by Donald Keene
After his return to Japan in 1895, Katayama became the director of the first Japanese settlement house. His firsthand knowledge of the suffering poor undoubtedly contributed to his socialist convictions. The period following the conclusion of the Sino-Japanese War was marked by rapid industrialization, an increase in salaried workers, rising prices, and great social change. But no matter how hard-pressed, workers had no means to protest against exploitation. In 1897 Katayama was active in the formation of labor unions and served as the editor of the first union periodical. The success of the railway strike of 1898 brought him celebrity and proved that the strike was an effective weapon with which workers could enforce their rights. But Katayama was convinced that efforts to improve the workers’ situation should always be in accordance with the law; he had no sympathy for anarchists.
In 1900 the Yamagata cabinet pushed through the “Security Police Law,” which included provisions directly affecting union activities. It did not prohibit strikes but punished both those who incited them and those who used violence to end them. This might seem evenhanded, but in fact the intent of this and similar clauses in the new law was to control the unions and prevent them from striking. Kōtoku wrote an editorial on the new law for the Yorozu chōhō in which he said that although “violence, defamation, coercion, enticement, and agitation” were all undesirable, they should be available to the labor movement because workers “lack education, money, writing, or speech-making ability, and haven’t the vote.” He argued that in their struggles with capitalists, they had no choice but to resort to what otherwise would be considered misdemeanors.
Kōtoku, who emerged as Katayama’s chief rival as leader of the left wing, published in 1901 his study Imperialism, the Monster of the Twentieth Century. Although he disclaimed any originality, saying that he had done no more than repeat what European and American scholars had already written, this was a pioneer work.22 His discussion of imperialism was effective, if not unique; his comments on the emperor were distinctive:
The emperor of Japan, unlike the young kaiser of Germany, is not fond of war; he places high value on peace. He does not delight in the barbarous vanity of victory for one country and desires that culture thrive for the benefit of the entire world…. He is definitely not one of the so-called patriots or imperialists.23
Kōtoku was convinced that Emperor Meiji used troops only for the sake of peace, humanity, and justice. He was sure that the emperor would prefer that soldiers fight not for him or out of loyalty but for these same three ideals. At this stage of his career Kōtoku revered the emperor. In response to articles by Yamakawa Hitoshi condemning the crown prince’s arranged marriage, Kōtoku expressed extreme regret that even two or three people were capable of “such insane impiety.” He hoped for a union of the people and the imperial house.24
At this time the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion in Peking attracted the attention of Kōtoku and other progressive writers, who considered the intervention of the European powers (and Japan) to be a crass instance of imperialism. Kōtoku was moved to write a series of forty editorials denouncing imperialism and advocating pacifism, two concerns that occupied a prominent place in his later writings.
In May 1901 Kōtoku, Katayama, and others who had acquired reputations as socialists decided to form a socialist party, to be called Shakai minshū-tō (Social-Democratic Party). The collapse of the Jiyū-tō (Freedom Party) in the previous year and the renunciation of its ideals by former members who joined Itō Hirobumi’s newly formed Seiyūkai had created the need for a party that stood for the rights of the underprivileged. At Nakae Chōmin’s request, Kōtoku wrote an editorial mourning the loss of the Jiyū-tō. It was brilliantly composed in the elaborate language then in favor and earned Kōtoku the reputation of an exceptional stylist.
Abe Isoo (1865–1949), a member of the former socialist study group, drew up a manifesto for the new party. Before long, most of its demands would be realized, but at the time they seemed dangerously revolutionary to the authorities. The demands included public ownership of the railways, free and compulsory elementary-school education, a prohibition on night work for children and women, and an end to the death penalty.25 No sooner was the manifesto issued than the government decided to ban the formation of the party and confiscated the manifestos.
According to Abe’s notes, the police leaked to him the information that the government would not prohibit the formation of the party provided that three of its demands were excised: the call for a reduction or an abolition of armaments, the advocacy of a popular referendum on every major decision, and the demand that the House of Peers be abolished. But Abe, an idealist, stubbornly refused to change a word.
The decree banning the party was issued by the minister of the interior, Suematsu Kenchō (1855–1920).26 Sakai Toshihiko (1870–1933), a close associate of Kōtoku’s on the Yorozu chōhō and an acquaintance of Suematsu, went to ask why the party had been banned. Suematsu’s answer was simple: “Other countries all have their hands full with the socialist party and are doing their best to suppress it. We in Japan must likewise devote all our efforts to suppressing it.” Kōtoku, learning of Suematsu’s attitude, wrote a withering reply saying that if Suematsu really wanted to prohibit socialism, he would have to drive all the socialists out of the country, burn all the relevant documents, and forbid the importation of foreign books. If he had the courage, the willpower, and the ability to do this, he might succeed in holding up socialism for one generation at most.27
Shortly afterward (on May 30, 1901), Kōtoku wrote “Japanese Democracy.” In the epigraph he quoted two tanka by Emperor Meiji: “Whenever I look at the writings of long ago, I wonder what will happen to the country I rule” and “When I put on layers of figured silks and brocade, I think of those who have not even sleeves to keep off the cold.”28 Kōtoku stated that the message conveyed by these two poems was democracy itself. Anyone who did not seek to carry out the emperor’s aims “committed a crime against His Majesty.” The emperor, the incarnation of democracy, deeply desired the happiness of his people, but some people in the government sought only their own profits and blocked the happiness of the people. Kōtoku called for new principles and new ideals to suit the new age.
In September 1901 Kōtoku met Tanaka Shōzō, a valiant battler against the pollution stemming from the copper mine at Ashio. In February 1900 some 3,000 farmers from Gumma and Tochigi Prefectures had traveled to Tōkyō to stage a peaceful demonstration, but the government ordered armed police to break up the demonstration and arrest the leaders. Tanaka, concluding that it was hopeless trying to appeal to the government, decided to throw himself on the mercy of the emperor by making a direct plea. He felt incapable of writing the fancy language needed for such a document and asked Kōtoku, now known as a stylist, to compose the appeal. On December 10, 1901, Tanaka attempted to push the document into the emperor’s carriage, but it never reached his eyes. Tanaka was arrested, as was Kōtoku as his accomplice. The government, not knowing what to do with the two men, finally released them as madmen.29
Three days after this incident, Nakae Chōmin died of cancer. When doctors informed him that he had only a year to live, he decided to devote his remaining days to writing his memoirs. His book, A Year and a Half, sold 10,000 copies in three days and went through twenty-two printings, evidence that liberal thought, despite governmental suppression, was of great interest to the public. Kōtoku, who thought of Chōmin as his only teacher, wrote a moving tribute that was published the next year.
In 1903 Kōtoku published The Essence of Socialism, an exposition of the principles of socialism. He acknowledged in the introduction his indebtedness to Marx, Engels, and others. His conclusion was that once socialism was put into effect, liberty, brotherly love, progress, and happiness would be solidly established. He earnestly hoped men of goodwill would come forward to help achieve socialism.30 The work had seven printings.
In October 1903 Kōtoku resigned from the Yorozu chōhō. Its editorial policy
had changed from that of a free forum, allowing even sharply contrasting opinions in its pages, to a mouthpiece of the government in its bellicose policy toward Russia.31 Kōtoku and Sakai decided that they would publish a periodical in which they could print their opinions without having to defer to anyone else. The first issue of the weekly Heimin shimbun (Common People’s Newspaper) appeared in November 1903, published by the Heiminsha, the newspaper’s parent organization.32 An announcement appeared at the top of the front page, stating the weekly’s future policy: the Heimin shimbun would promote liberty, equality, and fraternity. It advocated democracy, socialism, and pacifism. It hoped, to the degree the law permitted it, to obtain the active cooperation of many people. And while absolutely renouncing the use of force, it vowed to promote the socialist movement.
Even after war with Russia began to seem inevitable, the Heimin shimbun continued to print editorials denouncing warmongering. Kōtoku asked in one article who had the power to declare war. According to the constitution, it was the emperor’s prerogative, but before this prerogative could be exercised, someone else made the decision—not public opinion, the elected members of the Diet, or the administrative officials, but the “the usurers called bankers.”33
Even though Kōtoku’s writings could not prevent war with Russia, he continued his untiring efforts to douse the mindless war frenzy. In March 1904 he published his “Memorandum to the Russian Socialist Party,” calling its members his “comrades” and blaming the imperialistic greed of both countries for the war. He told his “brothers and sisters” of the Russian Socialist Party that both peoples had the same common enemies—so-called patriotism and militarism. His article, given also in translation in the English-language section of the Heimin shimbun, had a great impact on other countries where it was soon reproduced or translated. Iskra, the organ of the Russian Socialist Party, praised Kōtoku’s message as a document of the highest historical significance and joined in the cry of “Down with Militarism!”34
Despite the encouragement from the Russians, Kōtoku and the other members of the Heiminsha were no match for the war fever that gripped all Japan. In March, Kōtoku published the leading article “Alas, a Tax Raise!” in which he criticized the rise in taxes to pay for the war. The government, deciding that the article was harmful to national interests and disruptive to social order, sentenced Sakai, the publisher and editor of the Heimin shimbun, to two months of minor imprisonment, the first instance of a prison sentence being imposed because of socialist activity.35
The November 13, 1904, issue of Heimin shimbun was intended to celebrate the first anniversary of the publication. It was decided to devote the issue to a translation of the Communist Manifesto. But before the periodical appeared, Kōtoku, Nishikawa Mitsujirō, and Ishikawa Sanshirō, all members of the Heiminsha, were charged with disruptive activity against the state. Kōtoku was sentenced to five months’ imprisonment and a fine of fifty yen. The issue of Heimin shimbun carrying the translation by Kōtoku and Sakai of the Communist Manifesto was confiscated, and Kōtoku and Sakai had to pay an additional eighty yen in fines.
Kōtoku went to prison in July 1905. He spent the five months studying works of political doctrine and Joseph-Ernest Renan’s Life of Jesus. The period of uninterrupted time for study was a blessing in disguise, but he had never enjoyed robust health, and his stay in prison further weakened him. When he emerged, he was in no condition to attempt to revive the Heiminsha, as his old colleagues hoped. In a letter he wrote to the American anarchist Albert Johnson on August 10—the day the peace treaty between Japan and Russia was concluded—he revealed that although he went into prison as a socialist of the Marxist variety, he had returned to the outside world as a “radical anarchist.”36 He also listed the reasons that he thought he should go abroad. First, he wanted to master the foreign languages needed to understand international Communism and the anarchist movement. He wished also to visit revolutionary leaders in foreign countries and learn directly from their activities. Finally, he wished to go where the emperor’s poisonous hand did not reach and where he could discuss freely the emperor’s position as well as the political and economic system.37
Kōtoku did not explain the startling change in his attitude toward the emperor. His friend Kinoshita Naoe, like Kōtoku a socialist and pacifist, had in the past criticized the inconsistency exemplified by Kōtoku’s insistence on employing only legal means and his deferential attitude toward the emperor. But he now believed that as the result of his five months in prison, Kōtoku had become thoroughly and rigorously consistent in his views.38
While Kōtoku was in prison, the Heiminsha was forced by developments in the war to change its stand on pacifism. Attacks on the war were of little interest to Japanese who, after the victories at Port Arthur and Mukden, were sure that the triumphant end of the war was in sight. There still was enthusiasm for socialism, as shown by the huge turnout for the first May Day celebration in Japan, but the Heiminsha’s financial backers began to withdraw, and there was dissension in the ranks, especially between Christian and materialist socialists. Even Sakai decided to leave the Heiminsha and earn his living by editing a family magazine. On August 27 Kōtoku published a letter to his comrades stating that he planned to go to America. On September 26 after a party to celebrate Nishikawa Mitsujirō’s release from prison, all its members decided to disband the Heiminsha.
Kōtoku left for the United States in November 1905. Funds for the journey and his living expenses while in America were provided by friends and family. At the time of departure Kōtoku wrote in his diary,
Ah, why have I left Japan? I could not stop myself. Ever since governmental oppression caused the collapse of the Heiminsha, my sickness and poverty have made it impossible to do anything. On the night of the eighth, at the farewell party given by my comrades, Kinoshita said that seeing me off was like seeing off a wounded warrior. I am not a warrior, but it is true that I am going off like a fugitive from a defeated army, hiding from the world and seeking a refuge.39
Kōtoku discovered when he arrived in America that his reputation had preceded him. He was given a rousing welcome in Seattle and San Francisco by Japanese residents who had read his writings, notably the memorandum to the Russian Socialist Party. He was in great demand for lectures, and he mentioned having a steady stream of visitors. In San Francisco he was introduced to a Russian woman, a passionate anarchist, in whose house he rented a room. As he wrote to Johnson, while in prison he had become an anarchist, but it was only on coming in contact with his landlady40 that he was made aware of the general uselessness of elections and the need to assassinate rulers.41 He had come to believe that violence was necessary in order to topple oppressive governments and allow the birth of a society without government, in which everyone worked harmoniously for the good of the whole society.
During his six months in America, Kōtoku did not follow the program of studies he originally sent to Johnson, but he met many people and took an active part in founding the Social Revolutionary Party in America. It did not take him long, however, to discover that even in the United States there were limits to freedom of speech, and he had harsh comments about the racial prejudice that condemned Japanese immigrants to being either schoolboys or houseworkers.42 He was in San Francisco when the famous earthquake struck. Kōtoku rejoiced in the flames: “In their path, there are no gods, no wealth, no authority of any kind. Of all the many imposing churches and towering municipal buildings, the many banks, the many fortunes, every last one fell in a rain of sparks.”43
On the ship going back to Japan, Oka Shigeki, a member of the San Francisco branch of the Heiminsha, told Kōtoku that the first step in starting a revolution in Japan must be the overthrow of the emperor. He suggested that Kōtoku volunteer as a guard in the House of Peers as a way of gaining access to the emperor.
While Kōtoku was in America, there had been many changes in Japan. Of particular importance to the socialists was the resignation of the reactionary Katsura cabinet i
n December 1905 and the formation of the Saionji cabinet the following month. The new cabinet let it be known that it recognized socialism as a major current in the world and that it would not use police power indiscriminately to suppress it. This led some socialists in January 1906 to request permission to found the Nihon heimin-tō (Japan People’s Party). The government gave its permission. Another group (headed by Sakai Toshihiko) asked to found the Nihon shakai-tō (Japan Social Party), and this too was permitted. Socialist parties were now legally established in Japan.
Kōtoku, however, was no longer interested in parliamentary socialism, which he contrasted with what he called “pure socialism,” by which he meant anarchosocialism. He was intoxicated with the anarchism of flames, like those he had seen in San Francisco. His first lecture after returning to Japan shocked and confused fellow socialists. He urged direct action—a general strike—rather than legal and peaceful parliamentary strategies. This uncompromising attitude led inevitably to disputes, especially with those socialists who had aspired to legal recognition.
