released through his ties with and , among others.
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After the failure of the North–South talks, he did not take part in the separate government, but he did not oppose it. In July 1948, after the formation of the cabinet of the Republic of Korea government, he received an offer to join the cabinet from PresidentSyngman Rhee (李承晩), but he declined and afterward worked as an opposition politician. Although he acknowledged the inevitability of the establishment of the Republic of Korea government and engaged in politics, he was repeatedly drawn into ideological disputes by the Korean Democratic Party faction. Strongly hostile toward members of the Korean Democratic Party, he at one point even joined the Liberal Party within the National Assembly (Liberal Party). In 1954 he participated in the Constitution Protection Alliance but did not take part in the founding of the Democratic Party.
His childhood name was Jang Myeong-sang (張明相), his courtesy name was Chanseong (贊成), his art name was Sohae (宵海), and his family seat was Indong (仁同).2 He was from Chilgok, Gyeongsang Province.
Education
Waseda University Department of Political Science and Economics (dropped out)
He was born on December 19, 1882, in Chilgok County, North Gyeongsang Province, as the fourth son among four sons and two daughters of Jang Un-won (張雲遠), a Chambong (a minor official title) of the Indong Jang clan who was a landowner, and his mother Yi Yun-yong (李閏泳). His childhood name was Jang Myeong-sang (張明相), and his pen name was Sohae. His father, Jang Un-won, was a major landowner who owned extensive land throughout the Chilgok County area. In 1883, when the family moved to Busan, he also moved to No. 311, Jwacheon-dong (佐川洞), Busan, and studied Chinese characters at a private school called Jwacheon-jae (佐川齋). At that time, his family register was also moved to No. 311, Jwacheon-dong, Busan. Later, he studied at Yukyeong-jae (育英齋), a private school that had introduced new learning, and became interested in modern Western learning.
In 1903, through the good offices of Jang Ji-yeon (張志淵), then president of the Hwangseong Sinmun newspaper in Seoul, he enrolled in the state-run Hanseong English School and studied there for one year. In Seoul, he also met James Gale (Korean name 奇一), the pastor of Yeondong Church, from whom he learned English. His association with Gale, who had come to Korea in 1888 and was actively engaged in missionary work, later played a decisive role in helping him go to study in the United States.
While studying in the Department of political economics at Waseda University,2 he resented the ethnic discrimination policies of the Japanese authorities and, after one year, withdrew from the Department of Law at Waseda University in Japan. He went to see Park Yong-hyo (朴泳孝), who was in exile in Japan, and through his arrangement, he lodged at the house of Eastlake, a military attaché at the Japan–United States legation in Tokyo, and received basic military training together with about 50 students, including Yu Dong-yeol (柳東說). However, as the number of students grew to about 100 and the system was being organized, the Japanese authorities applied pressure and closed the school. Realizing the limits of studying in an enemy country after this incident, he returned home in 1907. In 1908, with 200 won in travel expenses provided with the help of missionary Gale, and carrying only a letter of recommendation from Gale to American universities, he left the country. Afterward he traveled through the Maritime Province, Siberia, and Europe.3 At that time, because Korea's diplomatic rights had been stripped, a normal departure through the arrangement of the Residency-General was entirely out of the question, so he reached the United States by way of the Maritime Province, Siberia, and Europe.
In March 1908, he crossed over from Chongjin (淸津) to Vladivostok on a merchant ship, where he met Chung Sun-man (鄭純萬), head of the Korean residents' association, and Ryu In-seok (柳麟錫), a Confucian scholar and anti-Japanese righteous army leader. He then passed through St. Petersburg and arrived in Moscow. In Moscow he met Yi Beom-jin (李範晋) and his son Yi Wi-jong (李韋鍾). He then passed through Germany, France, and Britain, and finally arrived in New York in June. However, after arriving in the United States, he was held in a detention cell of the U.S. Immigration Bureau because he did not have a passport. Later, he was specially released on the personal guarantee of Yi Sang-seol (李相卨), who had briefly arrived in New York on his way home after attending the Hague Peace Conference.
He immediately went to Indiana in the American Midwest, and with a recommendation letter from Pastor Gale, he enrolled in the Department of Law at Valparaiso University in Indiana, a Christian-affiliated school. After graduating in 1912, Ahn Chang-ho (安昌浩), who was organizing and active in the Young Korean Academy (興士團) in the United States, repeatedly visited him and proposed that they work together. However, having resolved to go to China, he declined Ahn Chang-ho's proposal. He went to Shanghai, China, joined the Dongjesa, and took his first step into the independence movement.
Independence movement
Participation in the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea
Study abroad and participation in the founding of the Provisional Government
In 1916, he graduated from the Department of Law at Indiana University in the United States. In 1916, he received word from Shin Gyu-sik (申圭植) in Shanghai expressing hope that he would work together with him, and without returning home, he went to China and joined the Dongjesa (同濟社) in Shanghai. Afterward, he took part in establishing the Bakdal Academy (博達學院) and supported education, and he also participated in forming the New Asia Dongjesa (新亞同濟社), an expanded and reorganized version of the Dongjesa. As a member of the Dongjesa, in 1917 he was dispatched to Andong (安東縣) in Manchuria, where he became friends with George L. Show, the head of the Andong branch of a British merchant ship (belonging to Yiliung & Co.), and served as a guide for exiles coming from within the country. Among the people he guided at that time were Kim Du-bong (金枓奉) and Kim Won-bong (金元鳳), who later became towering figures in the independence movement. He built a long-term friendship with Kim Won-bong and helped the Uiyeoldan and the founding of the Korean National Revolutionary Party.
While busy guiding independence activists on their exile journeys, he took part in the March 1st Movement in March 1919, and immediately after the March 1st Movement, he left for China.2 Afterward, he met Kim Du-bong and, together with him, went to Shanghai on a British ship. He was elected as a preparatory committee member for the national assembly of the Korean Residents' Association, a support organization for the establishment of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea (大韓民國臨時政府), and together with Kim Kyu-sik (金奎植), Lyuh Woon-hyung, and Yi Si-yeong (李始榮), he began preparatory work to establish the provisional government. In April 1919, when the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea was established, he was elected as a foreign affairs committee member of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Provisional Government.2 Since Kim Kyu-sik, who had been elected Minister of Foreign Affairs, was absent to attend the Paris Peace Conference, he assisted Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Lyuh Woon-hyung in carrying out the diplomatic activities of the Provisional Government, and he was appointed Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Provisional Government as Lyuh Woon-hyung's successor. On July 1, 1919, together with more than 170 members, he revived the Korean Red Cross Society (大韓赤十字會), and together with Yi Gwang-su (李光洙) and others, he was appointed as a member of the Standing Council (常議員) of the Korean Red Cross and was active in that role.
Around the winter of 1920, he, who was often called a militant faction or radical faction (過激派) by the Japanese because he generally favored the line of armed struggle, also felt disillusioned with the activities of the Provisional Government. He withdrew from the Provisional Government, left Shanghai for Beijing, and participated in the activities of the Uiyeoldan, the Koryo Communist Party (高麗共産黨), and the National Representative Conference (國民代表會議).
Withdrawal from the Provisional Government and the National Representatives' Conference
In 1921, he joined and was active in the Koryo Communist Party in Irkutsk, Soviet Russia. In 1922, when Lyuh Woon-hyung and Kim Kyu-sik were dispatched to the Far Eastern People's Congress, he attended as one of the Korean delegation. 34 When the Uiyeoldan planned the first assassination and sabotage operations, he asked Shaw, the head of the Andong branch of Yiliung & Co., to arrange for bombs for the operation to be brought into the country. In March 1922, when the Uiyeoldan attempted to assassinate Tanaka Giichi (田中義一), a Japanese Army general, the Provisional Government issued an official statement that the incident had no relation whatsoever to the Provisional Government and that it could not be held absolutely responsible for their actions. In response, the Uiyeoldan severed its ties with the Provisional Government and sought to receive funds through an alliance with the Koryo Communist Party instead. At this time, he cut ties with the Provisional Government and, moving back and forth between the Koryo Communist Party and the Uiyeoldan, performed the role of mediator and negotiator in the cooperation between the two.
At the recommendation of Jo Hun (趙勳), a leader of the Irkutsk branch of the Korean Communist Party under the Russian Bolshevik Party, he attended the founding congress of the Koryo Communist Party held in Irkutsk in May 1921. There he was elected as a member of the party's Central Committee and as one of the seven members of its Political Department. He went to Moscow as one of the Korean delegates to the communist party conference held in Moscow, together with Wang Sam-deok (王三德), An Byeong-chan (安秉瓚), and others. In Moscow, he met Lenin of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and was promised financial support for the independence movement. In September 1921, he participated in the Irkutsk Congress of Korean Communists in Russia (在露韓人共産者大會), where he met Boris Shumyatsky and took charge of the proceedings as a member of the presiding committee at the Irkutsk conference.
Activities of the Koryo Communist Party and socialist movement
In 1922, he joined with Han Jin-san (韓震山), who had run a medical practice in Beijing, to carry out the external affairs of the Irkutsk faction of the Koryo Communist Party. On January 22 of the same year, he was selected as one of 52 delegates to the Congress of the Oppressed Peoples of the Far East (極東被壓迫人民大會) to be held in Moscow, and attended. In December of that year, he was elected as an officer of the Kyorburo. However, he did not return to Vladivostok again, and therefore no longer directly took part in the Koryo Communist Party. In 1922, when it became known that Syngman Rhee and Jung Han-kyung had submitted a petition to the United States government asking for Korea to be placed under a mandate, he and his comrades strongly denounced it. From January to June 1923, more than 140 representatives of independence movement groups from various regions gathered in Shanghai for the National Representatives' Conference, the largest-scale meeting in the history of the independence movement, and he arrived in Shanghai and attended the National Representatives' Conference as a representative of Western Siberia.
In June 1922, in Beijing, some militant faction members who distrusted the Shanghai Provisional Government, together with Kim Kyu-sik, Won Se-hoon (元世勳), Shin Suk (신숙), and other members of the "Creation Faction" (創造派), gathered to organize an independent government called the "National Committee" (國民委員會), with the country's name as "Han" (韓). He took part in this and was appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs. This government, independent of the warnings from the Shanghai Provisional Government and expecting Soviet support, went to Vladivostok in August of the same year, but it collapsed on its own after being expelled by the Soviet government, which was in no position to actively support the Korean independence movement due to Lenin's death and the Russo-Japanese Agreement (日露協商).
From the winter of 1923, he, together with Kim Sung-suk (金星淑) and Jang Ji-rak (張志樂) in Beijing, joined in founding the Chang-il Party (創一黨) and published the journal Revolution (革命). The journal Revolution was published bimonthly and continued for three years until 1926. From 1926, he took part in the movement for a unified national party, and in October 1926 he became an executive committee member of the Korean Unified Independence Party Promotion Association (韓國唯一獨立黨促成會).
Journalism, educational activities, and joining the Uiyeoldan
In 1926, on the Double Tenth Festival (雙十節), China's national day, he was invited as a lecturer by Peking University to take part in the commemorative events. However, because of the content of his lecture, he was arrested by Chinese police on the grounds that he had "incited the Chinese people and disrupted national authority." However, because of the defense mounted by the Chinese press, which had an anti-Japanese orientation, he was not handed over to the Japanese police, and was sentenced to two years in prison in a trial by the Chinese government, and was imprisoned until he was released in the autumn of 1927.
On October 28, 1927, he participated in the founding of the Korean Unified Independence Party Promotion Association (韓國唯一獨立黨促成會) as part of the movement for a unified national party. The Unified Independence Party Promotion Association selected representatives from the Provisional Government and the leftist faction, and he attended as a representative of the leftist faction. The Promotion Association dispatched executive committee members to various regions. At this time, he was appointed as one of the seven executive committee members of the Promotion Association, and at the request of its representative Cho Seong-hwan (曺成煥), he was dispatched to southern China to appeal for the necessity of establishing a unified party. However, the movement for a unified party was frustrated as the Chinese Nationalist–Communist cooperation collapsed and differences in views among the leftist and rightist forces became apparent.
Afterward, together with Kim Sung-suk (金星淑) and others, he took part in publishing the anti-Japanese journal Hyeongmyeong (≪혁명≫).3 While active in publishing the Hyeongmyeong for three years, he was arrested by Chinese police acting under Japanese instigation, and was released through the defense of the Beijing Newspaper. In Shanghai, he joined the Uiyeoldan (義烈團) and served as an adviser to the Uiyeoldan. After discussing funding for the independence movement with Kim Chang-suk (金昌淑), he returned to Shanghai and met Kim Won-bong (金元鳳), and directed the making of bombs and their smuggling into the country. He directed the manufacture of bombs to kill Japanese people, and in the process of distributing and smuggling bombs into the country,4 he was pursued by Japanese spies.
In 1930, he temporarily worked as an English professor at Huabei University (華北大學) in Beijing. In July 1935, in Nanjing, together with Kim Kyu-sik, Kim Won-bong, and others, he took part in founding the Korean National Revolutionary Party (朝鮮民族革命黨) and joined as a party member.
Late colonial period
Escape and joining the National Revolutionary Party
On April 17, 1937, while active as a member of the National Revolutionary Party in Shanghai, he was arrested by a detective of the Japanese consulate and confined in the Japanese consulate for six months. Although he was severely tortured by the Japanese at the Japanese consulate in Shanghai, he never submitted, and he was taken back to Korea.4 He was then escorted back to Korea, where for one year he was dragged from one local police station to another and severely tortured. While in custody at Busan Prison, he was released after being given a suspended prosecution decision for lack of evidence.4 Since the Japanese could no longer find a legal basis for prosecuting him, he was released with a suspended prosecution due to insufficient evidence, and while under house arrest he rested and waited for an opportunity to escape abroad.
When the detective monitoring Jang Geon-sang asked for his help in arresting Kim Won-bong, Jang pretended to agree and turned that opportunity to his own advantage. In 1942, he escaped from Korea, and after eluding Japanese police in China, he notified Kim Won-bong that the Japanese were trying to use him to arrest Kim. He then passed through Manchuria, Shanghai, and Hong Kong, and was able to reach Chongqing (重慶) in Sichuan Province. During this period, he maintained contact with Kim Won-bong, and Kim Won-bong sent someone to escort him to Chongqing.
Afterward, together with Kim Won-bong, Kim Kyu-sik, and others, he took part in the movement for a unified national party. From 1939, a conflict arose within the National Revolutionary Party between supporters and opponents over the question of entering the Provisional Government. The party leader, Kim Kyu-sik, remained silent, and when the National Revolutionary Party came into conflict over joining the Provisional Government, he took the position of supporting entry into the Provisional Government together with Kim Sung-suk and others.
Re-entry into the Provisional Government
In 1941 he was elected a member of the Provisional Assembly of the Provisional Government, and became a member of the Provisional Government's Diplomatic Research Committee. In October 1942, he entered the Provisional Government and was elected as a member of the Diplomatic Research Committee and as a State Council member at the 35th State Council meeting of the Provisional Government. In April 1943, he was appointed as State Council member and Minister of Education (學務部長) of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea.
In August 1943, through military cooperation with British forces stationed in India, the Korean Liberation Army (韓國光復軍) Indo-Burma Front Operations Unit (印緬戰區工作隊) was dispatched and achieved remarkable results in its operations against the enemy. Then, on October 30 of the same year, when the Korean National Revolutionary Party applied to the Chinese Nationalist Party and Chinese authorities for passports in order to dispatch additional work team members to India, he also applied for a passport, but this did not succeed because the Chinese Nationalist Party refused. He had planned to go to the Indian and Burmese fronts under harsh conditions with other young party members to take part in the anti-Japanese war, and he had applied for a passport and was included on the list of additional dispatched personnel. In April 1944, he was elected as a member of the Provisional Assembly. In April 1944, he was re-elected as one of the State Council members of the Provisional Government.
At the 36th session of the Provisional Assembly in April 1944, the fourth constitutional revision was carried out, and about 20 State Council members were elected. At this time, he was appointed as State Council member and minister without portfolio as a member of the National Revolutionary Party.
We will make our utmost efforts to further consolidate and expand the nationwide united front together with all revolutionary groups, all armed units, all fighters, and compatriots at home and abroad, and to actively carry out full-scale armed struggle against Japanese imperialists. To all fighters and all compatriots! I hope that all preparations and actions will center on the organization and launch of this anti-Japanese struggle.
-From his inaugural address as State Council member of the Provisional Government, 1944
Afterward, he met with anarchists and moderate socialists in areas within China proper, and tried to persuade them to take part in the Provisional Government.
Immediately before liberation
In April 1945, on a secret mission from Kim Gu (金九), the Provisional Government's Minister of the Interior, he was selected as representative for building a joint front with the Korean Independence League (朝鮮獨立同盟), which was stationed in the North China region, and was dispatched to Yan'an (延安), where the Korean Independence League was stationed.
He departed from Chongqing and traveled by train to Xi'an (西安), where the headquarters of the Korean Liberation Army's 2nd Brigade was located, and there he met the commander of the 2nd Brigade, Yi Beom-seok (李範奭), to discuss the route to Yan'an. After leaving Xi'an, he arrived in Yan'an on foot in three days.
He met with Kim Du-bong, chairman of the Independence League and a native of Dongnae County in South Gyeongsang Province whom he had known for some time, as well as with Mu Jeong and Choe Chang-ik, leaders of the League. He proposed to Kim Du-bong and others that representatives of all overseas independence movement forces be selected to gather in Chongqing and discuss the establishment of a united front. Kim Du-bong also agreed and promised to go to Chongqing, and thus reached agreement with representatives of the Korean Independence League on left-right cooperation. However, although they confirmed that they had reached the same conclusion during the meeting, they did not achieve any clear results. Nevertheless, after Jang Geon-sang's visit, the Korean Independence League showed an attitude of partially recognizing the suzerainty of the Provisional Government, and at each event it displayed a portrait of Kim Gu in addition to Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong, and Zhou Enlai.
On August 15, 1945, after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and the unconditional surrender of Japan, he learned the news in Yan'an in North China. The Korean Independence League proposed that he immediately return to Korea via Manchuria, but he rejected the League's proposal and returned to the Provisional Government in Chongqing.
Liberation and return home
Political activities during the period of US Army Military Government
After liberation, Jang Geon-sang was active as an opposition politician. When the order of return was decided after the liberation, he returned home as one of the second group of the Provisional Government's return to Korea on December 3, 1945, and arrived at Gunsan Airport in North Jeolla Province. After returning home, Jang Geon-sang first went to visit Lyuh Woon-hyung (呂運亨), and then visited Pak Hon-yong. Afterward, he supported the line of Lyuh Woon-hyung and served as deputy party leader of the Korean People's Party (朝鮮人民黨) organized by him. The US Army Military Government offered him a position in the government, but he rejected the offer.
In February 1946, he took part in the Preparatory Committee for the Emergency Political Conference, which was led by Kim Gu and Syngman Rhee, but when it turned rightward, on February 14 he resigned from his position as State Council member of the Provisional Government together with Kim Sung-suk, Kim Won-bong, Sung Ju-sik (成周寔), and others. On February 15, he joined the Nationalist Democratic Front. After leaving the Provisional Government, Jang Geon-sang participated in the Nationalist Democratic Front (民族主義民族戰線) on February 15, 1946.5 He was actively engaged in the activities of the Nationalist Democratic Front, and volunteered as a member of the Nationalist Democratic Front's nationwide lecture tour, touring and giving lectures in South Gyeongsang Province, North Gyeongsang Province, South Chungcheong Province, North Chungcheong Province, South Jeolla Province, and North Jeolla Province. Meanwhile, Jang Geon-sang took a moderate line, and was one of the few leftist politicians of the post-liberation period who was not subjected to terror or violence.
From early August 1946, when the Korean People's Party, the South Korean New People's Party, and the Communist Party of Korea merged to form the South Korean Workers' Party (南朝鮮勞動黨), he joined the South Korean Workers' Party, but later he left it together with Lyuh Woon-hyung and others, and when the Socialist Workers' Party (社會勞動黨) was founded around Lyuh Woon-hyung, he joined it and was elected as a Central Committee member of the Socialist Workers' Party. However, the Socialist Workers' Party was dissolved due to the South Korean Workers' Party's subversion efforts. He again followed Lyuh Woon-hyung and joined the Workers' People's Party (근로인민당) on May 24, 1947.
On May 24, he was elected as vice chairman of the Korean People's Party led by Lyuh Woon-hyung. After Lyuh Woon-hyung was assassinated in Seoul in July 1947, he led the Workers' People's Party and took part in the Inter-Korean Conference in April 1948. Meanwhile, he visited Kim Gu and Kim Kyu-sik and urged them to refrain from going north in order to prepare for contingencies, but Kim Gu and Kim Kyu-sik went to North Korea partly by their own will and partly against their will.
Participation in the inter-Korean conference
In February 1948, when North Korea proposed the Pan-Korean Conference of Political Parties and Social Organizations, an argument for participation in the joint conference emerged centered on the left-right cooperation faction and the leftist faction. He declared that he would participate in the North–South Joint Conference. However, he visited Samcheong-jang and urged Kim Kyu-sik not to go north. This was because he warned that if Kim Kyu-sik, the leader of the moderate and centrist factions, were to go to North Korea and the conference failed, it would deal a major blow to them.
According to Song Nam-heon (송남헌), Jang Geon-sang, Won Se-hoon (원세훈), and others dissuaded Usa Kim Kyu-sik from going north because they considered the effect that Kim Kyu-sik's direct participation in the Inter-Korean Conference would have on the political sphere in the future.6 However, Kim Kyu-sik went north together with them. In April 1948, he crossed the 38th parallel on foot into North Korea and took part in the Conference of North and South Korean Leaders in Pyongyang. When he arrived in Pyongyang, he is said to have been surprised to see Kim Kyu-sik there.
During the Inter-Korean Conference, when the Democratic People's Republic of Korea unilaterally pushed forward the conference agenda, he protested, and he objected to Pak Hon-yong, who had called for following democratic decision-making, asking what this so-called democratic decision-making was.
Our people cannot live with communism. Our movement for the Workers' People's Party is not aimed at creating a communist society, but at living peacefully under the ideal of equality.7
During the Inter-Korean Conference, the remark that "Our people cannot live with communism. Our movement for the Workers' People's Party is not aimed at creating a communist society, but at living peacefully under the ideal of equality" became a problem, and he was for some time placed under house arrest by North Korea.7 Jang Geon-sang was able to return to Seoul about two weeks after Kim Gu and Kim Kyu-sik left. He is said to have owed this also to the help of Hong Myong-hee (벽초 홍명희), chairman of the North Korean Workers' Party, and Kim Du-bong, with whom he had a friendship.7
Meanwhile, the politicians who had participated in the Inter-Korean Conference retreated a step from their position of opposing the establishment of a separate government in South Korea and of non-participation, and changed their line to not participate in the establishment of the government but not oppose it.
Recognition of the separate government
Because Hong Myong-hee did not move south, he was left in charge of the Workers' People's Party. Afterward, he declared that he would not take part in the May 10 general election, but would not oppose it. However, the party strength of the Workers' People's Party weakened, and in 1949 it was finally subjected to a disposition of cancellation of party registration.
Political activities
After the establishment of the government
In 1948, he renounced his Republic of China nationality and acquired Republic of Korea nationality. After the establishment of the Republic of Korea government in July 1948, when Syngman Rhee formed his first cabinet, he was asked by the first president, Syngman Rhee, to join the cabinet, but he refused the request, saying that a government established as a separate government in South Korea alone risked the division of the nation.2Jang Taek-sang repeatedly proposed that he join the government, citing his past efforts, but he refused, saying that out of a sense of loyalty he could not do so. On May 10, 1950, he ran in the 2nd National Assembly general election (Busan Eul district) and was elected. During the election campaign, while he was detained in a police station cell after being accused of being a communist, he was elected as the second-highest vote-getter in the country (votes: 26,720).8
At the 2nd House of Representatives election, he presided over the proceedings as provisional chairman, but he had to endure criticism from both sides, being called a "Reddy" (빨갱이) and a pro-Japanese collaborator (친일파).9 Some members strongly criticized him, saying that a "Reddy" could not be entrusted with conducting the proceedings, and Jang Geon-sang, for the sake of peace in the National Assembly, voluntarily resigned as chairman.9 He received harsh criticism from Kwak Sang-hoon and Seo Beom-seok, and Jang Geon-sang later recalled that despite being from the same North Gyeongsang background, they treated him harshly.10Seo Beom-seok denounced him as "a Japanese spy." After being detained in China, he stayed in Busan and then negotiated with a Japanese policeman in order to travel back to China, and one of the policemen asked him to lure Kim Won-bong to Hong Kong. That policeman was a member of the same clan as Seo Beom-seok.10
Running as an independent in Busan, despite various obstructions from the police, he received the fourth-highest number of votes in the country and became the first elected member of the Republic of Korea to be elected while in prison. On June 25, 1950, when the war broke out, he went into hiding for about 90 days, thereby avoiding being abducted by the Korean People's Army. Although he fled south to avoid the North Korean People's Army, he was insulted by fellow assembly members as a communist and a "Reddy." Kwak Sang-hoon and others openly shunned him.
Afterward, in 1951, when the Liberal Party was founded within the National Assembly, Jang Geon-sang joined the Liberal Party within the National Assembly and was active in it. In 1952, when the various factions united to push for a constitutional amendment introducing a parliamentary cabinet system, he, together with Kim Dong-seong, Oh Wi-yeong, and 48 other Liberal Party members within the National Assembly, 39 members of the Democratic Nationalist Party, including Shin Ik-hee, So Seon-gyu, and Ji Cheong-cheon, 21 members of the Minwoohoe, including Yun Gil-jung, Kwon Jung-don, and Kim Eui-jun, and 15 independents, including Kwak Sang-hoon, Park Soon-cheon, and Seo Min-ho, cast votes in favor of the cabinet system constitutional amendment.11
Construction of progressive parties
Even after entering the National Assembly, he was openly called a "Red" and a "Red sympathizer" and insulted by members from the Hanmin Party, and he came to deeply resent the Hanmin Party faction. The exceptions were Chang Taek-sang and Yun Chi-young, close aides of Syngman Rhee, whom he sometimes met and with whom he kept in contact.
In 1954 he left the Liberal Party in the National Assembly and joined the Hoheon Dongjihoe. Although he joined the Hoheon Dongjihoe, Cho Bong-am was rejected by the former Hanmin Party faction, so he did not join the Democratic Party organization and instead took part in an independent movement to build a progressive party. In 1956, he worked with Cho Bong-am and others as an organizer of the Preparatory Committee for the Progressive Party.3 However, he disagreed with Cho Bong-am, who was viewed negatively for participating in the establishment of a separate government, and so he did not join the Progressive Party. He then came under surveillance and repression by the government.
Later life
In November 1957 he was implicated in the Park Jeong-ho incident and imprisoned, but he was released after being found not guilty. In 1958 he was booked in connection with the Progressive Party incident but was released due to lack of evidence.
On January 8, 1961, he assumed the post of chairman of the Revolutionary Party.3 When the May 16 coup took place on May 16, he was arrested under the "Special Act on the Punishment of Special Crimes" on the grounds that he had been a leader of the progressive faction, together with Kim Sung-suk, a comrade from the Provisional Government days. However, through the consideration of Park Chung-hee, he was released on medical bail.2 He appealed to Park Chung-hee about the injustice he had suffered, and his petition was accepted. He then returned to Seoul and lived in poverty in a shack in Jeong-dong. Because he had long resented Hanmin Party members, he even urged people around him to support Park Chung-hee in the 1963 presidential election.
Death
Living in poverty in a shack in Jeongneung-dong, Nowon District, Seoul, he died on May 14, 1974, at the age of 92. His funeral was held as a social funeral, and he was buried at the Shinsegye Cemetery on the outskirts of Seoul. From the 1980s onward, public opinion calling for his rehabilitation and reassessment emerged, and in 1986 the government of South Korea posthumously awarded him the Order of National FoundationPresidential Medal.
Kang Jun-man (April 3, 2004). "Chapter 2: The Eruption of Left-Right Conflict / 1946 – Launch of the Democratic Congress and the Democratic National Front." 《한국 현대사 산책 1940년대편 1 (8∙15해방부터 6∙25전야까지)》. Seoul: Inmul-gwa Sasangsa. p. 211. ISBN 89-88410-89-0. ↩
《대한민국의 기원》 (2006, Lee Jeong-sik, Ilchogak) p. 414 ↩
Kang Jun-man, 《한국현대사산책》 〈1940년대편 2권〉 (Inmul-gwa Sasangsa, 2004) p. 124 ↩↩2↩3
Elected as a winner of votes in the 2nd National Assembly election of 1950 onward.: Kang Jun-man, 《한국현대사산책》 〈1950년대편 1권〉 p. 40. ↩
Kim Hak-jun, 《혁명가들의 항일 회상》 (Minumsa, 2007) p. 296 ↩↩2
Kim Hak-jun, 《혁명가들의 항일 회상》 (Minumsa, 2007) p. 297 ↩↩2
Jang Geon-sang (張建相, 19 December 18821 – 14 May 1974) was a politician, independence activist, and unification movement activist of the Korean Empire. His family seat was Indong. His childhood name was Jang Myeong-sang (張明相), his courtesy name was Chanseong (贊成), and his art name was Sohae (宵海).
Life
Born in Chilgok, Gyeongsang Province, Joseon, he studied in Japan and the United States. In 1916, at the request of Shin Gyu-sik, he went to Shanghai, where he took part in the Dongje-sa and then participated in the establishment of the Shanghai Provisional Government, serving as Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs. Later, however, he left the Provisional Government, and at the end of 1920 he went to Beijing, where he took part in the National Representative Congress and the Korean Communist Party, and, together with figures critical of the Provisional Government's line, organized the Military Unification Conference.
In January 1922 he attended the Congress of the Peoples of the Far East held in Moscow, Soviet Union, and on his return in December he was elected a member of the Korbyuro leadership for the establishment of the Korean Communist Party. In 1923 he returned to Beijing and, together with Kim Seong-suk and others, organized the Changil Party (創一黨). Afterward he worked on the publication and editing of the magazine Revolution, and in October 1926 he became an executive committee member of the Korean Unified Independence Party Promotion Committee.
In 1937 he was arrested by consulate police in Shanghai and then repatriated. He was dispatched to China by the Japanese authorities with the aim of luring Kim Won-bong away. He escaped and went to China, then joined the Korean Nationalist Revolutionary Party. In 1940 he rejoined the Provisional Government and served as a State Councilor of the Provisional Government and as , among other posts. After liberation, in 1946 he left the Provisional Government and, while serving as vice chairman of the and working in bodies such as the Democratic Nationalist United Front, he led the Working People's Party after was assassinated in 1947. In 1948 he took part in the North–South Joint Conference. During the conference, he protested the unilateral decisions of the side and was detained, but he was released through his ties with and , among others.
After the failure of the North–South talks, he did not take part in the separate government, but he did not oppose it. In July 1948, after the formation of the cabinet of the Republic of Korea government, he received an offer to join the cabinet from PresidentSyngman Rhee (李承晩), but he declined and afterward worked as an opposition politician. Although he acknowledged the inevitability of the establishment of the Republic of Korea government and engaged in politics, he was repeatedly drawn into ideological disputes by the Korean Democratic Party faction. Strongly hostile toward members of the Korean Democratic Party, he at one point even joined the Liberal Party within the National Assembly (Liberal Party). In 1954 he participated in the Constitution Protection Alliance but did not take part in the founding of the Democratic Party.
His childhood name was Jang Myeong-sang (張明相), his courtesy name was Chanseong (贊成), his art name was Sohae (宵海), and his family seat was Indong (仁同).2 He was from Chilgok, Gyeongsang Province.
Education
Waseda University Department of Political Science and Economics (dropped out)
He was born on December 19, 1882, in Chilgok County, North Gyeongsang Province, as the fourth son among four sons and two daughters of Jang Un-won (張雲遠), a Chambong (a minor official title) of the Indong Jang clan who was a landowner, and his mother Yi Yun-yong (李閏泳). His childhood name was Jang Myeong-sang (張明相), and his pen name was Sohae. His father, Jang Un-won, was a major landowner who owned extensive land throughout the Chilgok County area. In 1883, when the family moved to Busan, he also moved to No. 311, Jwacheon-dong (佐川洞), Busan, and studied Chinese characters at a private school called Jwacheon-jae (佐川齋). At that time, his family register was also moved to No. 311, Jwacheon-dong, Busan. Later, he studied at Yukyeong-jae (育英齋), a private school that had introduced new learning, and became interested in modern Western learning.
In 1903, through the good offices of Jang Ji-yeon (張志淵), then president of the Hwangseong Sinmun newspaper in Seoul, he enrolled in the state-run Hanseong English School and studied there for one year. In Seoul, he also met James Gale (Korean name 奇一), the pastor of Yeondong Church, from whom he learned English. His association with Gale, who had come to Korea in 1888 and was actively engaged in missionary work, later played a decisive role in helping him go to study in the United States.
While studying in the Department of political economics at Waseda University,2 he resented the ethnic discrimination policies of the Japanese authorities and, after one year, withdrew from the Department of Law at Waseda University in Japan. He went to see Park Yong-hyo (朴泳孝), who was in exile in Japan, and through his arrangement, he lodged at the house of Eastlake, a military attaché at the Japan–United States legation in Tokyo, and received basic military training together with about 50 students, including Yu Dong-yeol (柳東說). However, as the number of students grew to about 100 and the system was being organized, the Japanese authorities applied pressure and closed the school. Realizing the limits of studying in an enemy country after this incident, he returned home in 1907. In 1908, with 200 won in travel expenses provided with the help of missionary Gale, and carrying only a letter of recommendation from Gale to American universities, he left the country. Afterward he traveled through the Maritime Province, Siberia, and Europe.3 At that time, because Korea's diplomatic rights had been stripped, a normal departure through the arrangement of the Residency-General was entirely out of the question, so he reached the United States by way of the Maritime Province, Siberia, and Europe.
In March 1908, he crossed over from Chongjin (淸津) to Vladivostok on a merchant ship, where he met Chung Sun-man (鄭純萬), head of the Korean residents' association, and Ryu In-seok (柳麟錫), a Confucian scholar and anti-Japanese righteous army leader. He then passed through St. Petersburg and arrived in Moscow. In Moscow he met Yi Beom-jin (李範晋) and his son Yi Wi-jong (李韋鍾). He then passed through Germany, France, and Britain, and finally arrived in New York in June. However, after arriving in the United States, he was held in a detention cell of the U.S. Immigration Bureau because he did not have a passport. Later, he was specially released on the personal guarantee of Yi Sang-seol (李相卨), who had briefly arrived in New York on his way home after attending the Hague Peace Conference.
He immediately went to Indiana in the American Midwest, and with a recommendation letter from Pastor Gale, he enrolled in the Department of Law at Valparaiso University in Indiana, a Christian-affiliated school. After graduating in 1912, Ahn Chang-ho (安昌浩), who was organizing and active in the Young Korean Academy (興士團) in the United States, repeatedly visited him and proposed that they work together. However, having resolved to go to China, he declined Ahn Chang-ho's proposal. He went to Shanghai, China, joined the Dongjesa, and took his first step into the independence movement.
Independence movement
Participation in the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea
Study abroad and participation in the founding of the Provisional Government
In 1916, he graduated from the Department of Law at Indiana University in the United States. In 1916, he received word from Shin Gyu-sik (申圭植) in Shanghai expressing hope that he would work together with him, and without returning home, he went to China and joined the Dongjesa (同濟社) in Shanghai. Afterward, he took part in establishing the Bakdal Academy (博達學院) and supported education, and he also participated in forming the New Asia Dongjesa (新亞同濟社), an expanded and reorganized version of the Dongjesa. As a member of the Dongjesa, in 1917 he was dispatched to Andong (安東縣) in Manchuria, where he became friends with George L. Show, the head of the Andong branch of a British merchant ship (belonging to Yiliung & Co.), and served as a guide for exiles coming from within the country. Among the people he guided at that time were Kim Du-bong (金枓奉) and Kim Won-bong (金元鳳), who later became towering figures in the independence movement. He built a long-term friendship with Kim Won-bong and helped the Uiyeoldan and the founding of the Korean National Revolutionary Party.
While busy guiding independence activists on their exile journeys, he took part in the March 1st Movement in March 1919, and immediately after the March 1st Movement, he left for China.2 Afterward, he met Kim Du-bong and, together with him, went to Shanghai on a British ship. He was elected as a preparatory committee member for the national assembly of the Korean Residents' Association, a support organization for the establishment of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea (大韓民國臨時政府), and together with Kim Kyu-sik (金奎植), Lyuh Woon-hyung, and Yi Si-yeong (李始榮), he began preparatory work to establish the provisional government. In April 1919, when the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea was established, he was elected as a foreign affairs committee member of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Provisional Government.2 Since Kim Kyu-sik, who had been elected Minister of Foreign Affairs, was absent to attend the Paris Peace Conference, he assisted Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Lyuh Woon-hyung in carrying out the diplomatic activities of the Provisional Government, and he was appointed Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Provisional Government as Lyuh Woon-hyung's successor. On July 1, 1919, together with more than 170 members, he revived the Korean Red Cross Society (大韓赤十字會), and together with Yi Gwang-su (李光洙) and others, he was appointed as a member of the Standing Council (常議員) of the Korean Red Cross and was active in that role.
Around the winter of 1920, he, who was often called a militant faction or radical faction (過激派) by the Japanese because he generally favored the line of armed struggle, also felt disillusioned with the activities of the Provisional Government. He withdrew from the Provisional Government, left Shanghai for Beijing, and participated in the activities of the Uiyeoldan, the Koryo Communist Party (高麗共産黨), and the National Representative Conference (國民代表會議).
Withdrawal from the Provisional Government and the National Representatives' Conference
In 1921, he joined and was active in the Koryo Communist Party in Irkutsk, Soviet Russia. In 1922, when Lyuh Woon-hyung and Kim Kyu-sik were dispatched to the Far Eastern People's Congress, he attended as one of the Korean delegation. 34 When the Uiyeoldan planned the first assassination and sabotage operations, he asked Shaw, the head of the Andong branch of Yiliung & Co., to arrange for bombs for the operation to be brought into the country. In March 1922, when the Uiyeoldan attempted to assassinate Tanaka Giichi (田中義一), a Japanese Army general, the Provisional Government issued an official statement that the incident had no relation whatsoever to the Provisional Government and that it could not be held absolutely responsible for their actions. In response, the Uiyeoldan severed its ties with the Provisional Government and sought to receive funds through an alliance with the Koryo Communist Party instead. At this time, he cut ties with the Provisional Government and, moving back and forth between the Koryo Communist Party and the Uiyeoldan, performed the role of mediator and negotiator in the cooperation between the two.
At the recommendation of Jo Hun (趙勳), a leader of the Irkutsk branch of the Korean Communist Party under the Russian Bolshevik Party, he attended the founding congress of the Koryo Communist Party held in Irkutsk in May 1921. There he was elected as a member of the party's Central Committee and as one of the seven members of its Political Department. He went to Moscow as one of the Korean delegates to the communist party conference held in Moscow, together with Wang Sam-deok (王三德), An Byeong-chan (安秉瓚), and others. In Moscow, he met Lenin of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and was promised financial support for the independence movement. In September 1921, he participated in the Irkutsk Congress of Korean Communists in Russia (在露韓人共産者大會), where he met Boris Shumyatsky and took charge of the proceedings as a member of the presiding committee at the Irkutsk conference.
Activities of the Koryo Communist Party and socialist movement
In 1922, he joined with Han Jin-san (韓震山), who had run a medical practice in Beijing, to carry out the external affairs of the Irkutsk faction of the Koryo Communist Party. On January 22 of the same year, he was selected as one of 52 delegates to the Congress of the Oppressed Peoples of the Far East (極東被壓迫人民大會) to be held in Moscow, and attended. In December of that year, he was elected as an officer of the Kyorburo. However, he did not return to Vladivostok again, and therefore no longer directly took part in the Koryo Communist Party. In 1922, when it became known that Syngman Rhee and Jung Han-kyung had submitted a petition to the United States government asking for Korea to be placed under a mandate, he and his comrades strongly denounced it. From January to June 1923, more than 140 representatives of independence movement groups from various regions gathered in Shanghai for the National Representatives' Conference, the largest-scale meeting in the history of the independence movement, and he arrived in Shanghai and attended the National Representatives' Conference as a representative of Western Siberia.
In June 1922, in Beijing, some militant faction members who distrusted the Shanghai Provisional Government, together with Kim Kyu-sik, Won Se-hoon (元世勳), Shin Suk (신숙), and other members of the "Creation Faction" (創造派), gathered to organize an independent government called the "National Committee" (國民委員會), with the country's name as "Han" (韓). He took part in this and was appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs. This government, independent of the warnings from the Shanghai Provisional Government and expecting Soviet support, went to Vladivostok in August of the same year, but it collapsed on its own after being expelled by the Soviet government, which was in no position to actively support the Korean independence movement due to Lenin's death and the Russo-Japanese Agreement (日露協商).
From the winter of 1923, he, together with Kim Sung-suk (金星淑) and Jang Ji-rak (張志樂) in Beijing, joined in founding the Chang-il Party (創一黨) and published the journal Revolution (革命). The journal Revolution was published bimonthly and continued for three years until 1926. From 1926, he took part in the movement for a unified national party, and in October 1926 he became an executive committee member of the Korean Unified Independence Party Promotion Association (韓國唯一獨立黨促成會).
Journalism, educational activities, and joining the Uiyeoldan
In 1926, on the Double Tenth Festival (雙十節), China's national day, he was invited as a lecturer by Peking University to take part in the commemorative events. However, because of the content of his lecture, he was arrested by Chinese police on the grounds that he had "incited the Chinese people and disrupted national authority." However, because of the defense mounted by the Chinese press, which had an anti-Japanese orientation, he was not handed over to the Japanese police, and was sentenced to two years in prison in a trial by the Chinese government, and was imprisoned until he was released in the autumn of 1927.
On October 28, 1927, he participated in the founding of the Korean Unified Independence Party Promotion Association (韓國唯一獨立黨促成會) as part of the movement for a unified national party. The Unified Independence Party Promotion Association selected representatives from the Provisional Government and the leftist faction, and he attended as a representative of the leftist faction. The Promotion Association dispatched executive committee members to various regions. At this time, he was appointed as one of the seven executive committee members of the Promotion Association, and at the request of its representative Cho Seong-hwan (曺成煥), he was dispatched to southern China to appeal for the necessity of establishing a unified party. However, the movement for a unified party was frustrated as the Chinese Nationalist–Communist cooperation collapsed and differences in views among the leftist and rightist forces became apparent.
Afterward, together with Kim Sung-suk (金星淑) and others, he took part in publishing the anti-Japanese journal Hyeongmyeong (≪혁명≫).3 While active in publishing the Hyeongmyeong for three years, he was arrested by Chinese police acting under Japanese instigation, and was released through the defense of the Beijing Newspaper. In Shanghai, he joined the Uiyeoldan (義烈團) and served as an adviser to the Uiyeoldan. After discussing funding for the independence movement with Kim Chang-suk (金昌淑), he returned to Shanghai and met Kim Won-bong (金元鳳), and directed the making of bombs and their smuggling into the country. He directed the manufacture of bombs to kill Japanese people, and in the process of distributing and smuggling bombs into the country,4 he was pursued by Japanese spies.
In 1930, he temporarily worked as an English professor at Huabei University (華北大學) in Beijing. In July 1935, in Nanjing, together with Kim Kyu-sik, Kim Won-bong, and others, he took part in founding the Korean National Revolutionary Party (朝鮮民族革命黨) and joined as a party member.
Late colonial period
Escape and joining the National Revolutionary Party
On April 17, 1937, while active as a member of the National Revolutionary Party in Shanghai, he was arrested by a detective of the Japanese consulate and confined in the Japanese consulate for six months. Although he was severely tortured by the Japanese at the Japanese consulate in Shanghai, he never submitted, and he was taken back to Korea.4 He was then escorted back to Korea, where for one year he was dragged from one local police station to another and severely tortured. While in custody at Busan Prison, he was released after being given a suspended prosecution decision for lack of evidence.4 Since the Japanese could no longer find a legal basis for prosecuting him, he was released with a suspended prosecution due to insufficient evidence, and while under house arrest he rested and waited for an opportunity to escape abroad.
When the detective monitoring Jang Geon-sang asked for his help in arresting Kim Won-bong, Jang pretended to agree and turned that opportunity to his own advantage. In 1942, he escaped from Korea, and after eluding Japanese police in China, he notified Kim Won-bong that the Japanese were trying to use him to arrest Kim. He then passed through Manchuria, Shanghai, and Hong Kong, and was able to reach Chongqing (重慶) in Sichuan Province. During this period, he maintained contact with Kim Won-bong, and Kim Won-bong sent someone to escort him to Chongqing.
Afterward, together with Kim Won-bong, Kim Kyu-sik, and others, he took part in the movement for a unified national party. From 1939, a conflict arose within the National Revolutionary Party between supporters and opponents over the question of entering the Provisional Government. The party leader, Kim Kyu-sik, remained silent, and when the National Revolutionary Party came into conflict over joining the Provisional Government, he took the position of supporting entry into the Provisional Government together with Kim Sung-suk and others.
Re-entry into the Provisional Government
In 1941 he was elected a member of the Provisional Assembly of the Provisional Government, and became a member of the Provisional Government's Diplomatic Research Committee. In October 1942, he entered the Provisional Government and was elected as a member of the Diplomatic Research Committee and as a State Council member at the 35th State Council meeting of the Provisional Government. In April 1943, he was appointed as State Council member and Minister of Education (學務部長) of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea.
In August 1943, through military cooperation with British forces stationed in India, the Korean Liberation Army (韓國光復軍) Indo-Burma Front Operations Unit (印緬戰區工作隊) was dispatched and achieved remarkable results in its operations against the enemy. Then, on October 30 of the same year, when the Korean National Revolutionary Party applied to the Chinese Nationalist Party and Chinese authorities for passports in order to dispatch additional work team members to India, he also applied for a passport, but this did not succeed because the Chinese Nationalist Party refused. He had planned to go to the Indian and Burmese fronts under harsh conditions with other young party members to take part in the anti-Japanese war, and he had applied for a passport and was included on the list of additional dispatched personnel. In April 1944, he was elected as a member of the Provisional Assembly. In April 1944, he was re-elected as one of the State Council members of the Provisional Government.
At the 36th session of the Provisional Assembly in April 1944, the fourth constitutional revision was carried out, and about 20 State Council members were elected. At this time, he was appointed as State Council member and minister without portfolio as a member of the National Revolutionary Party.
We will make our utmost efforts to further consolidate and expand the nationwide united front together with all revolutionary groups, all armed units, all fighters, and compatriots at home and abroad, and to actively carry out full-scale armed struggle against Japanese imperialists. To all fighters and all compatriots! I hope that all preparations and actions will center on the organization and launch of this anti-Japanese struggle.
-From his inaugural address as State Council member of the Provisional Government, 1944
Afterward, he met with anarchists and moderate socialists in areas within China proper, and tried to persuade them to take part in the Provisional Government.
Immediately before liberation
In April 1945, on a secret mission from Kim Gu (金九), the Provisional Government's Minister of the Interior, he was selected as representative for building a joint front with the Korean Independence League (朝鮮獨立同盟), which was stationed in the North China region, and was dispatched to Yan'an (延安), where the Korean Independence League was stationed.
He departed from Chongqing and traveled by train to Xi'an (西安), where the headquarters of the Korean Liberation Army's 2nd Brigade was located, and there he met the commander of the 2nd Brigade, Yi Beom-seok (李範奭), to discuss the route to Yan'an. After leaving Xi'an, he arrived in Yan'an on foot in three days.
He met with Kim Du-bong, chairman of the Independence League and a native of Dongnae County in South Gyeongsang Province whom he had known for some time, as well as with Mu Jeong and Choe Chang-ik, leaders of the League. He proposed to Kim Du-bong and others that representatives of all overseas independence movement forces be selected to gather in Chongqing and discuss the establishment of a united front. Kim Du-bong also agreed and promised to go to Chongqing, and thus reached agreement with representatives of the Korean Independence League on left-right cooperation. However, although they confirmed that they had reached the same conclusion during the meeting, they did not achieve any clear results. Nevertheless, after Jang Geon-sang's visit, the Korean Independence League showed an attitude of partially recognizing the suzerainty of the Provisional Government, and at each event it displayed a portrait of Kim Gu in addition to Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong, and Zhou Enlai.
On August 15, 1945, after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and the unconditional surrender of Japan, he learned the news in Yan'an in North China. The Korean Independence League proposed that he immediately return to Korea via Manchuria, but he rejected the League's proposal and returned to the Provisional Government in Chongqing.
Liberation and return home
Political activities during the period of US Army Military Government
After liberation, Jang Geon-sang was active as an opposition politician. When the order of return was decided after the liberation, he returned home as one of the second group of the Provisional Government's return to Korea on December 3, 1945, and arrived at Gunsan Airport in North Jeolla Province. After returning home, Jang Geon-sang first went to visit Lyuh Woon-hyung (呂運亨), and then visited Pak Hon-yong. Afterward, he supported the line of Lyuh Woon-hyung and served as deputy party leader of the Korean People's Party (朝鮮人民黨) organized by him. The US Army Military Government offered him a position in the government, but he rejected the offer.
In February 1946, he took part in the Preparatory Committee for the Emergency Political Conference, which was led by Kim Gu and Syngman Rhee, but when it turned rightward, on February 14 he resigned from his position as State Council member of the Provisional Government together with Kim Sung-suk, Kim Won-bong, Sung Ju-sik (成周寔), and others. On February 15, he joined the Nationalist Democratic Front. After leaving the Provisional Government, Jang Geon-sang participated in the Nationalist Democratic Front (民族主義民族戰線) on February 15, 1946.5 He was actively engaged in the activities of the Nationalist Democratic Front, and volunteered as a member of the Nationalist Democratic Front's nationwide lecture tour, touring and giving lectures in South Gyeongsang Province, North Gyeongsang Province, South Chungcheong Province, North Chungcheong Province, South Jeolla Province, and North Jeolla Province. Meanwhile, Jang Geon-sang took a moderate line, and was one of the few leftist politicians of the post-liberation period who was not subjected to terror or violence.
From early August 1946, when the Korean People's Party, the South Korean New People's Party, and the Communist Party of Korea merged to form the South Korean Workers' Party (南朝鮮勞動黨), he joined the South Korean Workers' Party, but later he left it together with Lyuh Woon-hyung and others, and when the Socialist Workers' Party (社會勞動黨) was founded around Lyuh Woon-hyung, he joined it and was elected as a Central Committee member of the Socialist Workers' Party. However, the Socialist Workers' Party was dissolved due to the South Korean Workers' Party's subversion efforts. He again followed Lyuh Woon-hyung and joined the Workers' People's Party (근로인민당) on May 24, 1947.
On May 24, he was elected as vice chairman of the Korean People's Party led by Lyuh Woon-hyung. After Lyuh Woon-hyung was assassinated in Seoul in July 1947, he led the Workers' People's Party and took part in the Inter-Korean Conference in April 1948. Meanwhile, he visited Kim Gu and Kim Kyu-sik and urged them to refrain from going north in order to prepare for contingencies, but Kim Gu and Kim Kyu-sik went to North Korea partly by their own will and partly against their will.
Participation in the inter-Korean conference
In February 1948, when North Korea proposed the Pan-Korean Conference of Political Parties and Social Organizations, an argument for participation in the joint conference emerged centered on the left-right cooperation faction and the leftist faction. He declared that he would participate in the North–South Joint Conference. However, he visited Samcheong-jang and urged Kim Kyu-sik not to go north. This was because he warned that if Kim Kyu-sik, the leader of the moderate and centrist factions, were to go to North Korea and the conference failed, it would deal a major blow to them.
According to Song Nam-heon (송남헌), Jang Geon-sang, Won Se-hoon (원세훈), and others dissuaded Usa Kim Kyu-sik from going north because they considered the effect that Kim Kyu-sik's direct participation in the Inter-Korean Conference would have on the political sphere in the future.6 However, Kim Kyu-sik went north together with them. In April 1948, he crossed the 38th parallel on foot into North Korea and took part in the Conference of North and South Korean Leaders in Pyongyang. When he arrived in Pyongyang, he is said to have been surprised to see Kim Kyu-sik there.
During the Inter-Korean Conference, when the Democratic People's Republic of Korea unilaterally pushed forward the conference agenda, he protested, and he objected to Pak Hon-yong, who had called for following democratic decision-making, asking what this so-called democratic decision-making was.
Our people cannot live with communism. Our movement for the Workers' People's Party is not aimed at creating a communist society, but at living peacefully under the ideal of equality.7
During the Inter-Korean Conference, the remark that "Our people cannot live with communism. Our movement for the Workers' People's Party is not aimed at creating a communist society, but at living peacefully under the ideal of equality" became a problem, and he was for some time placed under house arrest by North Korea.7 Jang Geon-sang was able to return to Seoul about two weeks after Kim Gu and Kim Kyu-sik left. He is said to have owed this also to the help of Hong Myong-hee (벽초 홍명희), chairman of the North Korean Workers' Party, and Kim Du-bong, with whom he had a friendship.7
Meanwhile, the politicians who had participated in the Inter-Korean Conference retreated a step from their position of opposing the establishment of a separate government in South Korea and of non-participation, and changed their line to not participate in the establishment of the government but not oppose it.
Recognition of the separate government
Because Hong Myong-hee did not move south, he was left in charge of the Workers' People's Party. Afterward, he declared that he would not take part in the May 10 general election, but would not oppose it. However, the party strength of the Workers' People's Party weakened, and in 1949 it was finally subjected to a disposition of cancellation of party registration.
Political activities
After the establishment of the government
In 1948, he renounced his Republic of China nationality and acquired Republic of Korea nationality. After the establishment of the Republic of Korea government in July 1948, when Syngman Rhee formed his first cabinet, he was asked by the first president, Syngman Rhee, to join the cabinet, but he refused the request, saying that a government established as a separate government in South Korea alone risked the division of the nation.2Jang Taek-sang repeatedly proposed that he join the government, citing his past efforts, but he refused, saying that out of a sense of loyalty he could not do so. On May 10, 1950, he ran in the 2nd National Assembly general election (Busan Eul district) and was elected. During the election campaign, while he was detained in a police station cell after being accused of being a communist, he was elected as the second-highest vote-getter in the country (votes: 26,720).8
At the 2nd House of Representatives election, he presided over the proceedings as provisional chairman, but he had to endure criticism from both sides, being called a "Reddy" (빨갱이) and a pro-Japanese collaborator (친일파).9 Some members strongly criticized him, saying that a "Reddy" could not be entrusted with conducting the proceedings, and Jang Geon-sang, for the sake of peace in the National Assembly, voluntarily resigned as chairman.9 He received harsh criticism from Kwak Sang-hoon and Seo Beom-seok, and Jang Geon-sang later recalled that despite being from the same North Gyeongsang background, they treated him harshly.10Seo Beom-seok denounced him as "a Japanese spy." After being detained in China, he stayed in Busan and then negotiated with a Japanese policeman in order to travel back to China, and one of the policemen asked him to lure Kim Won-bong to Hong Kong. That policeman was a member of the same clan as Seo Beom-seok.10
Running as an independent in Busan, despite various obstructions from the police, he received the fourth-highest number of votes in the country and became the first elected member of the Republic of Korea to be elected while in prison. On June 25, 1950, when the war broke out, he went into hiding for about 90 days, thereby avoiding being abducted by the Korean People's Army. Although he fled south to avoid the North Korean People's Army, he was insulted by fellow assembly members as a communist and a "Reddy." Kwak Sang-hoon and others openly shunned him.
Afterward, in 1951, when the Liberal Party was founded within the National Assembly, Jang Geon-sang joined the Liberal Party within the National Assembly and was active in it. In 1952, when the various factions united to push for a constitutional amendment introducing a parliamentary cabinet system, he, together with Kim Dong-seong, Oh Wi-yeong, and 48 other Liberal Party members within the National Assembly, 39 members of the Democratic Nationalist Party, including Shin Ik-hee, So Seon-gyu, and Ji Cheong-cheon, 21 members of the Minwoohoe, including Yun Gil-jung, Kwon Jung-don, and Kim Eui-jun, and 15 independents, including Kwak Sang-hoon, Park Soon-cheon, and Seo Min-ho, cast votes in favor of the cabinet system constitutional amendment.11
Construction of progressive parties
Even after entering the National Assembly, he was openly called a "Red" and a "Red sympathizer" and insulted by members from the Hanmin Party, and he came to deeply resent the Hanmin Party faction. The exceptions were Chang Taek-sang and Yun Chi-young, close aides of Syngman Rhee, whom he sometimes met and with whom he kept in contact.
In 1954 he left the Liberal Party in the National Assembly and joined the Hoheon Dongjihoe. Although he joined the Hoheon Dongjihoe, Cho Bong-am was rejected by the former Hanmin Party faction, so he did not join the Democratic Party organization and instead took part in an independent movement to build a progressive party. In 1956, he worked with Cho Bong-am and others as an organizer of the Preparatory Committee for the Progressive Party.3 However, he disagreed with Cho Bong-am, who was viewed negatively for participating in the establishment of a separate government, and so he did not join the Progressive Party. He then came under surveillance and repression by the government.
Later life
In November 1957 he was implicated in the Park Jeong-ho incident and imprisoned, but he was released after being found not guilty. In 1958 he was booked in connection with the Progressive Party incident but was released due to lack of evidence.
On January 8, 1961, he assumed the post of chairman of the Revolutionary Party.3 When the May 16 coup took place on May 16, he was arrested under the "Special Act on the Punishment of Special Crimes" on the grounds that he had been a leader of the progressive faction, together with Kim Sung-suk, a comrade from the Provisional Government days. However, through the consideration of Park Chung-hee, he was released on medical bail.2 He appealed to Park Chung-hee about the injustice he had suffered, and his petition was accepted. He then returned to Seoul and lived in poverty in a shack in Jeong-dong. Because he had long resented Hanmin Party members, he even urged people around him to support Park Chung-hee in the 1963 presidential election.
Death
Living in poverty in a shack in Jeongneung-dong, Nowon District, Seoul, he died on May 14, 1974, at the age of 92. His funeral was held as a social funeral, and he was buried at the Shinsegye Cemetery on the outskirts of Seoul. From the 1980s onward, public opinion calling for his rehabilitation and reassessment emerged, and in 1986 the government of South Korea posthumously awarded him the Order of National FoundationPresidential Medal.
Kang Jun-man (April 3, 2004). "Chapter 2: The Eruption of Left-Right Conflict / 1946 – Launch of the Democratic Congress and the Democratic National Front." 《한국 현대사 산책 1940년대편 1 (8∙15해방부터 6∙25전야까지)》. Seoul: Inmul-gwa Sasangsa. p. 211. ISBN 89-88410-89-0. ↩
《대한민국의 기원》 (2006, Lee Jeong-sik, Ilchogak) p. 414 ↩
Kang Jun-man, 《한국현대사산책》 〈1940년대편 2권〉 (Inmul-gwa Sasangsa, 2004) p. 124 ↩↩2↩3
Elected as a winner of votes in the 2nd National Assembly election of 1950 onward.: Kang Jun-man, 《한국현대사산책》 〈1950년대편 1권〉 p. 40. ↩
Kim Hak-jun, 《혁명가들의 항일 회상》 (Minumsa, 2007) p. 296 ↩↩2
Kim Hak-jun, 《혁명가들의 항일 회상》 (Minumsa, 2007) p. 297 ↩↩2