XLII. Organization, Central and Local; Currency and the Laws of the Tokugawa Bakufu
THE ORGANIZATION OF THE TOKUGAWA BAKUFU
THE organization of the Tokugawa Bakufu cannot be referred to any earlier period than that of the third shogun, Iemitsu. The foundations indeed were laid after the battle of Sekigahara, when the administrative functions came into the hands of Ieyasu. By him a shoshidai (governor) was established in Kyoto together with municipal administrators (machi bugyo). But it was reserved for Iemitsu to develop these initial creations into a competent and consistent whole. There was, first, what may be regarded as a cabinet, though the name of its members (roju, or seniors) does not suggest the functions generally discharged by ministers of State. One of the roju was appointed to the post of dairo (great senior). He corresponded to the prime minister in a Western Cabinet, and the other roju may be counted as ministers. Then there were junior ministers, and after them came administrators of accounts, inspectors, administrators of shrines and temples, and municipal administrators. The place where State business was discharged went by the name of Go-Yo-beya. There, the senior and junior ministers assembled to transact affairs, and the chamber being situated in the immediate vicinity of the shogun’s sitting-room, he was able to keep himself au courant of important administrative affairs. During the time of the fifth shogun, however, as already related, this useful arrangement underwent radical alteration. As for judicial business, there did not originally exist any special place for its transaction. A chamber in the official residence was temporarily assigned for the purpose, but at a later date a court of justice (Hyojo-sho) was established at Tatsunokuchi in Yedo. This organization, though carried within sight of completion in the days of the third shogun, required to be supplemented by the eighth, and was not actually perfected until the time of the eleventh.
THE DAIRO
The duties of the dairo—sometimes called karo or o-doshiyori—were to preside over the roju and to handle important administrative affairs. In many respects his functions resembled those discharged by the regent (shikken) of the Kamakura Bakufu. To the office of dairo a specially distinguished member of the roju was appointed, and if no one possessing the necessary qualifications was available, that post had to be left vacant. Generally the Ii, the Hotta, or the Sakai family supplied candidates for the office.
THE ROJU
The roju or senior ministers—called also toshiyori—discharged the administration. They resembled the kwanryo of the Muromachi Government. There were five of these ministers and they exercised control over all matters relating to the Imperial palace, the palace of the ex-Emperor (Sendo), the Imperial princes, the princely abbots (monzeki) and all the daimyo. It was customary to choose the roju from among officials who had previously served as governors of Osaka or Kyoto or as soshaban, who will be presently spoken of at greater length.
THE WAKA-DOSHIYORI
There were five junior ministers (waka-doshiyori) whose principal functions were to exercise jurisdiction over the hatamoto and the kenin. These latter names have already been alluded to, but for the sake of clearness it may be well to explain that whereas the fudai daimyo consisted of the one hundred and seventy-six barons who joined the standard of Ieyasu before the battle of Sekigahara, the hatamoto (bannerets), while equally direct vassals of the shogun, were lower than the daimyo though higher than the go-kenin, who comprised the bulk of the Tokugawa samurai. Members of the waka-doshiyori might at any time be promoted to the post of roju. Their functions were wide as well as numerous, and resembled those performed by the Hyojo-shu and the hikitsuke-shu of the Kamakura and Muromachi Governments. A junior minister must previously have occupied the post of administrator of temples and shrines (jisha-bugyo) or that of chamberlain (o-soba-shu) or that of chief guard (o-ban). The offices of minister and junior minister were necessarily filled by daimyo who were hereditary vassals of the shogun.
SECRETARIES
There were two secretariats, the oku-yuhitsu (domestic secretariat) and the omote-yuhitsu (external secretariat). They discharged, on account of the senior ministers, the duties of scribes, and were presided over by a todori, who, in later days, wielded large influence.
THE JISHA-BUGYO
The jisha-bugyo, as their name suggests, supervised all affairs relating to shrines, temples, Shinto officials, bonzes, and nuns as well as persons residing within the domains of shrines and temples. They also discharged judicial functions in the case of these various classes. The number of these administrators of shrines and temples was originally three, but afterwards it was increased to four, who transacted business for a month at a time in succession. The soshaban, who were entitled to make direct reports to the shogun, had to fill the office of jisha-bugyo in addition to their other functions, which were connected with the management of matters relating to ceremony and etiquette.
At first there were only two of these soshaban, but subsequently their number was increased to twenty-four, and it became customary for one of them to keep watch in the castle at night. They were generally ex-governors of Osaka and Fushimi, and they were necessarily daimyo who had the qualification of direct vassalage to the shogun. The jisha-bugyo performed their judicial functions in their own residences, each administrator employing his own vassals for subordinate purposes, and these vassals, when so employed, were distinguished as jisha-yaku or toritsugi. Further, officiating in conjunction with the jisha-bugyo f were chief inspectors (daikenshi), and assistant inspectors (shokenshi) whose duties require no description. The classes of people to whom the jisha-bugyo’s jurisdiction extended were numerous: they embraced the cemetery-keepers at Momiji-yama, the bonzes, the fire-watchmen, the musicians, the Shinto officials, the poets, the players at go or chess, and so forth.
THE MACHI-BUGYO
The municipal administrator (machi-bugyo) controlled affairs relating to the citizens in general. This was among the oldest institutions of the Tokugawa, and existed also in the Toyotomi organization. At first there were three machi-bugyo, but when the Tokugawa moved to Yedo, the number was decreased to one, and subsequently increased again to two in the days of Iemitsu. Judicial business occupied the major part of the machi-bugyo’s time. His law-court was in his own residence, and under his direction constables (yoriki or doshiri) patrolled the city. He also transacted business relating to prisons and the municipal elders of Yedo (machi-doshiyori) referred to him all questions of a difficult or serious nature.
THE KANJO-BUGYO
The financial administrator (kanjo-bugyo) received also the appellation of kitchen administrator (daidokoro-bugyo), and his duties embraced everything relating to the finance of the Bakufu, including, of course, their estates and the persons residing on those estates. The eight provinces of the Kwanto were under the direct control of this bugyo, but other districts were administered by a daikwan (deputy). There were two kinds of kanjo-bugyo, namely, the kuji-kata and the katte-kata (public and private), the latter of whom had to adjudicate all financial questions directly affecting the Bakufu, and the former had to perform a similar function in cases where outsiders were concerned. Various officials served as subordinates of these important bugyo, who were usually taken from the roju or the waka-doshiyori, and, in the days of the sixth shogun, it was found necessary to appoint an auditor of accounts (kanjo-gimmiyaku), who, although nominally of the same rank as the kanjo-bugyo, really acted in a supervisory capacity. The Bakufu court of law was the Hyojo-sho. Suits involving issues that lay entirely within the jurisdiction of one bugyo were tried by him in his own residence, but where wider interests were concerned the three bugyo had to conduct the case at the Hyojo-sho, where they formed a collegiate court. On such occasions the presence of the censors was compulsory. Sometimes, also, the three bugyo met at the Hyojo-sho merely for purposes of consultation.
THE CENSORS
An important figure in the Tokugawa organization was the censor (metsuke), especially the great censor (o-metsuke). The holder of the latter office served as the eyes and ears of the roju and supervised the feudal barons. There were four or five great censors. One of them held the additional office of administrator of roads (dochu-bugyo), and had to oversee matters relating to the villages, the towns, and the postal stations along the five principal highways. Another had to inspect matters relating to religious sects and firearms—a strange combination. Under the great censors were placed administrators of confiscated estates. The ordinary censors had to exercise surveillance over the samurai of the hatamoto and were under the jurisdiction of the waka-doshiyori. There were altogether sixty metsuke, and they travelled constantly throughout the empire obtaining materials for reports which were submitted to the waka-doshiyori. Among them are found censors who performed the duties of coroners.*
*The employment of censors by the Bakufu has been severely criticized as indicating a system of espionage. It scarcely seems necessary to observe that the same criticism applies to all highly organized Occidental Governments with their secret services, their detectives and their inquiry agencies.
THE CHAMBERLAINS
Even more important than the censors were the chamberlains (soba yonin) who had to communicate to the shogun all reports submitted by the roju, and to offer advice as to the manner of dealing with them. They also noted the shogun’s decisions and appended them to documents. The exercise of these functions afforded opportunities for interfering in administrative affairs, and such opportunities were fully utilized, to the great detriment of public interest. There were also pages (kosho); castle accountants (nando); literati to the shogun (oku-jusha), and physicians (oku-isha).
MASTERS OF CEREMONIES
The duty of transmitting messages from the shogun to the Emperor and of regulating all matters of ceremony connected with the castle was discharged by fifteen masters of ceremonies (koke) presided over by four chiefs (the office of chief being hereditary in such families as the Osawa and the Kira) who, although their fiefs were comparatively small, possessed influence not inferior to that of the daimyo. A koke was usually on watch in the castle by day. These masters of ceremonies are not to be confounded with the chamberlains (soshaban) already spoken of. The latter numbered twenty-four. They regulated affairs connected with ceremonies in which all Government officials were concerned, and they kept watch at the castle by night. Subordinate to the koke and the chamberlains were various officials who conveyed presents from the feudal lords to the shogun; directed matters of decoration and furniture; had charge of miscellaneous works in the castle, and supervised all persons, male or female, entering or leaving the shogun’s harem. Officials of this last class were under the command of a functionary called o-rusui who had general charge of the business of the harem; directed the issue of passports to men and women of the samurai class or to commoners, and had the care of all military stores in the castle. The name rusui signifies a person in charge during the absence of his master, and was applied in this case since the o-rusui had to guard the castle when the shogun was not present. The multifarious duties entrusted to officials over whom the o-rusui presided required a large number and a great variety of persons to discharge them, but these need not be enumerated in detail here.
THE TAMARIZUME
Characteristic of the elaborate etiquette observed at the shogun’s castle was the existence of semi-officials called tamarizume, whose chief duty in ordinary times was to repair to the castle once every five days, and to inquire through the roju as to the state of the shogun’s health. On occasions of emergency they participated in the administration, taking precedence of the roju and the other feudatories. The Matsudaira of Aizu, Takamatsu, and Matsuyama; the Ii of Hikone, and the Sakai of Himeji—these were the families which performed the functions of tamarizume as a hereditary right. It is unnecessary to describe the organization and duties of the military guards to whom the safety of the castle was entrusted, but the fact has to be noted that both men and officers were invariably taken from the hatamoto class.
THE WOMEN’S APARTMENTS
In the o-oku, or innermost buildings of the shogun’s castle, the harem was situated. Its chief official was a woman called the o-toshiyori (great elder), under whom were a number of ladies-in-waiting, namely, the toshiyori, the rojo, the churo, the kojoro, and others. There were also ladies who attended solely to visitors; others who kept the keys; others who carried messages to public officers, and others who acted as secretaries. All this part of the organization would take pages to describe in detail,* and is necessarily abbreviated here. We may add, however, that there were official falconers, sailors, grooms, gardeners, and every kind of artist or mechanician.
*For fuller particulars of the manner of daily life at the shogun’s court, see Chapter 1. Vol. IV, of Brinkley’s “Oriental Series.”
THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT SYSTEM
In organizing a system of local government the Tokugawa Bakufu began by appointing a shoshidai in Kyoto to guard the Imperial palace, to supervise Court officials, and to oversee financial measures as well as to hear suits-at-law, and to have control over temples and shrines. The shoshidai enjoyed a high measure of respect. He had to visit Yedo once in every five or six years for the purpose of making a report to the shogun in person. The municipal administrator of Kyoto and the administrators of Nara and Fushimi, the Kyoto deputy (daikwan), and all the officials of the Nijo palace were under the jurisdiction of the shoshidai. To qualify for this high office a man must have served as governor of Osaka. In the Imperial city the municipal administrator heard suits-at-law presented by citizens, managed the affairs of temples and shrines, and was responsible for collecting the taxes in the home provinces. There were two of these officials in Kyoto and, like their namesakes in Yedo, they had a force of constables (yoriki) and policemen (doshin) under their command.
THE JODAI
Regarded with scarcely less importance than that attaching to the shoshidai was an official called the jodai of Osaka, on whom devolved the responsibility of guarding the Kwansei. For this office a hereditary daimyo of the Tokugawa family was selected, and he must previously have occupied the offices of soshaban and jisha-bugyo. The routine of promotion was from the jodai of Osaka to the shoshidai of Kyoto and from thence to the roju. Originally there were six jodai but their number was ultimately reduced to one. Sumpu also had a jodai, who discharged duties similar to those devolving on his Osaka namesake. In Nagasaki, Sado, Hakodate, Niigata, and other important localities, bugyo were stationed, and in districts under the direct control of the Bakufu the chief official was the daikwan.
ADMINISTRATION IN FIEFS
The governmental system in the fiefs closely resembled the system of the Bakufu. The daimyo exercised almost unlimited power, and the business of their fiefs was transacted by factors (karo). Twenty-one provinces consisted entirely of fiefs, and in the remaining provinces public and private estates were intermixed.
LOCAL AUTONOMY
Both the Bakufu and the feudatories were careful to allow a maximum of autonomy to the lower classes. Thus the farmers elected a village chief—called nanushi or shoya—who held his post for life or for one year, and who exercised powers scarcely inferior to those of a governor. There were also heads of guilds (kumi-gashira) and representatives of farmers (hyakushodai) who participated in administering the affairs of a village. Cities and towns had municipal elders (machi-doshiyori), under whom also nanushi officiated. The guilds constituted a most important feature of this local autonomic system. They consisted of five householders each, being therefore called gonin-gumi, and their main functions were to render mutual aid in all times of distress, and to see that there were no evasions of the taxes or violations of the law. In fact, the Bakufu interfered as little as possible in the administrative systems of the agricultural, manufacturing, and commercial classes, and the feudatories followed the same rule.
FINANCE
The subject of finance in the Bakufu days is exceedingly complicated, and a very bare outline will suffice. It has already been noted that the unit of land-measurement varied from time to time and was never uniform throughout the empire. That topic need not be further discussed. Rice-fields were divided into five classes, in accordance with which division the rates of taxation were fixed. Further, in determining the amount of the land-tax, two methods were followed; one by inspection, the other by average. In the case of the former, the daikwan repaired in the fall of each year to the locality concerned, and having ascertained the nature of the crop harvested, proceeded to determine the rate of tax. This arrangement lent itself so readily to abuse that the system of averages was substituted as far as possible. That is to say, the average yield of crops for the preceding ten or twenty years served as a standard.
The miscellaneous taxes were numerous. Thus, there were taxes on business; taxes for post-horses and post-carriers; taxes in the form of labour, which were generally fixed at the rate of fifty men per hundred koku, the object in view being work on river banks, roads, and other public institutions; taxes to meet the cost of collecting taxes, and taxes to cover defalcations. Sometimes the above taxes were levied in kind or in actual labour, and sometimes they were collected in money. To facilitate collection in cities, merchants were required to form guilds according to their respective businesses, and the head of each guild had to collect the tax payable by the members. Thus, upon a guild of sake-brewers a tax of a thousand gold ryo was imposed, and a guild of wholesale dealers in cotton had to pay five hundred ryo. There was a house-tax which was assessed by measuring the area of the land on which a building stood, and there was a tax on expert labour such as that of carpenters and matmakers. In order to facilitate the levy of this last-named tax the citizens were required to locate themselves according to the nature of their employment, and thus such names were found as “Carpenter’s street,” “Matmaker’s street,” and so forth. Originally these imposts were defrayed by actual labour, but afterwards money came to be substituted.
An important feature of the taxation system was the imposition of buke-yaku, (military dues). For these the feudatories were liable, and as the amount was arbitrarily fixed by the Bakufu, though always with due regard to the value of the fief, such dues were often very onerous. The same is true in an even more marked degree as to taxes in labour, materials, or money, which were levied upon the feudatories for the purposes of any great work projected by the Bakufu. These imposts were called aids (otetsudai).
MANNER OF PAYING TAXES
The manner of paying taxes varied accordingly to localities. Thus, in the Kwanto, payment was generally made in rice for wet fields and in money for uplands, at the rate of one gold ryo per two and a half koku of rice. In the Kinai and western provinces as well as in the Nankai-do, on the other hand, the total tax on wet fields and uplands was divided into three parts, two of which were paid with rice and one with money, the value of a koku of rice being fixed at forty-eight mon of silver (four-fifths of a gold ryo). As a general rule, taxes imposed on estates under the direct control of the Bakufu were levied in rice, which was handed over to the daikwan of each province, and by him transported to Yedo, Kyoto, or Osaka, where it was placed in stores under the control of store-administrators (kura-bugyo).
In the case of cash payments the money was transported to the castle of Yedo or Osaka, where it came under the care of the finance administrator (kane-bugyo). Finally, the accounts connected with such receipts of cash were compiled and rendered by the administrator of accounts (kane-bugyo), and were subsequently audited by officials named katte-kata, over which office a member of the roju or waka-doshiyori presided. Statistics compiled in 1836 show that the revenue annually collected from the Tokugawa estates in rice and money amounted to 807,068 koku and 93,961 gold ryo respectively. As for the rate of the land-tax, it varied in different parts of the provinces, from seventy per cent, for the landlord and thirty for the tenant to thirty for the landlord and seventy for the tenant.
CURRENCY
It has been shown above that, from the time of the fifth shogun, debasement of the coins of the realm took place frequently. Indeed it may be said that whenever the State fell into financial difficulty, debasement of the current coins was regarded as a legitimate device. Much confusion was caused among the people by repeated changes in the quality of the coins. Thus, in the days of the eighth shogun, no less than four varieties of a single silver token were in circulation. When the country renewed its foreign intercourse in the middle of the nineteenth century, there were no less than eight kinds of gold coin in circulation, nine of silver, and four of copper or iron. The limits within which the intrinsic value of gold coins varied will be understood when we say that whereas the gold oban of the Keicho era (1596-1614) contained, approximately, 29.5 parts of gold to 13 of silver and was worth about seventy-five yen. The corresponding coin of the Man-en era (1860) contained 10.33 parts of pure gold to 19.25 of silver, and was worth only twenty-eight yen.
PAPER CURRENCY
The earliest existing record of the use of paper currency dates from 1661, when the feudal chief of Echizen obtained permission from the Bakufu to employ this medium of exchange, provided that its circulation was limited to the fief where the issue took place. These paper tokens were called hansatsu (fief notes), and one result of their issue was that moneys accruing from the sale of cereals and other products of a fief were preserved within that fief. The example of Echizen in this matter found several followers, but the system never became universal.
JUDICIAL PROCEDURE
The administration of justice in the Tokugawa days was based solely on ethical principles. Laws were not promulgated for prospective application. They were compiled whenever an occasion arose, and in their drafting the prime aim was always to make their provisions consonant with the dictates of humanity. Once, indeed, during the time of the second shogun, Hidetada, a municipal administrator, Shimada Yuya, having held the office for more than twenty years, and having come to be regarded as conspicuously expert in rendering justice, it was proposed to the shogun that the judgments delivered by this administrator should be recorded for the guidance of future judges. Hidetada, however, objected that human affairs change so radically as to render it impossible to establish universally recognizable precedents, and that if the judgments delivered in any particular era were transmitted as guides for future generations, the result would probably be slavish sacrifice of ethical principles on the altar of stereotyped practice.
In 1631, when the third shogun, Iemitsu, ruled in Yedo, a public courthouse (Hyojo-sho) was for the first time established. Up to that time the shogun himself had served as a court of appeal in important cases. These were first brought before a bugyo, and subsequently, if specially vital issues were at stake, the shogun personally sat as judge, the duty of executing his judgments being entrusted to the bugyo and other officials.
Thenceforth, the custom came to be this: Where comparatively minor interests were involved and where the matter lay wholly within the jurisdiction of one administrator, that official sat as judge in a chamber of his own mansion; but in graver cases and where the interests concerned were not limited to one jurisdiction, the Hyojo-sho became the judicial court, and the three administrators, the roju, together with the censors, formed a collegiate tribunal. There were fixed days each month for holding this collegiate court, and there were also days when the three administrators alone met at one of their residences for purposes of private conference. The hearing by the shogun was the last recourse, and before submission to him the facts had to be investigated by the chamberlains (sobashu), who thus exercised great influence. A lawsuit instituted by a plebeian had to be submitted to the feudatory of the region, or to the administrator, or to the deputy (daikwari), but might never be made the subject of a direct petition to the shogun. If the feudatory or the deputy Were held to be acting contrary to the dictates of integrity and reason, the suitor might change his domicile for the purpose of submitting a petition to the authorities in Yedo; and the law provided that no obstruction should be placed in the way of such change.
LAW
As stated above, the original principle of the Bakufu was to avoid compiling any written criminal code. But from the days of the sixth and the seventh shoguns, Ienobu and Ietsugu, such provisions of criminal law as related to ordinary offences came to be written in the most intelligible style and placarded throughout the city of Yedo and provincial towns or villages. On such a placard (kosatsu) posted up, in the year 1711, at seven places in Yedo, it was enjoined on parents, sons, daughters, brothers, husbands, wives, and other relatives that they must maintain intimate and friendly relations among themselves; and that, whereas servants must be faithful and industrious, their masters should have compassion and should obey the dictates of right in dealing with them; that everyone should be hard working and painstaking; that people should not transgress the limits of their social status; that all deceptions should be carefully avoided; that everyone should make it a rule of life to avoid doing injury or causing loss to others; that gambling should be eschewed; that quarrels and disputes of every kind should be avoided; that asylum should not be given to wounded persons; that firearms should not be used without cause; that no one should conceal an offender; that the sale or purchase of human being, should be strictly prohibited except in cases where men or women offered their services for a fixed term of years or as apprentices, or in cases of hereditary servitude; finally, that, though hereditary servants went to other places and changed their domicile, it should not be lawful to compel their return.
In the days of the eighth shogun, Yoshimune, it being held that crimes were often due to ignorance of law, the feudatories and deputies were directed to make arrangements for conveying to the people tinder their jurisdiction some knowledge of the nature of the statutes; and the result was that the mayors (nanushi) of provincial towns and villages had to read the laws once a month at a meeting of citizens or villagers convened for the purpose. Previously to this time, namely, in the days of the fourth shogun, Ietsugu, the office of recorder (tome-yaku) was instituted in the Hyojo-sho for the purpose of committing to writing all judgments given in lawsuits. But in the days of Yoshimune, the rules and regulations issued by the Bakufu from the time of Ieyasu downwards were found to have fallen into such confusion that the difficulty of following them was practically insuperable.
Therefore, in 1742, Matsudaira Norimura, one of the roju, together with the three administrators, was commissioned to compile a body of laws, and the result was a fifteen volume book called the Hatto-gaki (Prohibitory Writings). The shogun himself evinced keen interest in this undertaking. He frequently consulted with the veteran officials of his court, and during a period of several years he revised “The Rules for Judicial Procedure.” Associated with him in this work were Kada Arimaro, Ogyu Sorai, and the celebrated judge, Ooka Tadasuke, and not only the Ming laws of China, but also the ancient Japanese Daiho-ritsu were consulted.
This valuable legislation, which showed a great advance in the matter of leniency, except in the case of disloyal or unfilial conduct, was followed, in 1767, by reforms under the shoqun, Ieharu, when all the laws and regulations placarded or otherwise promulgated since the days of Ieyasu were collected and collated to form a prefatory vol-ume to the above-mentioned “Rules for Judicial Procedure,” the two being thenceforth regarded as a single enactment under the title of Kajo-ruiten. “The Rules for Judicial Procedure” originally comprised 103 articles, but, in 1790, Matsudaira Sadanobu revised this code, reducing the number of articles to one hundred, and calling it Tokugawa Hyakkajd, or “One Hundred Laws and Regulations of the Tokugawa.” This completed the legislative work of the Yedo Bakufu. But it must not be supposed that these laws were disclosed to the general public. They served simply for purposes of official reference. The Tokugawa in this respect strictly followed the Confucian maxim, “Make the people obey but do not make them know.”:
ENGRAVING: MATSUDAIRA SADANORU
CRIMES AND PUNISHMENTS
In Tokugawa days the principal punishments were; six: namely, reprimand (shikari), confinement (oshikome), flogging (tataki), banishment (tsuiho), exile to an island (ento), and death (shikei). The last named was divided into five kinds, namely, deprivation of life (shizai), exposing the head after decapitation (gokumon), burning at the stake (hiaburi), crucifixion (haritsuke), and sawing to death (nokogiri-biki). There were also subsidiary penalties, such as public exposure (sarashi), tattooing (irezumi)—which was resorted to not less for purposes of subsequent identification than as a disgrace—confiscation of an estate (kessho), and degradation to a status below the hinin (hininteshita).
The above penalties were applicable to common folk. In the case of samurai the chief punishments were detention (hissoku), confinement (heimon or chikkyo), deprivation of status (kaieki), placing in the custody of a feudatory (azuke), suicide (seppuku), and decapitation (zanzai). Among these, seppuku was counted the most honourable. As a rule only samurai of the fifth official rank and upwards were permitted thus to expiate a crime, and the procedure was spoken of as “granting death” (shi wo tamau). The plebeian classes, that is to say, the farmers, the artisans, and the tradesmen, were generally punished by fines, by confinement, or by handcuffing (tegusari). Priests were sentenced to exposure (sarashi), to expulsion from a temple (tsui-iri), or to exile (kamai).
For women the worst punishment was to be handed over as servants (yakko) or condemned to shave their heads (teihatsu). Criminals who had no fixed domicile and who repeated their evil acts after expiration of a first sentence, were carried to the island of Tsukuda, in Yedo Bay, or to Sado, where they were employed in various ways. Blind men or beggars who offended against the law were handed over to the chiefs of their guilds, namely, the soroku in the case of the blind, and the eta-gashira in the case of beggars.* Some of the above punishments were subdivided, but these details are unimportant.
*For fuller information about these degraded classes see Brinkley’s
“Oriental Series,” Vol. II.
PRISONS
In Yedo, the buildings employed as prisons were erected at Demmacho under the hereditary superintendence of the Ishide family. The governor of prisons was known as the roya-bugyo. Each prison was divided into five parts where people were confined according to their social status. The part called the agari-zashiki was reserved for samurai who had the privilege of admission to the shogun’s presence; and in the part called the agariya common, samurai and Buddhist priests were incarcerated. The oro and the hyakusho-ro were reserved for plebeians, and in the onna-ro women were confined. Each section consisted of ten rooms and was capable of accommodating seven hundred persons. Sick prisoners were carried to the tamari, which were situated at Asakusa and Shinagawa, and were under the superintendence of the hinin-gashira. All arrangements as to the food, clothing, and medical treatment of prisoners were carefully thought out, but it is not to be supposed that these Bakufu prisons presented many of the features on which modern criminology insists. On the contrary, a prisoner was exposed to serious suffering from heat and cold, while the coarseness of the fare provided for him often caused disease and sometimes death. Nevertheless, the Japanese prisons in Tokugawa days were little, if anything, inferior to the corresponding institutions in Anglo-Saxon countries at the same period.
LOYALTY AND FILIAL PIETY
In the eyes of the Tokugawa legislators the cardinal virtues were loyalty and filial piety, and in the inculcation of these, even justice was relegated to an inferior place. Thus, it was provided that if a son preferred any public charge against his father, or if a servant opened a lawsuit against his master, the guilt of the son or of the servant must be assumed at the outset as an ethical principle. To such a length was this ethical principle carried that in regulations issued by Itakura Suo no Kami for the use of the Kyoto citizens, we find the following provision: “In a suit-at-law between parent and son judgment should be given for the parent without regard to the pleading of the son. Even though a parent act with extreme injustice, it is a gross breach of filial duty that a son should institute a suit-at-law against a parent. There can be no greater immorality, and penalty of death should be meted out to the son unless the parent petitions for his life.” In an action between uncle and nephew a similar principle applied. Further, we find that in nearly every body of law promulgated throughout the whole of the Tokugawa period, loyalty and filial piety are placed at the head of ethical virtues; the practice of etiquette, propriety, and military and literary accomplishments standing next, while justice and deference for tradition occupy lower places in the schedule.
A kosatsu (placard) set up in 1682, has the following inscription: “Strive to be always loyal and filial. Preserve affection between husbands and wives, brothers, and all relatives; extend sympathy and compassion to servants.” Further, in a street notice posted in Yedo during the year 1656, we find it ordained that should any disobey a parent’s directions, or reject advice given by a municipal elder or by the head of a five-households guild, such a person must be brought before the administrator, who, in the first place, will imprison him; whereafter, should the malefactor not amend his conduct, he shall be banished forever; while for anyone showing malice against his father, arrest and capital punishment should follow immediately.
In these various regulations very little allusion is made to the subject of female rights. But there is one significant provision, namely, that a divorced woman is entitled to have immediately restored to her all her gold and silver ornaments as well as her dresses; and at the same time husbands are warned that they must not fail to make due provision for a former wife. The impression conveyed by careful perusal of all Tokugawa edicts is that their compilers obeyed, from first to last, a high code of ethical principles.