ON MARCH 1, 1919, Koreans from throughout the peninsula congregated in Pagoda Park in the capital city of Seoul to attend the national funeral of the last reigning Korean monarch, King Kojong, who had passed away earlier in the year. On that same afternoon, a young Korean man climbed atop a platform in the middle of Pagoda Park and read aloud a formal Declaration of Independence as Korean leaders simultaneously presented the written document to Japanese colonial officials. Upon the completion of the public reading, the large assembled crowd repeatedly chanted in unison Taehan Tongnip Mansei!(Long Live Korean Independence!), setting off waves of similar protests against Japanese rule throughout the Korean peninsula that lasted for months. Over two million Koreans from all walks of life participated in the nonviolent demonstrations, which subsequently became known as the March First movement. The Japanese, taken completely by surprise by the massive scale of the carefully orchestrated uprising, brutally repressed the demonstrations. Japan's powerful military police force arrested, imprisoned, tortured, and killed thousands of Koreans (Eckert et al., 1990, 276-79; Lee, 1984, 340-44).

Japan's harsh response to the March First movement necessitated that organized resistance against Japanese colonial rule would have to be coordinated and maintained in the Korean diaspora. Indeed, much of the trajectory of Korean nationalism occurred from beyond the Korean peninsula (Lee, 1963; Scalapino and Lee, 1972; Suh, 1967). Japanese repression, in particular, prevented the establishment of a base in Korea that could act with national authority. As a consequence, in April 1919, Korean nationalist leaders throughout