She was named Honorary President of the People's Republic of China and admitted to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), a few weeks before her death in 1981.

During the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945), she joined her sisters in China's wartime capital Chongqing to demonstrate national unity and support for the KMT-CCP alliance.

[21] Her mother, Ni Kwei-tseng, was born in Shanghai to a missionary family originally from Yuyao, Zhejiang, which upheld a Christian tradition dating back to the Ming dynasty.

[24] Acting on the advice of his missionary friend William Burke, who had ties to the Mulberry Street United Methodist Church in Macon, Charlie sent his eldest daughter Ai-ling to Wesleyan College in 1904.

[24] Ai-ling resigned in 1914 to marry H. H. Kung, passing the position on to Ching-ling,[21] who admired Sun as the hero who founded the Chinese Republic.

[30] The Soong family chased Ching-ling to Tokyo, attempting to dissuade her from the marriage, with her father Charlie even appealing to the Japanese government to denounce Sun.

On 7 April 1921, he assumed the title of Grand President of the Republic of China, setting up a breakaway regime to oppose the internationally recognised government in Beijing.

[47] On 14 July 1927, following Chiang Kai-shek and Wang Jingwei’s announcements severing ties with the CCP, Soong Ching-ling issued a statement condemning the KMT-CCP split.

On the advice of Eugene Chen, she departed for Moscow in late August, intending to persuade the Soviet leadership to reaffirm their support for the KMT within the United Front.

Stalin opposed efforts to overthrow Chiang Kai-shek, while Trotsky criticised the KMT as reflecting petty bourgeois values that undermined the prospects for land reform.

She was accompanied by Deng Yanda, a leftist leader of the Kuomintang, and cared for by Zhang Ke, a researcher from the Moscow Sun Yat-sen University.

She avoided contact with representatives of the KMT-led government, instead engaging with European labour movements and maintaining ties with major Communist organisations, despite the rising influence of the Nazis.

In 1934, a memo of Commintern suggests that the local Soviet representative believed it was a mistake to admit her into the Communist Party, which made her lose her unique value.

She also provided Dong Jianwu with a special passport signed by Zhang Xueliang, enabling him to link Communist organisations in Shanghai and Shaanxi.

[46] The three Soong sisters made public appearances in Hong Kong in favour of relief work until 1940, when the Japanese radio stated that they would evacuate rather than join the Chinese government in Chongqing to endure the war conditions.

[52] In response to this, they left for Chongqing, where they continued to appear to boost public morale touring hospitals, air-raid shelter systems and bomb sites during the war.

[34] In 1948, she was named honorary chairwoman of the Revolutionary Committee of the KMT, a left-wing splinter group claiming to uphold Sun Yat-sen’s legacy.

[57] She donated her Stalin Award to China Welfare Institute, which was then used to establish International Peace Maternity And Child Health Hospital in Shanghai in 1952.

In December of the same year, she was elected a vice-chairwoman of the CPPCC, which became a consultative body, and replaced Liu Shaoqi as chairperson of the Sino-Soviet Friendship Association.

[57] She was re-elected to the post of Vice-chairperson of the PRC at the Third National People's Congress in 1965, and appeared frequently in the early 1960s on ceremonial occasions, often greeting important visitors from abroad.

During the Cultural Revolution, Soong was heavily criticized by Red Guard factions, and in one incident, the marker of her parents' grave was toppled and their bodies exposed.

[61] Soong wrote seven letters to criticize the Cultural Revolution Campaign and objected to the excessive violence against her colleagues and other moderates within the CCP.

[62] Soong Ching-ling moved to her Shichahai residence in Beijing, where she penned several articles commemorating late Chinese leaders Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai.

In November 1980, she wrote to the CCP Central Committee, urging the Party to reflect on the suffering it had inflicted on the people during past political movements.

"[65] When she fell in 1981, Wang Guangmei, the widow of Liu Shaoqi, visited her and later approached Hu Yaobang to ask if Soong could be admitted to the CCP.

[66] Song Renqiong and Liao Chengzhi visited Soong in the hospital and informed her of the Politburo's decision, first in Chinese and then in English for confirmation.

Soviet President Leonid Brezhnev offered "profound condolences," a term stronger than that used upon Mao Zedong's death, acknowledging her role as honorary chair of the Sino-Soviet Friendship Association.

[69] Hosted by Hu Yaobang, who was widely expected to become the next chairman of the CCP, the televised mourning ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in central Beijing drew over 10,000 attendees.

In his eulogy, Deng Xiaoping mentioned that Soong, the aunt of then-President of Taiwan Chiang Ching-kuo, had expressed hope for reunification talks between the governments of Beijing and Taipei in the near future.

[81] Soong Mei-ling criticised her sister Ching-ling for "being disloyal to her country, lacking benevolence to the people, failing to fulfil filial piety to her parents, showing infidelity in her marriage, neglecting righteousness to her relatives and friends, disregarding greater justice, showing no reverence for heaven and earth, offering no remonstrance to tyrants, and failing to pacify citizens".