No CrossRef data available.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 May 2025
Minobe Tatsukichi (1873-1948), professor of constitutional law on the Tōdai Faculty of Law, was one of prewar Japan's foremost legal scholars. The emperor-organ theory is the doctrine with which his name is associated; it held that the emperor was an organ of the state; the repository of sovereignty, he was still a constituent part of the larger entity, the state. Hozumi Yatsuka (1860-1912) and Uesugi Shinkichi (1878-1929), both also professors on the Faculty of Law, provided the theoretical underpinning for an alternate doctrine. Citing conservative European legal theorists (and paraphrasing France's Louis XIV), they argued that the emperor was the state. The two positions framed the legal debate under the Meiji Constitution.
1 Tachibana's book started out as a monthly serial in Bungei shunjū; under the title “My Tōdai” (Watakushi no Tōdai), it ran for sixty-six instalments. I have translated fifteen of these chapters: Tokyo Imperial University and the War (forthcoming).
2 Hiraizumi Kiyoshi (1895-1984), professor on the Tōdai Faculty of Law, was noted for his outspoken nationalism. Tachibana devotes the five chapters preceding this one to Hiraizumi. Hiraizumi was purged by the Occupation in 1948. This and later notes are the translator's.
3 The February 26 Incident was an Army revolt in central Tokyo, February 26-29, 1936; it involved the assassination of the three major figures mentioned below.
4 The Imperial University News (Teikoku daigaku shimbun [1920-44], then Daigaku shimbun) was a serious and respected journal.
5 Prime Minister Hamaguchi was attacked in 1930 and died in 1931; Finance Minister Inoue was assassinated on February 9, 1932; Prime Minister Inukai was assassinated May 15, 1932. The May 15 Incident was the revolt by young naval officers that resulted in the assassination of Prime Minister Inukai.
6 Fuasshizumu hihan, Tokyo: Nihon hyōronsha, 1934.
7 Minoda's phrase shinajinteki [literally, like Chinese people] has at least a tinge of condescension. Shina for China was common usage in the 1930s.
8 Prewar and wartime Japanese censorship involved deleting passages but noting the fact and extent of deletion by means of such measures as this string of Xs.
9 Nagata was assassinated on August 12, 1935.
10 “Go-ichigo jiken no hihan,” Bungei shunjū, November 1933
11 Kikigaki: Nambara Shigeru kaikoroku, ed. Maruyama Masao and Fukuda Kanichi; Tokyo: Tokyo daigaku shuppankai, 1989.
12 In other words, first the outer line of defense was demolished, then the inner.
13 Kokutai: literally, form of state/country, supposedly distinct from seitai (form of government), but code for Japan's supposedly unique relation between emperor and people. The demand for the “clarification of the kokutai“ was the shibboleth of anti-liberal forces around Genri Nihon; it led to Emperor- Organ Incident.
14 Miyazawa Toshiyoshi, Kempō kōgian: Kōgiyō. 1 1938. Article 1: “The Empire of Japan shall be reigned over and governed by a line of Emperors unbroken for ages eternal.” Article 4: “The Emperor is the head of the Empire, combining in Himself the rights of sovereignty, and exercises them, according to the provisions of the present Constitution.”
15 To indicate respect for the emperor, Minoda leaves the space immediately above the word ‘emperor’ blank.
16 Tennō kikansetsu jiken: shiryō wa kataru, 2 vols., Tokyo: Yūhikaku, 1970-71.
17 “Minobe Tatsukichi ron,” Chūō kōron, March 1935.
18 “Daigaku no jichi——jiken to hito,” Asahi Jyaanaru; Asahi jyanaaru henshūbu, ed, Daigaku no jichi, Tokyo: Asahi shimbunsha, 1963.
19 1913-91; political scientist. Tōdai Faculty of Law (graduated 1937); member, Tōdai Faculty of Law, 1942-73.
20 1932-33; attack on Kyoto University Faculty of Law Professor Takigawa Yukitoki by rightwing forces. The Ministry of Education instructed the Kyoto University president to fire Takigawa. Eight professors (of fifteen) and thirteen assistant professors (of eighteeen) resigned in protest. The Tōdai Faculty of Law made no concerted protest.
21 The editors were three of Onozuka's disciples: Nambara Shigeru, Rōyama Masamichi, and Yabe Teiji.
22 Watakushitachi no Takigawa jiken, ed., Takigawa jiken Tōdai henshūiinkai (Tokyo: Shinchosha, 1985).
23 One of Tōdai's main gates was the Red Gate.
24 TT: Many students took part in this mass meeting, and among the authors of the book Our Takigawa Incident, which contains the recollections of participants in a commemoration fifty years later, are these noteworthy names: Okōchi Kazuo (Tōdai president), Nakamura Akira (Hosei University president), Ōgiya Shōzō (commentator), Okakura Koshirō (Doshisha University professor, scholar of international politics), Seki Kakehiko (Toritsu University professor, politician), Tsugawa Takeichi (doctor, Communist Party Diet member), Imai Tadashi (movie director), Hata Yawara (Saitama governor), and others; and others participating in the actions of that era include Dan Kazuo (novelist), Hanamori Yasuji (counsel of the Kurashi no techō Research Institute), Tamiya Torahiko (novelist), Sugiura Mimpei (novelist), Hosoda Kichizō (LDP Diet representative, Minister of Transport), and others.
25 The “young prophet” was Fujii Takeshi (1888-1930), close disciple of Uchimura Kanzō; the cry, “Perish,” is a refrain in his poem “Perish.”
You have
Access
Open access