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Prince Saionji and the Popular Rights Movement

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2011

Jackson H. Bailey
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Extract

Saionji Kimmochi was often called the last bulwark against complete usurpation of power in the civil government by the Japanese military in the early and middle 1930's. As the last of the Genrō he represented also leadership which had developed in the Meiji period centering in a small group of able men who carried Japan from isolation to intimate involvement in world affairs. Not as well known is Saionji's role in the Meiji period; its study brings rewarding insight into the pattern of leadership and the development of political life during those years. It is the purpose of this paper to describe Saionji's background and to analyze his role in the movement for popular rights and a constitution which culminated in the issuance of the Imperial Rescript of October 12, 1881, the Rescript which promised a constitution and the establishment of a parliament.

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Articles
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The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 21 , Issue 1 , November 1961 , pp. 49 - 63
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1961

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References

1 Ki, Kimura, Saionji Kimmochi (Tokyo, 1948), p. 35Google Scholar. Hereafter cited as Kimura (1948). (Saionji quoted by Koizumi.)

2 Ki, Kimura, Saionji Kimmochi (Tokyo, 1958), 7Google Scholar. Hereafter cited as Kimura (1958).

3 Kimura (1948), p. 36.

4 Kimura (1948), p. 98.

5 Kimura (1948), pp. 101–102.

6 I have not been able to locate this report.

7 Tokki, Andō, Saionji-kō to Kōnan sensei. (Prince Saionji and Professor Kōnan), (Tokyo, 1936), p. 54.Google Scholar

8 See his comments to Hashimoto Saneyana in a letter. Reprinted in the magazine Kokoro, August 1950. (Letter No. 6, Sept. 1873)

9 Yūgo, Kobayashi, Rikken Seiyūkai-shi (Tokyo, 1924), II, 16–17.Google Scholar

10 The term min which is translated as people creates a problem of definition. It is unlikely that Saionji envisaged anything approaching mass democracy. He was too much of an aristocrat. He desired a gradual broadening of the base of political participation in an evolutionary process.

11 Ki, Kimura, Saionji Kimmochi Jiden (Tokyo, 1949), p. 81.Google Scholar

12 Tokki, Andō, Saionji Kimmochi (Tokyo, 1938), p. 124.Google Scholar

13 Biographers are vague as to whether Saionji helped establish the school or agreed to lecture there after it was set up. See Takekoshi Yosaburō, Tōan-kō (Tokyo, 1930), 100; Tokki, Andō, Tōan-kō keifu (Tokyo, 1949), 47Google Scholar. Since he was already involved with the Tōyō Jiyū Shimbun the latter interpretation seems more likely.

14 His lecture manuscript was held by Meiji University, but was destroyed in the great earthquake of 1923.

15 Andō Tokki quotes an obscure source as saying that he got a loan of government money through Inoue Kaoru in the Foreign Office, but this is difficult to accept. (Andō, Saionji Kimmochi, pp. 105–106.)

16 Saionji's biographers do not state exactly when Nakae joined the paper, but Kimura quotes Saionji as saying he approached Nakae and asked him to join. (Kimura, Saionji Kimmochi Jiden, p. 80.)

17 This phrase has Deen discussed by ProfessorWright, Mary in her monograph The Last Stand of Chinese Conservatism (Stanford, 1957)Google Scholar and in her article in the Journal of Asian Studies, November 1958. The last two characters were adopted in China as the reign title for the Manchu Emperor in the period 1861–75. As such it has been translated as “union in the cause of law and order.” (The Last Stand of Chinese Conservatism, p. 19, note j) Professor Wright translates the four characters from Chinese to mean “officials and people together desiring a return to law and order.” (Journal of Asian Studies, Nov. 1958, p. 105).

18 Meiji Bunka Zenshu, IV (Tokyo, 1928), 345–46.Google Scholar

19 Mary Wright, Journal of Asian Studies, Nov. 1958, p. 106.

20 A complete file of the Tōyō Jiyū Shimbun is held in the Meiji Shimbun Zasshi Bunko at Tokyo University.

21 Gi ; Dō .

22 In common speech they had long been known as the “people above the clouds.”

23 Andō, Toan-ko Keifu, pp. 42–43.

24 Mainichi Shimbun, July 26, 1901. Number 32 in a serial biography of Saionji entitled “Comments on Present-day Personalities,” by Ishikawa Hanzan. Unfortunately Ishikawa does not state who made this remark.

25 The most complete source of information on these maneuverings is an article published by the Osaka Nippō, April 19, 1881. I have drawn from it as well as from the comments of Andō and Kimura.

26 Mainichi Shimbun, July 26, 1901.

27 Kimura, (1958), pp. 49–52. The letter was submitted March 30, 1881.

28 Kimura (1958), p. 49.

29 Kokoro, August, 1950, (Letter No. 13, March 31, 1881).

30 Andō, Saionji Kimmochi, pp. 109–111.

31 Ibid., pp. 107–109.

32 Andō, Tōan-kō Keifu, 47. The author used an interesting play on words. He said that Saionji's rise would be accompanied by the clanging of a bell, “gikan, gikan, gikan.” Gikan has two meanings: it is the onomatopoeic word for the sound of a bell and it is the title of a government official.

33 Mainichi Shimbun, September 1, 1901.

34 The Sanji-in was a body established in October 1881, concurrently with the announcement of plans for drafting a constitution. Its function was to draw up laws for promulgation by the Genrō-in and to carry on the drafting of the constitution. Its members were called Gikan and were advised by specialists called Gikan-hō. The Sanji-in was headed by Itō Hirobumi.