1. Chen Jiongming, spelled Chan Kwing-ming, courtesy name Jingcun, nickname Ayan, was a Chinese lawyer, military general, revolutionary, federalist and politician who was best known as a Hailufeng revolutionary figure in the early period of the Republic of China.
Chen Jiongming led the Constitution Protection Region of Southern Fujian from 1918 to 1920.
In 1904, Chen Jiongming attended the Haifeng Normal School to train to become a schoolteacher, graduating and applying for a teaching position at the advanced primary school in Haifeng in 1905.
Chen Jiongming was initially supposed to be the principal, but was banned from joining for his revolutionary ideas.
Chen Jiongming occasionally went to Huizhou to tutor wealthy students for the district examination.
Therefore, Chen Jiongming was asked to take up the position for a reward of 1000 US Dollars.
Chen Jiongming replied, saying that he would first look into the matter himself.
Chen Jiongming collected evidence and interviewed witnesses, and went to Guangzhou to confront the Governor-General, successfully defending the petition and impeaching the magistrate, later donating his monetary reward at the Huizhou Fraternal Association in Guangzhou, explaining that he would not have done it for money as he was a citizen from the East River region.
Chen Jiongming returned home from the academy in 1908, establishing the Haifeng Self-Government Gazette in early 1909, where he was the editor-in-chief.
The minimum age to join was 30, and Chen Jiongming, who was barely above the limit, was one of the people elected to the assembly to represent Huizhou.
Chen Jiongming was one of the only progressives in the conservative-dominated assembly.
Chen Jiongming was elected to chair the Committee of Legal Matters.
Chen Jiongming introduced 6 of the 25 bills the Assembly passed during its first session.
Chen Jiongming submitted a proposal about gambling, stating in his speech that:.
Chen Jiongming supported a bill to expropriate funds from family and clan estates.
However, when the matter was left to the gentry to decide, Chen Jiongming protested, saying that from experience, the gentry would do nothing, and some sort of government intervention would be preferred.
Chen Jiongming was one of the delegates representing Guangdong, along with another progressive, Qiu Fengjia.
Chen Jiongming may have joined the Tongmenghui between 1906 and 1908, inspired by his Japanese-educated instructor at the academy, Zhu Zhixin, but another source states that he joined the organization in 1909 at the meeting of the Union of Provincial Assemblies in Shanghai.
Chen Jiongming, taking advantage of his position as the senator from Huizhou fu, had rented a house outside the Big East Gate for storage of weapons and ammunition.
When Chen Jiongming returned to Canton in May 1910, the Assembly was in hot debate over the Canton-Hankou Railway Company.
Chen Jiongming was skeptical about the Assembly's plan to push for the early inauguration of the national parliament.
Chen Jiongming agreed with another Assemblyman that he would support the proposal only to "ride with the tide", as he was already committed to a revolution instead of reform.
Fully aware that he would lose the vote as many assemblymen were bribed by gambling companies, Chen Jiongming put it to a written vote, which lost.
Chen Jiongming then turned this around and exposed the bribed assemblymen, with the 35 assemblymen who voted against the proposal forced to resign.
Chen Jiongming was instrumental in backing Sun Yat-sen's Constitutional Protection Movement.
In 1918, Chen Jiongming led the Guangdong Army and captured southern Fujian.
Chen Jiongming stayed in southern Fujian for two years, during which he devoted himself to building the Constitution Protection Region of Southern Fujian with Zhangzhou as its center, and implemented anarchist policies.