The disorder accompanying the voting today in the Legislative Yuan at Taipei marks the vitality of the democracy that has taken root on Taiwan. It’s apt, too, that all the banner-waving, protesting, speechifying, and even tossing around of balloons bearing political slogans took place under the gaze of a portrait of the founder of Chinese democracy, Sun Yat-sen, a New York Sun contributor, who urged self-rule because “I believe in the Chinese people.”

In a debate over presidential power, and defense spending, the parliament was “festooned with banners promoting both sides in the dispute,” the Associated Press reported, “while arguments on the floor broke into shouting and pushing matches.” Quite a contrast with the solemnity and lock-step conformity of the meetings in March of Communist China’s top legislative body, the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference National Committee.

That’s the long-winded moniker for the rubber-stamp pseudo-parliament that serves as window-dressing for the one-man tyranny of the party boss, Xi Jinping. There are no debates at its sessions. Its most recent meetings closed with a ceremony stressing the need to “adhere to Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era as our guide” and vowing to “unswervingly push forward the Chinese-style modernization.”

That nebulous rhetoric is meant to signal the backing of the Communist regime for Mr. Xi’s program of consolidating power in his hands and accelerating China’s efforts to dominate the global economy in high-tech industries where the West still has, for now, an edge. Capitalizing on American and European complacence, China has already soared to become workshop to the world. Its ambition is to dethrone America as the globe’s superpower.

Mr. Xi’s appetite for expansion also encompasses the island democracy just 81 miles off the shore of the mainland. At the start of the year, he addressed his subjects to offer “a warning to Taiwan’s voters,” the Financial Times reported. In 2024, 75 years since Chairman Mao’s communists conquered the mainland after a civil war, “China will surely be reunified,” Mr. Xi menaced. Taiwan’s legislature is weighing how to respond to that saber-rattling.

Taiwan’s new president, William Lai, has already incurred the wrath of Beijing, which calls him a “dangerous separatist.” That’s because he had the gall, as the mainland sees it, to ask in his inaugural speech that Beijing “respect the choices of the people of Taiwan, and in good faith, choose dialogue over confrontation.” He also vowed that Taiwan would stand firm “in the face of the many threats and attempts at infiltration from China.” 

As if to underscore Mr. Lai’s point, Beijing has since ramped up its military exercises around Taiwan as “punishment” for the new president’s remarks. Yet Free China is not a monolith. While Mr. Lai’s party in parliament is pushing to modernize Taiwan’s military, the opposition Nationalist party — which gained a majority in the last election — favors a conciliatory posture toward the mainland and is seeking to limit Mr. Lai’s power. Hence today’s contention.

Such policy debates are the hallmark of democracy. And the divided nature of Taiwan’s government reflects the fact that the citizenry are themselves unsettled as to the best approach to relations with the Communist mainland. After all, many Taiwanese have family and economic ties with mainland China. Not to mention a common language and cultural heritage that unites the Chinese people despite a political divide between Free and Communist republics.

That is why Sun Yat-sen’s successor, Chiang Kai-shek, maintained that China would, ultimately, be reunified. Not under the Marxist tyranny that took root at Beijing, but the constitutional democracy that blossomed at Taipei — with the Legislative Yuan at its heart. The imperial dynasty fell because it failed to “heed the voice of the people,” Sun wrote decades ago. The spirited debates in Taiwan’s parliament are a reminder that Mr. Xi makes that mistake today.