Chiang family private journals at Stanford University to be returned to Taiwan

蔣家在斯坦福大學的私人日記將歸還台灣

US court grants ownership over trove of Chiang Kai-shek, Chiang Ching-kuo documents to Taiwan government


TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — After a recent U.S. court ruling on July 11, a trove of documents belonging to Kuomintang (KMT) founder and former Taiwan President Chiang Kai-shek (蔣中正) will be returned to Taiwan from Stanford University’s Hoover Institution.

After a decade-long legal dispute over ownership of the documents, the U.S. District Court of San Jose ruled in favor of Chiang's family members, who were assisted and represented by Taiwan’s Academia Historica, an official record-keeping agency operating under the National Development Council, reported the San Francisco Standard.

The collection includes 51 boxes of documents including journals, political speeches, and other private files of Chiang and his son Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國). According to reports, Chiang Ching-kuo’s daughter-in-law, Chiang Fang Chi-yi (蔣方智怡), loaned the documents to a Stanford University research organization in 2005 for safe-keeping and academic purposes.

However, in 2013, other family members led by Chiang Fang Chi-yi’s granddaughter, Chiang Yo-mei (蔣友梅), contested the Hoover Institute’s right to possess the documents, claiming they should be kept privately within the family. Then, the Taiwanese government also made a legal motion to secure possession of the documents.

Eventually, Chiang Fang Chi-yi, Chiang Yo-mei, and five other Chiang family members agreed to pass ownership rights of the documents on to the Taiwan government.

In a statement on the ruling, the Hoover Institution noted that the collection offers “unique insight into a critically important period" and has been “the most requested collection” in the organization’s archive. The Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in San Francisco commented, “We are delighted to learn that the diaries will be returning to Taiwan,” per the Standard.

After the physical books and files are returned to Taiwan, they will be preserved by the Academia Historica in Taipei and will possibly be displayed for public viewing for special exhibitions and provided on request to scholars in Taiwan.

Most of the collection has been digitized, and the Hoover Institution will still be permitted to maintain its digital collection and reproduce copies for approved scholars upon request. However, some portions of journals and a few files were redacted upon family members' requests due to the sensitivity of private comments, meaning some details of the Chiang family's private life and thoughts still remain a secret.

Of particular interest to contemporary presidential historians is the family legacy of current Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安), born with the name Chang Wan-an (章萬安). Chiang Wan-an’s father, John Chang (章孝嚴), was born in 1941 in China, and he is alleged to be an illegitimate son of Chiang Ching-kuo and a woman named Chang Ya-ruo (章亞若).

While Chiang Wan-an’s legacy as a great-grandson of Chiang Kai-shek is generally accepted among the Taiwanese public, scholars will be interested to learn if any of the redacted portions of the collection might corroborate the backstory of his father, who was born during the tumultuous period of World War II and the Chinese Civil War.

The Hoover Institution initially agreed with the Chiang family that the redacted portions of the collection would remain private until the year 2035. Reports do not indicate whether Taipei will adhere to the terms of the family's agreement with the Hoover Institution, but it is likely that such a provision would be maintained as part of the family’s agreement to transfer ownership rights of the collection to the government.