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II. Ōi Kentarō: Radicalism and Chauvinism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2011

Marius B. Jansen
Affiliation:
University of Washington
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Extract

He westernization and reformation of Japan in the nineteenth century were motivated in large measure by a desire to escape the fate of Asian nations that had failed to make a thorough renovation. The example of China in particular seemed to prove the aggressive nature of European imperialism and the necessity for speedy and drastic changes. Japan's modernization, however, was not motivated by a defense mentality alone. There was, rather, a defense-in-depth concept whereby a renovated Japanese nation should, at the very least, join and, if possible, lead other Asian countries in resistance to the West. This awareness of community with Asia was a constant factor in Japanese politics during the Meiji period. The leaders of the liberal-democratic movement emphasized this theme most strongly; they sought from the first to apply their ideas abroad. They condemned their government's apparent indifference to Asian affairs and its anxiety to please the West. The liberals found a more ready response to such charges than they did to their proposals for changes at home, and so they tended to use them more and more. When this nationalist emphasis is considered in conjunction with the lack of a program of domestic and economic reform, the total effect of the liberal-democratic movement can be considered as tending toward militarism and aggression as often as it did toward peace and democracy.

Type
Problems of Political Power in Modern Japan: A Symposium
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1952

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References

1 Toshio, Ueda, “Nihon no kaikoku to Chūgoku” (The opening of Japan, and China), Kokusaihō Gaikō Zasshi (Journal of International Law and Diplomacy), Vol. XLIX, November 1950, 88101Google Scholar. The last of a series of three articles.

2 Taisuke, Itagaki, ed., Jiyūtō shi (History of the Liberal Party), (Tokyo: 1910), Vol. 2, 344fGoogle Scholar; a clear statement of the meaning of liberalism, national unity, and Asian goals.

3 See especially Ike, Nobutaka, The Beginnings of Political Democracy in Japan (Baltimore: 1950)Google Scholar, for an excellent survey of the Meiji movement with special reference to two theorists, Nakae Chōmin and Ueki Emori.

4 Scalapino, Robert A., An Analysis of Political Party Failure in Japan (Harvard University Ph. D. Dissertation: 1948), 118fGoogle Scholar. This outstanding study is to be published shortly.

5 A small group of liberals actually did join Saigō. Itagaki was able to hold his followers in check, however, explaining to them, “Saigō fights the government with arms, we fight it with minken (people's rights).” Ōtsu Junichirō, Dai Nihon kensei shi (Constitutional history of Japan), (Tokyo: 1927) Vol. 2, 112Google Scholar.

6 Yoshitake, Oka, “Meiji shoki no jiyūminken ronsha no me ni eijitaru tōji no kokusai jōsei” (The international situation as seen by the democratic spokesmen of early Meiji), in Seiji oyobi Seijishi kenkyū (Studies in politics and political history) (Tokyo: 1935), 471514Google Scholar. A volume of essays dedicated to the memory of Yoshino Sakuzō.

7 Professor Oka's article, an analysis of four leading liberal dailies, is particularly valuable on this point.

8 This is not to claim that Japan's imperialist drive derived solely from a depressed internal market which forced zaibatsu industrialism to seek markets abroad. But certainly if the political parties had focused attention upon domestic programs instead of foreign opportunities and insults their effect on foreign policy would have been very different.

9 Yoshitarō, Hirano, Bajō Ōi Kentarō den (Tokyo: 1938), 476Google Scholar. Most of this has been incorporated into the same author's Minken undō no batten (The development of the movement for people's rights) (Tokyo: 1948), 240Google Scholar.

10 Mitsukuri later became a member of the Genrōin, a judge, and, posthumously, Baron. Biographical sketch in Shinsen daijimmei jiten (Newly selected biographical dictionary) (Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1938), Vol. 6, 60Google Scholar. Mitsukuri was the first to coin the compound for “constitution” (kempō), and Ōi was sufficiently impressed by this to change his name from Daisuke to Kentarō. Hirano, Bajō Ōi, 12.

11 Accounts for these early years of Ōi's life are quite inadequate. Hirano, who stresses Ōi's liberalism, minimizes the service in the War Office, explaining that poverty and debt forced Ōi's decision; he makes no mention of Tsuda. The official Kokuryūkai (Amur, “Black Dragon” Society) history, Tōa senkaku sbishi kiden (Stories and biographies of pioneer East Asian adventurers), (Tokyo: 1936)Google Scholar, however, stresses Tsuda's role and portrays him as Ōi's patron for these years. Biography of Ōi in Vol. 3, 137.

12 Etō left the government in 1873, and led the first of the samurai revolts under slogans calling for democratic rights and war with Korea.

13 Jiyūtō shi, Vol. 1, 117–125.

14 Ike, op. cit., 59. See especially Shigeki, Tōyama, “Seikan ron, jiyūminkenron, hōkenron ” (Discussions of a punitive expedition against Korea, liberty and people's rights, and feudalism), in Rekishigaku Kenkyū (Historical Research) (Tokyo: Nos. 143, 145; January, May, 1950), 112, 19–34Google Scholar; a searching analysis of contradictions in the early liberal movement. In an editorial controversy of 1875 the progovernment Nichi-Nichi shimbun's proposal that the franchise should be extended according to income was sharply disputed by the liberal Yūbin Hōchi shimbun, which held for ballots for samurai.

15 “Hirano, Minken undō, iii, brackets Ōi with Nakae and Ueki and contrasts the three to the “gentleman” liberals.

16 Hirano, Bajō Ōi, p. 74. The author implies a coolness toward Ōi on the part of the “respectable” liberals.

17 When mob violence broke out in protest against forced labor for public works which the liberal leaders had opposed in Fukushima, the government prosecuted the liberals. For the entire incident and trial, Jiyūtō shi, Vol. 2, 1–39. For newspaper accounts of the trial, Yasumasa, Nakayama, ed., Shimbun shūsei Meiji hennen shi (Chronological history of Meiji compiled from newspapers) (Tokyo: 1940), Vol. 5, 326Google Scholar.

18 This is developed in my dissertation, The Japanese and the Chinese Revolutionary Movement. 1895–1915 (Harvard University: 1950).Google Scholar

19 In the Fourth Diet, Kōno Hironaka assured the government that the argument was one of means, not ends. Tōyama Shigeki, “Jiyū minken undō to tairiku mondai” (The liberal-democratic movement and the problem of the continent,” Sekai, June, 1950, 27–38, for Kōno, 36.

20 Accounts of the incident can be found in Hirano, Bajō Ōi, 83–215, Minken undō, 49–94, Ōtsu, op. cit., 2, 725–737, Jiyūtō shi, 2, 357–374, and Tōa senkaku shishi kiden, 1, 92–116.

21 Yoshirō, Sakatani. Segai Inoue Kō den (Biography of the great Inoue), (Tokyo: 1933), 3, 741765Google Scholar, gives the story from the viewpoint of Inoue, who was then Foreign Minister.

22 Jiyūtō shi, 2, 345f.

23 Hirano, loc. cit., gives long excerpts from Ōi's testimony under questioning as well as from his speech.

24 Bajō Ōi, 108.

25 Reprinted in Bajō Ōi, 361–395, and in Minken undō, 201–239.

26 Reprinted in Bajō Ōi, 397–474.

27 See Ibid., 233–242, for excerpts from such a speech. Ōi was still campaigning against mixed residence of foreigners in 1893. Meiji hennen shi, Vol. 8, 465; from the Chōya of September 30, 1893.

28 Also released for political crimes were Kōno Hironaka, Kataoka Kenkichi, Hoshi Toru, and several other prominent liberals.

29 It may be mentioned that on this issue Dr. Hirano treats his subject with somewhat greater respect than does Mr. Tōyama. The former's books cited here are designed to show Ōi as a liberal, while the latter's theme of contradictions in the liberal movement seems at times to underestimate (or to take for granted) Ōi's social and economic program.

30 Minken undō, 109.

31 Meiji hennen shi, 7, 271; Minken undō, 103f.

32 Meiji hennen shi, 9, 35–6, 66, 67–8, for Diet activities.

33 Among Oi's many speeches was one given at a memorial meeting for Kim Ok-kiun, whose assassination had inflamed Japanese public opinion. Ibid., 9, 56.

34 Bajō Ōi, 274. One wonders how Ōi would have liked his Prime Minister; Tokugawa Keiki won out over Itagaki Taisuke by 171 votes.

35 Minken undō, 145f.

36 Meiji hennen shi, 8, 280; from Nichi-Nichi of July 26, 1892.

37 Bajō Ōi, 292.

38 Reprinted in Ibid., 326–340.

39 Thus Ōi visited Sun Yat-sen in Tokyo on December 8, 1913, to ask his help in starting industries in China under a Japan-China Business Association. From the Foreign Office Files, Kakumei tō kankei, “Bōmei sho o fukumu” (Refugees), L.C.#M.T.1.6.1.4.1., Exposure 2775f.

40 Miyazaki Torazō, , an adventurer who worked with Sun Yat-sen, found ŌI in Singapore in 1898. Sanjū-sannen no yume (Thirty-three years' dream), (Tokyo: 1942), 110Google Scholar. And the Kokuryūkai history gives Ōi generous coverage in its list of patriots.

41 Bajō Ōi, 344–5.

42 See Biographical sketch in Dai jimmei jiten by Inoue Kiyoshi, Vol. 1, 490–491.

43 From Jiji yōron; Minken undō, 225. For a detailed discussion of Ōi's view of private rights, see Kichisaburō, Nakamura, “Meiji mimpō shi ni okeru Ōno Azusa to Ōi Kentarō” (Ōno Azusa and Ōi Kentarō in the History of Civil Law in the Meiji Era), in Waseda Hōgaku (Waseda Law Review), Vol. XXIV, Nos. 1, 2, 1948Google Scholar; 100–121, 181–189.

44 There is a good biography by Sōgorō, Tanaka, Nihon fascism no genryū: Kita Ikki no shisō to shōgai (The origins of Japanese fascism: The life and thought of Kita Ikki) (Tokyo: 1949), 418Google Scholar, which traces Kita's progression through socialist and nationalist societies into fascism.