366 



JAPAN. 



were of the rank of choku, appointed directly by 

 the Emperor, 3,496 so, appointed by the Council 

 of State and reported to the Emperor, 25.942 han, 

 appointed by the heads of departments, 2,189 po- 

 lice or prison agents, and 18,573 miscellaneous 

 salaried employees. Of the whole, 30,316 serve 

 the national administration directly, and 20,044 

 the local authorities, the former receiving in 

 salaries $640,473, and the latter $359,674 ; the 

 total public expense for civil service being 

 $1.000,147. In the national election system 

 necessitated by Japan's representative institu- 

 tions, there were, in 1890, 257 electoral districts, 

 300 Deputies to be elected to the House of Com- 

 mons or Representatives, 453,895 electors, or 12 

 to every 1,000 of the population. The number 

 of electors not voting was 32,689, or 7 out of 

 every 100. The total of ballots cast was 421,206. 

 As yet, the islands of Hokkaido (Yezo) and 

 Okinawa (Riu Kiu) are not organized under the 

 electoral law. In 1890, 2,230 persons sat in the 

 42 prefectural and 3 imperial city councils. Male 

 citizens aged twenty-five, domiciled three years in 

 their districts, who pay $10 in local taxes, are 

 eligible to these councils, and in 1890 these per- 

 sons numbered 755.412, while those who had the 

 right to vote numbered 1,409,510. Japan has 

 a total of 136 persons on her foreign consular 

 and legational staff, and she treats on her own 

 soil with 116 foreigners representing the various 

 treaty powers. 



The Imperial Diet. The second session of 

 the Diet opened Nov. 26, 1891, and. after a dead- 

 lock between the Government and the Opposi- 

 tion, the lower house was dissolved and the up- 

 per house prorogued. During the three months 

 following, after violent agitation, in which more 

 than 40 newspapers were suspended, and election 

 riots, in which 20 persons were killed and 140 

 wounded, a majority hostile to the Government 

 was returned. Of the 297 members elected to the 

 lower house, 108 are agriculturists, 61 members 

 of prefectural assemblies, 17 barristers, 16 bank- 

 ers, 13 journalists, and 11 business men. On the 

 whole, there is a decided increase of men who 

 have had practical experience in executive office 

 or in the local assemblies, and the rise of a dis- 

 tinct class of politicians is shadowed forth, with 

 a decrease of barristers and journalists. The re- 

 sults of the election ultimately forced the resig- 

 nation of the members of the Cabinet, compelled 

 the Government to abandon the attempted prose- 

 cution of two Liberals, Counts Okuwa and Ita- 

 gaki, and to institute an inquiry into govern- 

 mental interference with the elections. A new 

 coalition Cabinet, consisting mostly of ex-minis- 

 ters, was formed, and is believed to be one of the 

 strongest in commanding popular confidence 

 organized since 1889. The Diet was convoked 

 May 2, and on the 16th prorogued for one week, 

 on account of its vote of censure passed on the 

 Government. Matters progressed favorably in 

 the Diet on its reassembling. On the 21st the 

 Peace Preservation Regulations were again put 

 in force, and 141 persons, mostly the young ultra- 

 patriotic " fire eaters " called soshi, and. as a rule, 

 graduates of the private schools, against which 

 the hostility of the Government is constantly 

 manifest, were expelled from the capital, and or- 

 dered not to come within 20 miles of it while the 

 Diet should be in session. On June 15 the ses- 



sion closed, after a dispute between the two 

 houses, which the Emperor, to whom it was re- 

 ferred, decided in giving to the upper house an 

 equal right with the lower house to interfere 

 with the budget. Of the eleven bills j 

 eight were Government measures, one was for the 

 railway loan of $60,000,000 to be raised in twelve 

 years, looking to the purchase of railways now 

 owned by private corporations, one for the estab- 

 lishment of a parcel post, and one postponing the 

 new civil and commercial codes until 1896. This 

 relegates the question of treaty revision to the 

 background, the Japanese not being readv to 

 have brought home to their bosoms and bu 

 the Teutonic and Christian ideas that lie at the 

 basis of Western law. In Asiatic society the 

 unit is the family, and the freedom of the indi- 

 vidual and the manifold relations growing out 

 of it are not practically known, as in Europe and 

 America. Five questions of precedent, and of 

 vast importance, hitherto unsettled, were d 

 by this session of the Diet, and the days when 

 Japanese ministers can rule without taking ac- 

 count of the press and of Parliament are proba- 

 bly forever over. During August the new coali- 

 tion ministry, being formed, proceeded to warn 

 the local prefectural governors against interfer- 

 ence in local and national elections, and to dis- 

 miss or change a number of them. Owing to 

 the absence of the Portuguese charge rfYr 

 from Japan, the Government, in an imperial 

 ordinance dated July 14, denounced its right of 

 extra - territoriality and declared it forfeited. 

 This means the nullification of the clauses in 

 the treaty of Aug. 3, 1860, connected with con- 

 sular jurisdiction. Portugal has protested. The 

 Diet reassembled Nov. 29, being formally opened 

 as usual by the Emperor in person. 



Important Events. Earthquakes, typhoons. 

 inundations, smallpox, and fires causing great 

 loss of life and property were frequent during 

 1892. The National Exposition named for l s !4 

 has been indefinitely postponed. Dr. Gottfried 

 Wagener, a German inventor, who since 1870 

 had been greatly influential in improving Japa- 

 nese artistic and mechanical processes and prod- 

 ucts, died in Tokio, Nov. 8, and was posthu- 

 mously honored by the Mikado. Dr. J. C. 

 Hepburn, the American scholar, translator, lexi- 

 cographer, and physician, in active benevolent 

 service at Yokohama since 1859, the best known 

 foreigner in Japan, after many farewell tokens 

 of appreciation, sailed for San Francisco, Oct. 22. 

 The death of Gen. Yamada, Minister of Justice. 

 and hero in the Restoration War in 1868 and 

 the Satsuma rebellion of 1877. was made public 

 Nov. 15. The grotesque mummery of acting 

 toward his corpse as if he were a living man. in 

 order to invest him, before burial, with signal 

 marks of imperial favor, including confectionery 

 and a decoration, was kept up in his case. The 

 funeral on the 17th was one of gorgeous magnifi- 

 cence and vast expense. The usual military 

 manoeuvres took place at Utsunomiya late in 

 October. On Dec. 1, in the Diet, it was an- 

 nounced by the Minister of State. Watanale, 

 that a reduction of the land tax to the amount 

 of $3,750,000 was to be made by reassessment of 

 taxable values. Thus frankly the Government 

 has accepted the great fiscal measure long agi- 

 tated by thejiyu-to party. 



