At about 190 pages into Tragedy and Hope, Quigley, considered by many to be the best historian of the 20th century, sets the record straight regarding the so-called Meiji Restoration in Japan. By all outward appearances, the Restoration wrested power away from the shogun and placed it back in the hands of the Japanese emperor. But while this story of the emperor’s return to power was spread far and wide, the reality of the situation was quite different. In truth, the Restoration had simply shifted power away from the shogun and into the hands of feudal lords who “proceeded to rule Japan in the emperor’s name and from the emperor’s shadow.”[1] These leaders, organized in a shadowy group known as the Meiji oligarchy, had obtained complete domination of Japan by 1889. To cover this fact with camouflage, they unleashed a vigorous propaganda [of] abject submission to the emperor which culminated in the extreme emperor worship of 1941–1945.
To provide an administrative basis for their rule, the oligarchy created an extensive governmental bureaucracy…To provide an economic basis for their rule, this oligarchy used their political influence to pay themselves extensive pensions and government grants [and engaged] in corrupt business relationships with their allies in the commercial classes…To provide a military basis for their rule, the oligarchy created a new imperial army and navy and penetrated the upper ranks of these so that they were able to dominate these forces as they dominated the civil bureaucracy. To provide a social basis for their rule, the oligarchy created…five ranks of nobility recruited from their own members and supporters.
Having thus assured their dominant position…the oligarchy in 1889 drew up a constitution which would assure, and yet conceal, their political domination of the country.[2]
The oligarchy presented the constitution as “an emission from the emperor, setting up a system in which all government would be in his name, and all officials would be personally responsible to him.”[3] This seemingly legitimate constitution called for a legislative body composed of both an elected House of Representatives and a House of Peers. Though these provisions were enacted, they were essentially meaningless:
The form and functioning of the constitution was of little significance, for the country continued to be run by the Meiji oligarchy through their domination of the army and navy, the bureaucracy, economic and social life, and the opinion-forming agencies such as education and religion.[4]
Like all ruling classes, the Meiji maintained control by indoctrinating the masses in an ideology that served the oligarchs’ interests. Specifically, they propagated the Shinto ideology, which called for subordination to the emperor. “In this system, there was no place for individualism, self-interest, human liberties, or civil rights.”[5]
The Japanese people accepted this Shinto ideology, and as a result the Meiji oligarchy was able to ruthlessly exploit them in the emperor’s name. However, interestingly enough, the Meiji were beholden to an even greater power. Behind them there existed yet another group, numbering no more than a dozen men, which represented the ultimate ruling power in Japan. Quigley explains:
These leaders came in time to form a formal, if extralegal, group known as the Genro…Of this group, Robert Reischauer wrote in 1938: “It is these men who have been the real power behind the Throne. It became customary for their opinion to be asked and, more important still, to be followed in all matters of great significance to the welfare of the state. No Premier was ever appointed except from the recommendation of these men who became known as the Genro. Until 1922 no important domestic legislation, no important foreign treaty escaped their perusal and sanction before it was signed by the Emperor. These men, in their time, were the actual rulers of Japan.”[6]
Footnotes:
- Tragedy and Hope, page 194
- Tragedy and Hope, page 195
- Tragedy and Hope, page 195
- Tragedy and Hope, page 196
- Tragedy and Hope, pages 197–198
- Tragedy and Hope, page 200
