Editing Charter Oath

{{Short description|First constitution of modern Japan, promulgated 1868}}
[[File:5jo1.gif|thumb|right|200px|The Charter Oath as officially published.]]
The {{nihongo|'''Charter Oath'''|五箇条の御誓文|Gokajō no Goseimon|more literally, the '''Oath in Five Articles'''}} was promulgated on 6 April 1868 in [[Kyoto Imperial Palace]].<ref>Keene, p. 137. Other translations are seen in the literature, such as '''Five-Article Oath''' or '''Charter Oath in Five Articles'''.</ref><ref>http://www.meijijingu.or.jp/about/3-3.html {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100125205058/http://www.meijijingu.or.jp/about/3-3.html |date=2010-01-25 }} 慶応4年(明治元年)3月14日、明治天皇は京都御所紫宸殿に公卿・諸侯以下百官を集め、維新の基本方針を天地の神々にお誓いになりました。The Charter Oath was promulgated on the fourteenth day of the third month by the [[Japanese calendar#History|old calendar]], equivalent to April 6.</ref> The Oath outlined the main aims and the course of action to be followed during [[Emperor Meiji]]'s reign, setting the legal stage for Japan's modernization. This also set up a process of urbanization as people of all classes were free to move jobs so people went to the city for better work. It remained influential, though less for governing than inspiring, throughout the [[Meiji era]] and into the twentieth century, and it can be considered the first [[constitution]] of modern Japan.<ref>Keene, p. 340, notes that one might "describe the Oath in Five Articles as a constitution for all ages. Japan was modernized due to the Charter Oath."</ref>

==Rules==
As the name implies, the text of the Oath consists of five clauses:

{{quotation|By this oath, we set up as our aim the establishment of the national wealth on a broad basis and the framing of a constitution and laws.

# Deliberative assemblies shall be widely established and all matters decided by open discussion.
# All classes, high and low, shall be united in vigorously carrying out the administration of affairs of state.
# The common people, no less than the civil and military officials, shall all be allowed to pursue their own calling so that there may be no discontent.
# Evil customs of the past shall be broken off  and everything based upon the just laws of Nature.
# Knowledge shall be sought throughout the world so as to strengthen the foundation of imperial rule.<ref>McLaren, p. 8, quoted in De Bary ''et al.'', p. 672.</ref>}}

==Origin and subsequent influence==
The first draft of the Oath was written by junior councilor [[Yuri Kimimasa]] in January 1868, containing progressive language that spoke to the frustrations that the radical but modestly born Meiji leaders had experienced in "service to hereditary incompetents".<ref name="Jansen 2002, p. 338">Jansen (2002), p. 338.</ref> Yuri's language was moderated by his colleague [[Fukuoka Takachika]] in February to be "less alarming", and [[Kido Takayoshi]] prepared the final form of the Oath, employing "language broad enough to embrace both readings".<ref name="Jansen 2002, p. 338"/> The Oath was read aloud by [[Sanjō Sanetomi]] in the main ceremonial hall of the [[Kyoto Imperial Palace]] in the presence of the Emperor and more than 400 officials. After the reading, the [[kuge|nobles]] and ''[[daimyō]]s'' present signed their names to a document praising the Oath, and swearing to do their utmost to uphold and implement it. Those not able to attend the formal reading afterwards visited the palace to sign their names, bringing the total number of signatures to 767.<ref>Keene, Meiji and His World, page 140</ref>

The purpose of the oath was both to issue a statement of policy to be followed by the post-[[Tokugawa shogunate]] government in the Meiji period, and to offer hope of inclusion in the next regime to pro-Tokugawa domains. This second motivation was especially important in the early stages of the [[Meiji Restoration|Restoration]] as a means to keep domains from joining the Tokugawa remnant in the [[Boshin War]]. Later, military victory "made it safe to begin to push court nobles and ''daimyō'' figureheads out of the way".{{attribution needed|date=December 2016}}<ref>Jansen (2002), 342.</ref>

The promise of reform in the document initially went unfulfilled: in particular, a parliament with real power was not established until 1890, and the [[Meiji oligarchy]] from [[Satsuma han|Satsuma]], [[Chōshū Domain|Chōshū]], [[Tosa Domain|Tosa]] and [[Hizen Domain|Hizen]] retained political and military control well into the 20th century. In general, the Oath was purposely phrased in broad terms to minimize resistance from the ''daimyōs'' and to provide "a promise of gradualism and equity":{{attribution needed|date=December 2016}}<ref>Jansen (2002), p. 339</ref>

{{quotation|"Deliberative councils" and "public discourse" were, after all, terms that had been applied to cooperation between lords of great domains. That "all classes" were to unite indicated that there would continue to be classes. Even "commoners" were to be treated decently by "civil and military" officers, the privileged ranks of the recent past. No one was likely to be in favor of the retention of "evil customs"; a rather Confucian "Nature" would indicate the path to be chosen. Only in the promise to "seek knowledge throughout the world" was there a specific indication of change; but here, too, late Tokugawa activists had deplored the irrationality of Japan's two-headed government as the only one in the world. Moreover the search would be selective and purposeful, designed to "strengthen the foundations of imperial rule".<ref>Jansen (2002), p. 339.</ref>}}

The Oath was reiterated as the first article of the constitution promulgated in June 1868, and the subsequent articles of that constitution expand the policies outlined in the Oath.<ref>De Bary ''et al.'', pp. 672–673.</ref> Almost eighty years later, in the wake of the [[World War II|Second World War]], [[Hirohito|Emperor Shōwa]] paid homage to the Oath and reaffirmed it as the basis of [[kokutai|"national polity"]] in his [[Humanity Declaration|Imperial Rescript on National Revitalization]].<ref>De Bary ''et al.'', p. 1029. Jansen (2002), p. 339.</ref> The ostensible purpose of the rescript was to appease the American occupiers with a renunciation of imperial divinity, but the emperor himself saw it as a statement of the existence of democracy during the [[Meiji era]].<ref>Dower, 1999, pp. 314, 317.</ref>

==See also==
* [[Five Public Notices]]
* [[Seventeen-article constitution]]

==Notes==
{{Reflist|2}}

==References==
* {{cite book | editor1-last=De Bary |editor1-first=William |title=Sources of Japanese Tradition | volume = II: 1600 to 2000 |orig-year=1958 |edition=2nd |year= 2005 |publisher=Columbia |location=New York |isbn= 0-231-12984-X | editor2-first = Arthur | editor2-last = Tiedemann |url-access=registration |url= https://archive.org/details/sourcesofjapanes00colu}}
* {{cite book | author-link = John W. Dower| last =Dower | first = John W. |title= Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II |year=2000 |publisher= Norton |location=New York|isbn= 0-393-04686-9 |title-link= Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II}}
* [[Marius Jansen|Jansen, Marius B.]]  (2000). ''The Making of Modern Japan.'' Cambridge: [[Harvard University Press]]. {{ISBN|978-0-67400334-7}}; [https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/44090600  OCLC 44090600]
* [[Donald Keene|Keene, Donald]] (2002). ''Emperor of Japan: Meiji and His World, 1852-1912.'' New York: [[Columbia University Press]]. {{ISBN|978-0-231-12340-2}}; [http://www.worldcat.org/wcpa/oclc/46731178 OCLC 46731178]
* {{cite book |last=McLaren |first= W. W. |title=Japanese Government Documents |year=1979 |publisher= University Publications of America |location= Bethesda, MD |isbn= 0-313-26912-2}}

==Further reading==
* {{cite book |last=Akamatsu |first=Paul |others=[[Miriam Kochan]] (trans.) |title=Meiji 1868: Revolution and Counter-Revolution in Japan |year=1972  |publisher=Harper & Row |location=New York |language=ja |isbn=0-06-010044-3 }}
* {{cite book |last=Akita |first=George |title=Foundations of Constitutional Government in Modern Japan 1868-1900 |year=1967 |publisher=Harvard |location=Cambridge |isbn=0-674-31250-3}}
* {{cite book |last=Beasley, William G. |author-link=William G. Beasley |title=The Rise of Modern Japan: Political, Economic and Social Change Since 1850 |year=1995 |publisher=St. Martin's Press |location=New York |isbn=0-312-23373-6 |url=https://archive.org/details/riseofmodernjapa00beas_0 }}
* [[John Breen (scholar)|Breen, John]], "The Imperial Oath of April 1868: ritual, power and politics in Restoration Japan," ''Monumenta Nipponica,'' 51, 4 (1996)
* {{cite book|editor-link2=Gilbert Rozman|editor-link1=Marius Jansen |editor-last=Jansen |editor-first=Marius B. |editor2=Gilbert Rozman  |title=Japan in Transition: From Tokugawa to Meiji |year=1986 |location=Princeton |publisher=Princeton |isbn=0-691-10245-7 }}
* {{cite book |last=Murphey |first=Rhoades |title=East Asia: A New History |year=1997 |publisher=Addison Wesley Longman |location=New York |isbn=0-321-42141-8 }}

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[[Category:Meiji Restoration]]
[[Category:Emperor Meiji]]
[[Category:Defunct constitutions]]
[[Category:1868 in Japan]]
[[Category:Oaths]]