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Tang Shaoyi

Chinese politician; first Premier of the Republic of China (1862–1938)

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Tang Shaoyi 唐紹儀
1st Premier of the Republic of China
In office 5 August – 19 September 1922
President	Li Yuanhong
Preceded by	Yan Huiqing
Succeeded by	Wang Chonghui
In office 13 March – 27 June 1912
President	Yuan Shikai
Preceded by	Position established
Succeeded by	Lu Zhengxiang
Minister of Mail and Communications
In office 26 October – 1 November 1911
Monarch	Xuantong Emperor
Prime Minister	Yikuang, Prince Qing (cabinet)
Preceded by	Sheng Xuanhuai
Succeeded by	Yang Shiqi (acting)
In office 17 August 1910 – 6 January 1911 (acting)
Monarch	Xuantong Emperor
Preceded by	Xu Shichang
Succeeded by	Sheng Xuanhuai
Chinese Consul-general in Korea
In office 1896 – 1897
Preceded by	Position established
Succeeded by	Tang Zhaoxian (acting)
Personal details
Born	(1862-01-02)2 January 1862 Xiangshan County, Guangdong, Qing dynasty, China
Died	30 September 1938(1938-09-30) (aged 76) Shanghai, Republic of China
Political party	Unity Party
Alma mater	Queen's College, Hong Kong Columbia University
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese	唐紹儀
Simplified Chinese	唐绍仪
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Táng Shàoyí Wade–Giles T'ang2 Shao4-i2 Yue: Cantonese Yale Romanization Tòhng Siuh Yìh Jyutping Tong4 Siu6 Ji4

Tang Shaoyi (Chinese: 唐紹儀; 2 January 1862 – 30 September 1938), also spelled Tong Shao Yi, courtesy name Shaochuan (少川), was a Chinese statesman who briefly served as the first Premier of the Republic of China in 1912. In 1938, he was assassinated by the staff of the Bureau of Investigation and StatisticsinShanghai.

Tang was a native of Xiangshan County, Guangdong. Tang was educated in the United States, attending elementary school in Springfield, Massachusetts, and high school in Hartford, Connecticut.^[1] He later studied at Queen's College, Hong Kong, and then Columbia University in New York on the Chinese Educational Mission. He was a member of Columbia College's class of 1882 before being recalled back to China by the Qing government.^[2] Tong was a classmate and close friend of future Columbia president Nicholas Murray Butler.^[3]

Tang was a friend of Yuan Shikai; and during the Xinhai Revolution, negotiated on the latter's behalf in Shanghai with the revolutionaries' Wu Tingfang, ending up with the recognition of Yuan as President of the Republic of China. He had been a diplomat with Yuan Shikai's staff in Korea.^[1] In 1900, he was appointed head of the Shandong Bureau of Foreign Affairs under governor Yuan Shikai.^[1]

Widely respected, he became the Republic's first Prime Minister in 1912, but quickly grew disillusioned with Yuan's lack of respect for the rule of law and resigned.^[4] He later took part in Sun Yat-sen's government in Guangzhou. Tang Shaoyi opposed, on constitutional grounds, Sun's taking of the "Extraordinary Presidency" in 1921; Tang resigned from his position. In 1924, he refused an offer to be foreign minister under warlord Duan Qirui's provisional government in Beijing.

In 1937, Tang bought a house on Route Ferguson in the Shanghai French Concession and retired there.^[5] The following year, the Japanese invaded and occupied Shanghai (though not yet the foreign concessions). Japanese general Kenji Doihara attempted to recruit Tang to become president of the new pro-Japanese puppet government, and Tang was willing to negotiate with the Japanese. The Kuomintang's intelligence agency Juntong learned about the negotiation, and its chief Dai Li ordered his assassination. On 30 September 1938, Tang was killed in his living room by a Juntong squad who pretended to be antique sellers.^[6]

Tang Shaoyi's daughter Tang Baoyue (English name May Tang) was married to the prominent diplomat V. K. Wellington Koo. She died in October 1918 during the 1918 flu pandemic, after falling ill for only a week.^[7] Another daughter Lora Tang was married to the well-known Singapore philanthropist Lee Seng Gee, former chairman of the Lee Foundation. Another daughter from his first wife, Isobel, was married to Henry K. Chang (Chang Chien), the Chinese Ambassador and Consul General at San Francisco (1929).^[8]