The Meiji Restoration in World History

A century and a half has passed since the Meiji period started in 1868. Events marking the 150th anniversary of the Meiji Restoration were held throughout Japan.

These events wound up being, more often than not, regional promotional projects tied to efforts to revitalize the countryside that were full of nostalgia for tales of national successes, as implied in the central government’s slogan “learn from the spirit of Meiji, reaffirm the strengths of Japan” (referenced in measures related to Meiji 150 promoted by the Cabinet Office and interagency meetings). Japanese look back on the Meiji period as a national adolescence, a time bursting with ambitions and youthful ardor. A glorious period when the remote island nation, left behind by global events, opened itself to outside interaction and set off at an unremitting gallop aiming for the clouds above the hill,Footnote 1 rising up to become one of the foremost nations of the world.

Still, something rings false about waxing nostalgic over bygone glories of the Meiji period at a time when Japan’s adolescence is long past and its society faces an unprecedented era featuring a declining birthrate, a graying of the population, and low economic growth. The government-initiated Meiji 150 anniversary events lacked enthusiasm. And as I mentioned, local authorities staged a great show of activity, busy with a series of projects to showcase their local history of the transformation from the end of the Tokugawa period to the Restoration. Someone should probably check to see whether, in the pursuit of tourism promotion, the discussion of history was impacted by immoderate attempts to downplay any negative aspects.

In any case, it seems rather unlikely that we should end up sketching out an isolated, inward-looking history that focuses on the level of citizens or regional society from the generous amount of contemplation we had about the Meiji period. For Japan, which successfully caught up to the West long ago and now seems to be at a turning point in a historic period of stagnation, I believe that it is vitally more important to make an objective history of its modernization period beginning with the Meiji Restoration and to link it to other histories around the world to create a useful resource of knowledge.

My background is legal history; in particular, I have researched the formation and transformation of modern Japan’s legal system with the Meiji Constitution at its core. Here, after outlining the process of the creation and adoption of a constitutional system of government that led to the enactment of the Meiji Constitution, I would like to propose what significance the history of the Meiji Constitution holds in world history. Constitutional system in the nineteenth century typically meant a parliamentary system guaranteeing the political participation of its citizens. Below, I use the terms constitutional and parliamentary systems interchangeably.

Public Discourse: The Precondition for Introducing a Constitutional System

As is commonly known, the introduction of a parliamentary system in Japan was put forward in the Oath of Five Articles (Charter Oath) issued March 14, 1868 (Keiō 4): “Deliberative assemblies shall be widely established and all matters decided by open discussion.”Footnote 2 Initially, the draft document read “council of feudal lords shall be established.” The redaction of “council of feudal lords (rekkō kaigi)” to be replaced simply with “assemblies (kaigi)” appears, from our perspective today, to hold some sort of deep significance. It implies a path toward building a new state, not a federation of feudal lords comprising their separate domains as they were, but a unified state led by the emperor as sovereign ruler. This alteration of terms for the assembly, then, permits the later establishment of an organ representing the people that participates in politics under the lead of a sovereign monarch, the emperor.

The leaders of the Meiji Restoration shared this general course of action. Iwakura Tomomi, for instance, made a recommendation in January 1869 (Meiji 2) for political reform consisting of four items—build a system of government, cultivate reverence for the emperor, establish a legislative assembly, and relocate the capital. In particular, he advocated founding solid institutions that would preserve the state even if the future did not provide Japan with a benevolent ruler and wise ministers, and as time passed, argued for the creation of an assembly body. So long as an arrangement was established where the emperor would adopt laws and policies based on the proceedings of public discussion in the assembly body, Iwakura anticipated it would mean that the state structure would be stable and resilient, so that is why he called for the introduction of a parliamentary system (Iwakura 1968, p. 685 ad passim). His notion was for the legislative assembly to be the core pillar of the national government, providing a unifying force in the system.

Iwakura’s call for government to be based on public discourse, which went beyond the differing viewpoints at the end of the Tokugawa period, has recently attracted a great deal of interest and scrutiny once again. The assessments have been mixed (Mitani 2017; Nara 2018). Yet, the belief that the people’s representatives should take part in politics, unconstrained by the old class system, came about in this period, and by extension, the notion that Japan should adopt a parliamentary system became self-evident. Nevertheless, it was not all smooth sailing; they had not planned to introduce a parliamentary system with representatives of the people right at the start. It required over two decades to achieve—the inauguration of the Imperial Diet was in 1890 (Meiji 23). Keeping that in mind, first let us look at the early indications of constitutional government in the first year of Meiji.

The Meiji leaders issued several documents on various forms of government that they wrote building off of the Charter Oath. This is when they settled upon the separation of powers (legislative, executive, and judicial) and decided to set up a system with a legislative assembly. A new regional organization of “fu/han/ken” (urban and rural prefectures and domains) was created to select members to the legislative assembly; in practice, it was dominated by the feudal domains of the old system. The Kōgisho, the first Meiji-period assembly, was established in January 1869 and held its first meeting the following April. Made up of members primarily sent by the various domains, it aimed to be a legislative body, “its primary business being the making of laws” (Kōgisho’s draft rules).

This assembly held its last meeting in the July of that year. The smooth deliberative proceedings encountered obstacles, as some members called for a rapid replacement of the old ways with the new, such as the discussion on banning Christianity and western clothes, or the controversy over the proposal Mori Arinori put forward to abolish the wearing of swords. It was premature to set up a parliamentary system for law-making in a form such as the Kōgisho. In its place, the bureaucratic reforms of August 1870 established a Syūgiin, merely a government advisory body, not a legislative organ, with a reduced role in the system for deliberation. Once the traditional feudal domains were replaced with new prefectures in August 1871, the Syūgiin existed in name only because its members had been selected by the now-abolished domains.

The legislative advisory body function was carried over to the newly established Left Chamber (Sain). A revised administrative ordinance in January 1872 expanded the Left Chamber’s power as a legislative deliberative organ—“as a rule, this body shall deliberate on the regulations and laws generally to be issued”—but its constituent members were appointed and dismissed by the administrative organ, the Central Chamber (Seiin). This meant temporarily abandoning the idea of the deliberative organ being a representative institution.

So, you could regard the replacement of the feudal domains with new prefectures as a setback for institutionalizing a system for public discourse and public opinion. It did not mean, however, the complete defeat of that concept. Rather, the Meiji leadership continued to search for a proper form of parliamentary government that would be more representative of the people.

The turning point came with the Iwakura Mission. The leaders of the government who got the opportunity to examine Western civilization in its true form for themselves ultimately returned home, after many twists and turns, with a belief for civilizing Japan. It is worth noting that the two key members of the Mission, Ōkubo Toshimichi and Kido Takayoshi, both offered their own written opinions on adopting a constitutional system after their return. Let us examine their opinions next.

The Iwakura Mission and Constitution Considerations: Kido Takayoshi and Ōkubo Toshimichi

Ōkubo and Kido returned home in May and July of 1873 (Meiji 6), ahead of the mission. The two hurried back to Japan after having received news that the caretaker government was involved with radical reforms, resulting in conflict within the administration. Both men considered ways of rebuilding the state as they later came to grips with a significant challenge: the rift in the government caused by the debate over whether to send a punitive military expedition to Korea (Seikanron). Faced with this difficult situation, the two of them, by chance, called for the introduction of a constitutional system.

First was Kido. Shortly after his return and without delay, he submitted his opinion regarding a constitution in writing to the imperial court and released something in the same vein to the public in October. The gist of his argument was as follows.

“The urgent task for us today,” Kido stated, “is to add more clauses to the Oath in Five Articles, expanding it into the rules of government” (Kido 2003, p. 123). Kido insisted that the pressing matter before the country was to flesh out the Charter Oath and thereby settle on a constitution (“rules of government”). The key to the country’s fate, he reasoned, lay in what form the constitution would have.

So, what sort of constitution was suited to Japan in Kido’s opinion? In a word, an “autocratic” constitution. As Japan was still a country where civilization had yet to spread widely, Kido explained, the government was obligated to properly guide its citizens gradually to a more civilized state of being by means of the emperor’s decisive measures, executed by public officials in the government. What he regarded as the nation’s foremost task was the forceful leadership of the emperor and, under him, a government that serves him; he was endorsing a sort of tyranny of the public officials.

We may find his praise of autocracy dreadful. But it contained a deep conviction backed up by the Iwakura Mission’s experiences in the West. Although he called it autocracy, he said it must be carried out based on the people’s consent. Even speaking about the emperor, he asked rhetorically, “How could the whole country be the private property of one family?” In other words, even though Kido called his concept autocratic, precisely because it was a constitution, its purpose was not to guarantee the tyranny of the monarch, but rather to promote the unity of the people and respect their will. Constitutional government’s main objective is precisely the rule of politicians by the will of the people. Accordingly, even as he argued for an autocratic constitution, what Kido was focused on for the future was a constitutional monarchy in which the monarch shares sovereignty with his subjects. He made this point clear in his writings: “Although I speak today of an autocratic constitution, it is only until that time popular discussion occurs, which is the basis for constitution of shared sovereignty, which, in turn, is necessary as the foundation for the people’s welfare” (Kido 2003, p. 128). In other words, Kido’s plan for enacting a constitution envisions a steady evolution from autocracy to shared sovereignty, anticipating the creation of a citizenry able to shoulder the responsibility of the nation. This was a view he held in common with Ōkubo.

Ōkubo gave Itō Hirobumi, who had been ordered to examine systems of government, a written opinion stating his views on constitutional forms of government in November 1873 (Meiji 6). You could say it was a report of accomplishments in which Ōkubo summarized in careful detail what he came to realize about Western civilization while serving as the Iwakura Mission’s deputy; in that sense, it was similar to Kido’s report. He began by acknowledging the many varieties of national systems in the West. There are many systems of government in the world, from monarchies to democracies and everything in between. Each had its own historical background, and so it was not possible to determine unconditionally which one was the best. A country’s political structure is intrinsically molded and accretes naturally under given conditions, the country’s culture and national traits. Consequently, he asserted, any reforms must ultimately conform with the country’s “land, customs, manners, and spirit of the age”; one should not thoughtlessly copy another country’s institutions.

The issue was to establish a national system suited to Japan’s circumstances and political features. Ōkubo, too, considered the formation of a national foundation as the urgent task: “our business, first and foremost, is the rather important and urgent discussion of our national polity.” And what had to be done first for that purpose, was “to determine the laws of the nation,” i.e. to enact a constitution.

So, as you can see, Ōkubo and Kido shared a broad approach for creating a constitution. Yet, we can identify a gap between the two men just by glancing at the substance of their proposed constitutions. In contrast to Kido’s push for a monarchic autocracy, Ōkubo promoted shared sovereignty. As he laid out in his writings, “By having the constitution be a system of shared sovereignty, I believe we establish the monarch’s rights above and limit the people’s rights below, an arrangement that is completely fair and just” (Ōkubo 2014, p. 186).

So, Kido argued for an autocratic constitution and Ōkubo advocated a constitution where the monarch shares sovereignty with his subjects. But they both shared a structure of a similar quality, assigning the people a political role in that framework. “Can we make a government that excludes the people?” Ōkubo asked rhetorically in his written opinion. This was an ideal he held in common with Kido. As we saw earlier, the true nature of Kido’s argument in favor of an autocratic constitution was that it envisioned delegating power to the autocrat temporarily to realize the popular will. Their objective might be characterized as a national political self-awareness to hasten the enlightenment of the people.

Their conceptions concerning the process for achieving this objective were not very far apart. As Ōkubo wrote, “We should not arbitrarily imitate the countries in Europe with their systems for shared sovereignty between the sovereign and his subjects. Our country has a body of law naturally arising from its unbroken imperial line. Its people have their own degree of civilization. We must establish a legal charter only after due examination and consideration of the merits for our country” (Ōkubo 2014, p. 188). It means that Ōkubo and Kido shared a historicist understanding of a constitution: that imperial rule would be shaped by Japan’s unique traits and characteristics. The historical school of jurisprudence that the men learned from their experiences in Europe was something that guided their “arguments favoring a gradual process for constitutional enactment” (Talks with Itō Hirobumi in Ōkubo 2014, p. 206).

Kido and Ōkubo did not live to see the establishment of the constitutional system for Japan. The man who, through great efforts, was able to realize their last wishes was Itō Hirobumi. Let us next look at how he enacted the Meiji Constitution.

Itō Hirobumi and Enacting the Meiji Constitution

As previously mentioned, the nation’s task since the end of the Tokugawa shogunate had been to establish an organ for public debate (a legislative assembly), after forming a system of government that fostered public discourse and public opinion. The leaders in the Meiji government were keenly aware of this. The journey to making Japan a constitutional state commenced with bureaucrat-driven reforms.

After leaving the government in the wake of the political upheaval in 1873 touched off, Itagaki Taisuke and other influential men now out of power launched and led the Freedom and People’s Rights Movement, which evolved into a campaign to establish the national assembly. The push for a constitution, coming from both the bureaucracy and the public, elicited negative and positive reactions until it finally resulted in the promulgation of the Constitution of the Empire of Japan (the Meiji Constitution) on February 11, 1889.

What clearly had a fateful impact on the way to establishing the Meiji Constitution was the political crisis of 1881 (Meiji 14). The Minister of the Right Iwakura Tomomi ordered every vice-minister (sangi, the equivalent of a cabinet minister) to draw up and submit a written opinion on the constitution in 1880. The opinion written by Ōkuma Shigenobu, more than any other, startled the government, and it became the spark that set off the political crisis of 1881.

Ōkuma, unlike the other vice-ministers, advocated a radical argument for opening the legislature in 1883 (Meiji 16). Moreover, in his written opinion, he proposed a British-style parliamentary cabinet system centered on a national assembly, saying “a government by constitution is a government by political parties.” Hiding his report with its controversial subject matter from Iwakura and the other vice-ministers, Ōkuma tried to submit it as a secret memorial to the throne. In part owing to such clandestine actions as this, Ōkuma’s position in the government was left somewhat tarnished.

Soon afterwards, a scandal erupted over corrupt property sales by the Hokkaido Development Commission. Anti-government protests began to heat up after information was leaked to the public about plans for the Hokkaido Development Commission’s sale of government-owned land and assets at unusually low prices to companies tied to the government. Ōkuma was widely suspected of being the source of the leaks. It was rumored that Ōkuma, the proponent of party politics, was in a conspiracy to overthrow the government by colluding with some protestors who were out of power. So, on October 9, the government decided to stop the sale of the government-owned property at the same time that it decided to expel Ōkuma and the bureaucratic subordinates under his wing from the government. This was the political crisis of 1881 (Meiji 14).

The political crisis was a major turning point in Japanese constitutional history. After Ōkuma’s ouster, an imperial rescript was issued on October 12 calling for a national assembly to be established and it was declared that it would open in 1890 (Meiji 23). Finding itself caught in a pincer movement—Ōkuma’s secret memorial from within, and the Freedom and People’s Rights Movement from without—the Meiji government publicly pledged, in the name of the emperor, to enact a constitution that would establish the national legislature.

Thus, the government had to get to work in a hurry to enact the constitution. Its preparation was flawless. In June, after Ōkuma’s secret memorial laying out his opinion on a constitution had been discovered within the government, Iwakura compiled his own constitutional opinion piece as a countermeasure; in opposition to Ōkuma’s proposed Westminster system, he offered a concept modeled on a Prussian-style constitutional monarchy. Inoue Kowashi was the author; he was the Meiji government’s mastermind who later drafted the constitution. In fact, the establishment of the Meiji Constitution is unthinkable without Inoue’s vigorous efforts.

Yet, it was not only the constitution that was drafted at that time. The Imperial Household Law (kōshitsu tenpan), which is considered a fundamental law for the state the same as the constitution (kenpō), was also drafted during this period (which is why the Meiji national legal system is sometimes called the Ten-Ken system). In addition, the Parliamentary Law, the House of Representatives Election Law, the Accounting Law, and the House of Peers Ordinance were promulgated on the same day as the constitution (February 11, 1889). While not formally constitutional law, they all were laws/ordinances indispensable for the actual functioning of the legislative and public finance system laid down by the constitution. They are called organic laws, as they are important laws that directly flesh out a constitution. Between the political crisis of 1881 and the promulgation of the constitution, there were many other important state institutions and systems continually being established. This was the period in which the Meiji state’s “kuni no katachi (shape of the nation)” came together.

Here I would like to give my perspective on kuni no katachi. I wrote, above, that Inoue Kowashi drafted the Meiji Constitution. Itō Hirobumi is typically advertised at the father of the Meiji Constitution. Perhaps Itō arrogated to himself Inoue’s achievement?

Inoue, certainly, had a tremendous presence in the drafting of the various articles of the constitution. When we turn to consider the creation of the panoply of national institutions that enabled the constitution to function, rather that the writing of the constitution itself, Itō’s presence grows more prominent. When Itō is called the father of the Meiji Constitution, it should be understood to mean of all the institutions of state, that is, national institutions and kuni no katachi (constitution), rather than simply kenpō (constitution). (The meaning of the English word “constitution” has an original sense of the structure as well as the forming or establishing of that structure.) To understand this point, I must touch on Itō’s constitutional study mission to Europe.

The year after the political crisis of 1881, Itō set out for Europe to do some constitutional research. And what he learned was the relative nature of constitutional law: that a constitution is fine insofar as it describes things in a general way. He grew aware that it is sufficient for the constitution to prescribe the structure and organization of the legislature, stipulate the rights and duties of its citizens, and enumerate the monarch’s powers. That being the case, the actual enactment of the constitution does not demand that much effort. What is more important, he said at the time, is to establish the administration to enable the legislature to function when it is opened.

After returning home from his constitutional study trip, he did carry out reform of the imperial court and implement education for the emperor as a constitutional monarch. He also sought to modernize the institutions for governance by introducing a cabinet system and renovating the existing Grand Council of State (Dajōkan) system. In the cabinet system, any of the citizens could become a minister, regardless of their status (such as being from a noble family). He also instituted a system for the bureaucracy, and for that purpose the Imperial University was founded (1886). A recruitment system was put in place to hire men who studied at the Imperial University as civil servants to administer the state.

This series of reforms sketched out the kuni no katachi, a constitutional state; the promulgation of the constitution on February 11, 1889 (Meiji 22) was the finishing touch. His molding of the kuni no katachi is Itō Hirobumi’s contribution to Japanese constitutional history.

The Meiji Constitutional System as World History Heritage

There are various possible ways of appreciating the innovativeness of the Meiji Restoration. As the classical rivalry between the “lectures” faction and the “labor-farmer” faction in the pre-war debate on Japanese capitalism over the characterization of the bourgeois revolution. As a revolution for independence or a people’s revolution that beat back the foreign threat of being colonized and maintained Japan’s independence as a country. Or, as a nationalist revolution that, by carrying out important reforms such as replacing feudal domains with prefectures and abolishing the four-tier social class system of the Tokugawa period, established a unified, sovereign nation.

As you can tell by the title of this chapter, I regard the Meiji Restoration as a constitutional revolution first and foremost. Consistently through various twists and turns, Meiji leaders pushed ahead with the transition to a constitutional system and the introduction of a parliamentary system, from its start in the politics of public discourse that vigorously took place at the end of the Tokugawa period. Its intended destination for some time was the very enactment of the Constitution of the Empire of Japan in 1889. We should appreciate the Meiji Restoration as a long process of revolution that spanned over 20 years.

The establishment of a constitutional system in the Meiji period, it is safe to say, has a significance in world history. We can cite two major countries in the non-Western world that came up with a constitution before Japan, Tunisia (1861) and the Ottoman Empire (1867), but neither were sustained for long and both were suspended. Japan is the rare case in the non-Western world that inherited constitutionalism successfully. Why was it possible for constitutionalism to become established in Japan? As I have run out of space here already, I shall have to put off a fundamental inquiry for another day. But I would like to leave you with a few points.

First, there is the long view. Calls for a parliamentary system of government came from within and outside of the government. But to actually achieve it, government leaders such as Kido and Ōkubo recognized the need for sufficient preparations. They firmly believed that the introduction of a constitutional system needed a slow and steady approach, never something radical or slipshod.

Second, there is the prerequisite, the nation-state. A constitutional system is one that guarantees the political participation of its citizens. This necessitates agents who are citizens able to bear the responsibility in national politics. Various measures to that end were proposed, but I would like to take the opportunity here to endorse historicism. The Iwakura Mission observed and became aware of the fact that the political systems and social organizations of each country in the Western world all differed. Moreover, historicismFootnote 3 was a fundamental trend of thought at the time. It was widely held that citizens with a shared history should be responsible for the laws and systems. After Itō’s constitutional research reaffirmed this point, Japan’s basic policy was set: to enact a constitution unique to the country, based on the historical traditions of the people.

Third, the relative nature of the constitution. As I just mentioned, Itō thought that a constitution, by itself, was nothing more than a sheet of paper; to breathe life into it, it was essential to have chain of institutions working in a coordinated fashion. Itō’s real worth as a rare sort of leader for the constitution can be found in the fact that he both recognized that reforming the nation’s institutions was inseparable from, and was one part of the process toward, enacting a constitution, and successfully implemented those institutional reforms.

Thus, the Meiji Restoration as constitutional revolution achieved results for the time being. But the promulgation of the constitution was not the end point. In fact, the start of parliamentary government saw the conflict intensify between the party-led Diet and the government dominated by several of the former domains, but finally party politics took root and there were visible signs of systemic transformations on the path to a parliamentary cabinet system.

Amid the global trend of anti-parliamentarianism, Japan, too, began adopting authoritarianism and a structure for total war in the early Shōwa period. Japanese constitutional history holds positive and negative aspects such as this. This is exactly why Japan, based on its historical experiences, is in a position to give advice and counsel to countries trying to introduce constitutional systems and to those that did so but where they are not functioning properly. The Meiji Restoration should be seen as a precious resource of knowledge for this purpose.

Bibliography: For Further Reading

Iwakura, Tomomi. 1968. Iwakura-kō jikki (Authentic Chronicle of Prince Iwakura). Hara Shobō.

Kido, Takayoshi. Tsumaki, Chūta and Nihon Shiseki Kyōkai (eds). 2003. Kido takayoshi monjo dai 8kan (The Papers of Kido Takayoshi, Volume 8). Tokyo: The University of Tokyo Press.

Mitani, Hiroshi. 2017. Ishinshi saikō: kōgi ōsei kara shūken datsu mibunka e (Reconsidering the Restoration: from Public Debates and Imperial Rule to Centralizing Power and Abolishing the Feudal Class Structure). Tokyo: NHK Books.

Nara, Katsuji. 2018. Meiji ishin o toraenaosu: hi "kokumin" teki apurōchi kara saikōsuru henkaku no Sugata (Rethinking the Meiji Restoration: The Revolution Reconsidered from an anti-“Popular” Approach). Tokyo: Yūshisha.

Ōkubo Toshimichi. Nihon Shiseki Kyōkai (eds). 2014. Ōkubo toshimichi monjo: 5. (The Papers of Ōkubo Toshimichi, Vol. 5). Tokyo: The University of Tokyo Press.

Additional Bibliography

Ōishi, Makoto. 2005. Nihon kenpō shi daini-han (The History of the Constitution of Japan, Second Edition). Tokyo: Yūhikaku.

A compact and condensed outline by one of the leading researchers of Japanese constitutional history who inherited the mantle from Messrs. Inada Masatsugu and Kojima Kazushi.

Takii, Kazuhiro. 2003. Bunmeishi no naka no meiji kenpō : kono kuni no katachi to seiyō taiken (The Meiji Constitution: the Japanese Experience of the West and the Shaping of the Modern State). Tokyo: Kōdansha sensho metier. (Published in English as: Takii, Kazuhiro. Noble, David (trans). 2007. The Meiji Constitution: the Japanese Experience of the West and the Shaping of the Modern State. Tokyo: International House of Japan.)

This argues that the history of the enactment of the Meiji Constitution as culturally negotiated history from the viewpoint of western legal history.

Takii, Kazuhiro. 2010. Itō hirobumi: chi no seijika (Itō Hirobumi: Wise Politician). Tokyo: Chūō Kōron Shinsha.

My attempt to depict Itō Hirobumi as the designer of the national system. It covers his continuous path toward achieving constitutional politics.