No rebellion, however, proved more serious and more difficult to repress than the revolt of Saigō in Satsuma. The genesis of this insurrection must be traced to complex circumstances under which the leading statesmen of the new government had been split into two factions, one of which had its central figure in Saigō. The occasion for the rupture was the dispute which arose among the ministers of the crown in regard to the policy to be pursued by Japan toward Korea. Throughout the Tokugawa period it had been customary for Korea, on each occasion of a coronation in that country, to send an ambassador to confirm the friendly relations between the two states. When the restoration took place in Japan her government dispatched an envoy to Korea to convey intelligence of the fact and to renew expressions of amity, but the Koreans refused to recognize the envoy or accept his message, owing ostensibly to the fact that the new term "Great Empire of Japan" was employed in the imperial letter. At a later date the Japanese sent home certain Koreans who had been shipwrecked on the coast of Japan, and took the opportunity of renewing expressions of friendship by the mouths of the officials who escorted the castaways. Korea received the shipwrecked sailors, but declined to receive the officials accompanying them. The youthful government contained men, particularly the Councilors Saigō Takamori, Soyeshima Taneomi, Itagaki Taisuke, Gotō Shōjirō, and Etō Shimpei, who deeply resented the conduct of Korea, and counseled the opening of the peninsular kingdom by force of arms. Other chief officials of the government, headed by Ōkubo Toshimichi, opposed this view, and being supported by the minister of the left, Iwakura, who had just returned from his travels through Europe and America, the peace party carried the day. The advocates of recourse to arms resigned, and a new cabinet was organized, under Iwakura and Ōkubo, which was the first cabinet change in Japan since the restoration. The immediate effects of this change were important. The revolt of Etō has already been related, and the case of Itagaki and Gotō will soon be heard of. The name of Saigō has been mentioned as one of the two heroes whose mutual trust had resulted in averting the great battle imminent in Edo. A man of overmastering sincerity, his position in the Tōkyō government, in which he was commander in chief of the army, had been unique. When he resigned and retired to Kagoshima in Satsuma, and established a private military school, nearly all the ambitious young men of the province flocked to the school. Many came from other prefectures also, for Saigō's reputation as the chief agent in bringing about the restoration was immense, and his simple, great personality commanded universal love and respect. These students, little intent on studies, where animated by a desire to raise Saigō to the leadership of a colossal opposition to the new cabinet, whose policy and conduct they honestly abhorred. When the Hagi and Kumamoto insurrections broke out in 1876 these truculent students maintained correspondence with the rebels, but refrained from openly imitating their example. By and by, some officials of the imperial government who visited the province were seized by the students and tortured into a false confession that they had come with a secret commission to assassinate Saigō. The war department, apprehending dangerous contingencies, now ordered that the powder stored in Kagoshima should be transferred to Ōsaka, but the powder was seized en route by the students, who also managed to possess themselves of the arsenal and implements of war belonging to the naval department in Kagoshima. Saigō earnestly endeavored at first to restore order and discipline among these turbulent disciples, but he finally yielded to the persuasion of his chief followers, who represented that on him devolved the patriotic duty of clearing away disloyal and crafty subjects from the foot of the throne, and who showed him, at the same time, the false confession extorted by torture from government officials. Saigō thereupon circulated a letter throughout the adjacent provinces explaining the necessity of resorting to arms. News of these events reached the emperor in Kyōto, whither he had temporarily gone. He made that city his headquarters, and gave to Prince Arisugawa a commission to quell the rebellion, Yamagata Aritomo, minister of war, and Kawamura Sumiyoshi, vice minister of the navy, being appointed chiefs of staff. The brigades dispatched to the scene of disturbance were commanded by Major Generals Nozu, Miyoshi, and Miura, and Saigō and his fellow-conspirators were stripped of all their ranks and honors.
The insurgents assembled in Kagoshima now numbered some 15,000 picked samurai of desperate courage and great skill in the use of their weapons. At the head of this force Saigō set out for Kumamoto on February 15, 1876, and on the 22d of that month he sat down with his whole army before Kumamoto castle, an error of strategy which ultimately enabled the government to confine the insurrection to the Island of Kiushū. Major General Tani Tateki, who held command of the garrison, made a stubborn resistance, though many of the samurai among his troops went over to the rebels. The imperial army arriving in the province of Higo, endeavored to reach Kumamoto from the northwest via Takase. Severe fighting look place, but the forces of the government pushed steadily on. At point after point the rebels made obstinate stands, especially in the strong position of Tawara-saka, where a great number of lives were lost by both sides, and the whole district was devastated. The government troops, though victorious, found themselves seriously weakened, and the insurgents fought with undiminished desperation. Shortly before this, Yanagiwara Sakimitsu, a senator, was sent by the emperor to Kagoshima to warn Shimazu Hisamitsu, the former feudal chief of Satsuma, and his son, Tadayoshi, against connecting themselves with the insurgents. He was accompanied on this mission by Lieutenant General Kuroda Kiyotaka, an influential member of the Satsuma fief, and the two labored so successfully that the dockyard and arsenal, which had been dismantled by the rebels, were restored to a defensible condition. It now became possible to advance upon the rear of the rebels, and General Kuroda, being appointed chief of the staff, landed a body of troops at Yatsushiro in order to attack Saigō from the south. The insurgents were now assaulted from two directions, but they fought so well that the imperial army could not yet effect the relief of Kumamoto castle, which, having been besieged for over fifty days, was being reduced to straits for want of provisions. The commander of the garrison now managed to send an officer through the besieging army with intelligence of his perilous condition, and on receipt of the message General Kuroda set all his troops in rapid motion, and forced his way to Kumamoto on April 14, the insurgents breaking up into two bodies, one of which retreated into the province of Bungo and the other into the Hitoyoshi valley in Higo, where the country offered excellent facilities for resistance. Upon the retreat of the rebels from Kumamoto, Vice Minister Kawamura Sumiyoshi was sent to Kagoshima, at the head of 8000 men, to attack the rebellion at its root, whereupon Saigō, who was with the Hitoyoshi branch of the rebels, learning that Kagoshima had fallen into the hands of the government's troops, issued orders for a retreat in the directions of Satsuma and Osumi. The Hitoyoshi insurgents then effected their escape with much adroitness into Hiuga province, following three different routes, and the imperial army occupied the Hitoyoshi position on June 1. The Bungo body of insurgents, meanwhile, being hard pressed by the government forces, retired to a strong position at Nobeoka, in Hiuga, and opened communications with the other body, which had fortified itself at Miyazaki in the same province. Several battles and skirmishes ensued, and it was not till the end of July that Miyazaki was reduced, Nobeoka falling on August 14. The rebels now retreated northward to Enotake, where they were closely besieged by the imperial army, but on the 18th of the same month they succeeded, with extraordinary celerity and address, in effecting a retreat right through the besieging lines, and pushing rapidly on to Kagoshima, which place they suddenly attacked and took. The imperial forces were now concentrated about Kagoshima, and after a sanguinary engagement, lasting ten days, the rebels were driven to Shiroyama, where their last fight was fought on September 24. Saigō Takamori committed suicide, and Toshiaki and the other rebel chiefs fell on the field of battle, the rebellion being thus finally crushed. A provisional court was organized in Kiushū under the presidency of Kōno Tokama, a secretary of the senate, for the trial of those taken in the fighting, seventeen of whom were sentenced to death. In this sanguinary struggle the whole of the army and navy had been engaged, the old imperial bodyguard reorganized, a band of swordsmen volunteers enrolled, and a company of policemen, also for sword service, sent to the scene of the fighting. The Japanese sword was used by both armies with great skill and deadly effect. The total number of men engaged on the government side was 60,000, and the entire outlay involved was 416 million yen. At one time, indeed, the affair had threatened to assume almost uncontrollable dimensions, for in the early days of the rebels' valiant fighting ominous signs of disaffection made themselves apparent in the prefectures of Yamaguchi, Kōchi, Fukuoka, and elsewhere. Much as the trouble cost, however, in blood and treasure, its national uses were very great. By it the army and navy gained invaluable experience, and all the institutions of the central government were subjected to the test of severe practice, while the people learned, once for all, that armed efforts to disturb the new order of things were utterly hopeless, and that adverse opinion must be limited to the channels of speech and pen. The treasury, however, found itself seriously embarrassed. It had been obliged to borrow fifteen million yen from the Fifteenth National Bank, and also, most reluctantly, to issue fiduciary notes aggregating 270,000,000 yen in addition to those already issued for the purpose of redeeming the fiat paper of the daijōkwan, the mimbushō, and the former feudal barons.
While the rupture of the cabinet had occasioned the immense rebellion of Kagoshima and the tragic end of the great Saigō, his former colleagues, Itagaki and Gotō, also did not accept the political defeat of their faction without a struggle. Their struggle, however, produced widely different results from those of Saigō's uprising. Itagaki and Gotō addressed to the government a memorial urging the expediency of at once establishing a national assembly in Japan. But the government rejected the memorial on the ground that the time was not ripe for so radical a measure. Nevertheless, the embryo of a deliberative assembly was in truth formed about this time, for the local governors were all summoned to Tōkyō, and invited to discuss together questions relating to roads, rivers, bridges, the relief of the destitute, public meetings, and other matters connected with their jurisdictions. Moreover, in 1875 a senate (genrō-in) was organized for legislative purposes, its members being appointed from among men conspicuous for merit and capacity. In 1876 and 1877, owing to rebellious disturbances fomented by the seceding councilors of state, the local governors were not summoned to Tōkyō for consultation, but in 1878 they assembled in the capital and discussed questions relating to local reorganization, to city and prefectural assemblies—the bases of a future parliament—and to local taxes. Subsequent to this meeting rules relating to the organization of towns, villages, districts, and divisions were promulgated, as well as rules relating to the collection of taxes, while in 1879 the system of local assemblies was established in each city and prefecture. The members of these assemblies were elected by the people from among themselves, and were invested with extensive deliberative functions in relation to local administration. In the following years the governors were again summoned to Tōkyō for the purpose of deliberating about relief funds and revising the rules discussed at their previous meeting, these rules being supplemented by others relating to the organization of divisions, towns, and villages. Meanwhile, the advocates of popular rights increased in number and influence day by day. A newspaper press had arisen which made this subject a favorite topic of discussion, and political associations were formed agitating the establishment of a diet or petitioning the government in that sense. In view of this growing excitement and to avert contingencies incidental to it, regulations were issued for the better control of newspapers and political meetings. In 1880 a political party, the Jiyū-tō (Liberals), destined subsequently to play a prominent part in national affairs, was organized, under the leadership of Itagaki Taisuke, while within the government Ōkuma Shigenobu, a councilor of state, advocated the opening of a national assembly without delay. The ministers of the crown, however, adhered to their former decision that the time was not ripe. Not discouraged by this refusal, the advocates of a parliamentary system continued their agitation, and spared no pains to injure the credit of the cabinet with the nation. The sovereign, therefore, judging it expedient to announce publicly the intentions entertained by him, issued with the advice of his ministers, in October, 1881, a rescript declaring that in the 23d year of Meiji (1890) a constitutional government should be established. Ōkuma Shigenobu, together with Kōno Hironaka and others, now resigned their official positions and organized a political party, the Kaishin-tō (Progressives), which, though occupying a common platform with the Jiyū-tō in respect of a national assembly, worked in general opposition to the latter. At a much later date a third party, hostile to both of the above, was formed, namely, the Kokumin Kyōkai, or National Unionists.
Immediately after the issue of the rescript fixing the date for opening the diet, the government set about drafting the constitution, the utmost care and research being brought to bear on this important work. In the spring of 1882 Itō Hirobumi was dispatched on a special mission to Europe for the purpose of investigating the constitutional law of the various states and its practical applications, and on his return a legislative bureau, charged with the functions of drafting the constitution, revising the laws, and remodeling the official organization, was established. In 1884 titles of nobility—prince, marquis, count, viscount, and baron—were created, patents being granted to over five hundred of the former territorial and court nobles, as well as to officials distinguished for services rendered to the state. In February of the following year great changes were effected in the administrative organization. The offices of daijō daijin, sadaijin, udaijin, sangi, and ministers of departments were abolished, and in their stead were created ministers of state for home affairs, foreign affairs, finance, war, the navy, education, justice, agriculture and commerce, and communications, these ministers constituting a cabinet under the leadership of the minister president and the presidency of the emperor himself. Outside the cabinet were the minister of the imperial household, the lord keeper of the privy seal, and a number of court councilors, while in each department there was a vice minister, as well as a director and vice directors of each of its bureaus, together with councilors and secretaries. These changes were much more radical than anything previously effected during the Meiji era, all other reforms having been mere modifications of the old system prescribed in the Taihō Code of 701 A. D. At the same time regulations providing for the appointment of civil officials by competitive examination were promulgated, and various new laws and ordinances were issued. One of the most important effects of this great reform was that it put an end completely to the pernicious system of selecting officials from personal considerations without regard to competence. No changes of a radical character have since that time been effected in the administration. Count Itō Hirobumi, the chief author of these reforms, became the first minister president of state. In 1888 a privy council was established, its members being selected from among old and distinguished officials, and its function being to advise the sovereign with respect to any matter submitted by his majesty for its deliberation. Count Itō became its president, resigning his post of minister president of state to Count Kuroda Kiyotaka. In the same year a large body of laws for the reorganization of cities, towns, and villages was promulgated, to go into effect from the year 1891, and these laws were followed in 1890 by similar statutes for the organization of prefectures and districts, the general purport of all this legislation being local autonomy.
The 11th of February in the 22d year of Meiji (1889) saw the promulgation of the imperial Constitution. On this memorable occasion the emperor delivered from the throne the following speech: "Whereas We make it the joy and glory of Our heart to behold the prosperity of Our country, and the welfare of Our subjects, We do hereby, in virtue of the supreme power We inherit from Our Imperial Ancestors, promulgate the present immutable fundamental law, for the sake of Our present subjects and their descendants. The Imperial Founder of Our House and Our other Imperial Ancestors, by the help and support of the forefathers of Our subjects, laid the foundation of Our Empire upon a basis which is to last forever. That this brilliant achievement embellishes the annals of Our country, is due to the glorious virtues of Our Sacred Imperial Ancestors, and the loyalty and bravery of Our subjects, their love of their country, and their public spirit. Considering that Our subjects are the descendants of the loyal and good subjects of Our Imperial Ancestors, We doubt not but that Our subjects will be guided by Our views, and will sympathize with all Our endeavors, and that, harmoniously coöperating together, they will share with Us Our hope of making manifest the glory of Our country, both at home and abroad, and of securing forever the stability of the work bequeathed to Us by Our Imperial Ancestors."
The promulgation of the Constitution took place in the throne room of the Tōkyō palace, the princes of the blood, ministers of state, peers, governors of cities and prefectures, presidents of city and prefecture assemblies, the foreign representatives, and all officials of and above chokunin rank being present. The Constitution consisted of seventy-six articles contained in seven chapters. It provided for the perpetuity of the imperial succession; defined the imperial prerogatives and the privileges granted to the people; declared the latter's obligation to pay taxes and serve as soldiers, but guaranteed them against being arrested, imprisoned, tried, or punished except by the process of law; decreed the inviolability of person and property; granted freedom of residence and conscience, and declared that no man's house could be officially entered without a legal warrant. The law of the houses, promulgated simultaneously, created a bicameral diet—a house of peers and a house of representatives—to be convened every year, and in this diet was vested legislative power without recourse to which no law could be enacted or altered, and financial authority without the exercise of which the annual budget could not become existent. The law of election, which also formed one of the appended statutes of the Constitution, provided for all affairs relating to the franchise and its exercise; the law of finance regulated fiscal matters; and the imperial house law determined affairs connected with the succession, the household, the princes of the blood, and the like. The day of the promulgation of the Constitution was observed as a grand national fête, amnesty was proclaimed in the case of all political offenders, and largess was freely distributed to the aged and indigent. It was certainly a subject for national rejoicing and congratulation that this advanced stage of governmental progress was reached in Japan without any of the scenes of bloodshed and violence which had disfigured such changes in many other countries.
The establishment of a constitutional form of government having long been an object of ardent desire of the people, all classes, official and private alike, had been preparing themselves for the welcome event. In addition to the Liberal and Progressive parties mentioned, Count Gōto Shōjirō had formed a third, the Daidō Danketsu (Great Affiliation), which, however, after a brief existence, split up into two or three insignificant bodies. When the first general election for the new national diet took place in July, 1890, there were several rival parties and much political ardor, but everything passed off in an orderly and quiet manner. In view of the assembly of the diet the old senate (genrō-in) was abolished, most of its members being nominated members of the upper house. By imperial edict the two houses were convoked in Tōkyō on November 25 of the same year, and his majesty the emperor opened the diet in person on November 29. The house of representatives consisted of 300 members elected by the people in the various localities; the house of peers, of the princes of the blood, the princes and marquises, all of whom sat in their own right, a certain number of counts, viscounts, and barons elected by their respective orders, highest taxpayers elected by the prefectures, one for each, and a proportion of members nominated by the sovereign in consideration of meritorious services or proficiency in learning. So with 1890 began the new régime of Japan.