The Japanese Journal of American Studies, No. 33 (2022)

Copyright © 2022 The Japanese Association for American Studies. All rights reserved.

Konpira-san as Enemy Asset:
The Contestation and Confrontation over theInterpretation of a Shinto Sea Deity and
the Kotohira Jinsha v. McGrath Case in 1949

Manako OGAWA*INTRODUCTION
Japan is an archipelago blessed with one of the most productive seas in
the world, and its people have engaged in fishing for centuries. Becauseof the migratory nature of fish, Japanese fisherfolk have constantly
explored the sea around and outside Japan. On their adventurous yet highly
dangerous journeys, they often brought guardian deities of the sea withthem. In the Korean Peninsula, where the Japanese built towns to conduct
commercial fishing beginning in the fifteenth century, they erected a small
Shinto shrine. In 1678, Yoshizane Sō, feudal load of Tsushima domain in
Japan, established Kotohira Shrine at the foot of Mount Yongdu (Jp. Ryūtō)
when the domain’s institution, Japan House (Wakan), was moved to that
spot.1As the people of Tsushima looked to Kotohira Shrine (also called
Konpira Shrine), popularly known as “Konpira-san” for protection of thefishing and maritime trades between Japan and Korea, it was probably
the most popular kami, or deity, of the sea in western Japan.2 The history*Professor, Ritsumeikan University

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of Kotohira Shrine goes back to ancient times. Located at the top of amountain in the middle of the Sanuki Plain, the shrine had served as a
noticeable landmark for vessels sailing off the coast of the Seto Inland Sea.
As a beacon that saved many lives, it gradually developed a reputation
as a guardian of navigation. Its ofuda, or talismanic strip, available at asmall fee, traveled with fishing and merchant vessels, and some of thesestrips became enshrined at Kotohira shrines established by fisherfolks
and merchants where they settled. After the medieval era, Konpira-sandeveloped into Konpira Daigongen, an amalgamation of Shinto, Buddhism,
and Shugendō (a set of beliefs and practices associated with mountains).
Following the policy of separating Buddhism from Shinto carried out by the
Meiji government, Konpira Daigongen reorganized itself as Kotohiragū, aShinto shrine, in 1871, enshrining the kami Ōmono-nushi-no-mikoto andEmperor Sutoku (reigned 1124–1140).3 With the dawn of the modern era,
Japanese fisherfolk spread throughout the Pacific. Worship of Konpira-san
accompanied them on journeys and crisscrossed the Pacific to Sakhalin,
Korea, former Manchuria (Northeast China), Taiwan, the South Sea Islands(Nan’yō Guntō, former Japanese mandates in the Micronesian region), andeven outside of the Japanese empire.4 Hawaii Kotohira Shrine in Honolulu
was a product of the mobility of the Japanese fisherfolk since the beginningof government-contract immigration (kan’yaku imin) between Meiji Japanand the Hawaiian Kingdom in 1885.5
Shinto shrines in Hawaiʻi expanded with the growth of Japanese settler
communities. In particular, Hawaii Kotohira Shrine in Honolulu grew tobe the largest shine in the Hawaiian archipelago by the 1930s. Japan’s
Pearl Harbor attack in 1941 and the subsequent war brought its rituals to a
halt. After the war, the US Department of Justice confiscated the propertyof Hawaii Kotohira Shrine under the Trading with the Enemy Act andattempted to put it up for auction in 1948. Shrine members filed a lawsuit,
Kotohira Jinsha [shrine] v. McGrath, and after winning the lawsuit, theshrine property was returned to them in 1951, and it is still there.
The history of Hawaii Kotohira Shrine from its birth to its wartime
suppression and postwar court struggles for survival not only shows thesignificance of Konpira-san as a sea deity but also reveals US policy toward
Shinto, an essential component of Japanese religious culture. Nevertheless,Shinto, the sea deities in Hawaiʻi in particular, has received little academic
attention with some notable exceptions. Takakazu Maeda compiled ahistory of Shinto shrines in Hawai‘i, including Hawaii Kotohira Shrine, byusing local Japanese newspapers and a limited number of primary sources

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owned by Shinto shrines.6 The sixth chapter of Noriko Shimada’s bookon the wartime experiences of ethnic Japanese in Hawai‘i was on Shinto.7
Referring to Maeda’s work, Shimada heavily relied on local English andJapanese newspapers, and she concluded that anti-Shinto campaigns
spearheaded by local English newspapers influenced the drastic measures ofthe federal government against Shinto shrines.
Both Maeda and Shimada agree that Shinto shrines in Hawai‘i were
intrinsically related to the emperor, which made Shinto an ethnic religion
acceptable only to ethnic Japanese; the members of Hawaii Kotohira Shrine
denied the practice of emperor worship at the trial for strategic reasons.8
Such an ahistorical generalization about Shinto ironically meshes with
the interpretation of the US Department of Justice that it was a cult of
Mikadoism, a spiritual backbone for Japan’s ultranationalistic propaganda
and responsible for its imperial aggression. In sharp contrast to suchoversimplistic interpretations, Helen Hardacre has succinctly stated that
Shinto was never “just one thing.” Rather, it has been “highly diverse andstratified in every historical era.”9 Fabio Rambelli has indicated that Shinto
contains hybridized aspects of Buddhism, Daoism, Confucianism, and evenWestern religious cultures.10 In this article I attempt to add to this variegatedinterpretation of Shinto.
Japan’s empire building beginning in the late nineteenth century
coincided with the export of Shinto outside of the Japanese archipelago.
Besides functioning as a source of emotional support for Japanesesettlers, overseas shrines played a significant role as the vanguard ofJapan’s colonial control and imperial subject making.11 While Hardacre
distinguished some 1,640 overseas shrines with diverse forms from settler’s
shrines to government-constructed ones, Michio Nakajima classified theminto four categories: (1) shrines founded in “overseas colonies” such as in
Taiwan, Korea, and the South Sea Islands; (2) shrines erected in “occupied
areas” such as in the Republic of China and Southeast Asia; (3) shrines
built in Manchuria; and (4) shrines erected in Hawaiʻi or in North or SouthAmerica where Japan did not have any administrative power.12 Nobutaka
Inoue categorized settlers’ shrines in Hawaiʻi into those dedicated to folk
religious deities and those housing ancestral or tutelary deities of homevillages; Kotohira Shrine belonged to the former group.13
In line with the interpretation of Hawaii Kotohira Shrine as a settlers’
shrine with folk religious aspects, the unique characteristics of Kotohira
Shrine as a highly mobile sea deity cannot be underestimated. As
Rambelli pointed out, an important feature of sea religion was “its fluid,

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decentralized nature, as related to shape-shifting deities, moving from one
place to another, and to shifting networks of people connected by changing
sea routes and trade interests.”14 Examining whether Hawaii Kotohira
Shrine shared such features, given that it was a sea deity, is one of themost important purposes of this article. In addition, I examine how the
US comprehended the complex dimensions of Shinto and shaped (mis)perceptions of Kotohira Shrine, which escalated to the drastic action of its
confiscation after the end of the war in 1948.
In order to detail the contestation and confrontation over theinterpretation of the sea deity between the worshippers of Hawaii Kotohira
Shrine and the US government, I used archival records of the Federal
Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the US Department of Justice, and theGeneral Headquarters Supreme Commander for Allied Powers (GHQ/
SCAP) of the US National Archives and Record Administration, College
Park, as well as the records of the US District Court for the District of
Hawaiʻi at the Hawaiian and Pacific Collections, University of Hawai‘i
Hamilton Library.
THE EARLY DAYS of HAWAII KOTOHIRA SHRINE
The history of Hawaii Kotohira Shrine began with the growing numbersof Japanese fisherfolk. Inspired by the expanding Japanese population
after the beginning of government-contract immigration in 1885, Japanesefisherfolk, those from Wakayama, Yamaguchi, and Hiroshima Prefectures inparticular, headed to Hawaiian waters to feed Japanese settlers, who chose
fish as a primary protein source.15 The expansion of the Japanese fishingfleets accompanied the formation of Japanese fishing communities and theestablishment of Shinto shrines to protect them from dangers at sea.
The oldest recorded Shinto sea deities in Hawaiʻi were at Kotohira
Shrine, established in Wailuku, a coastal town on the island of Maui, in
1901.16 In Honolulu, the Fishermen’s Association, an organization ofJapanese fishing boat owners in Kakaʻako set up a Shinto household altar(kamidana) at its office and added a deified ofuda talismanic strip from
Kotohiragū. In 1921, the altar developed into Kakaʻako Kotohira Shrine.
Another Kotohira shrine (hereafter, Hawaii Kotohira Shrine) was foundedat the corner of Walter Lane and North King Street around 1920 by Itsuki
Hirota, a Shinto priest from Hiroshima Prefecture, and his friends. In 1928,
Misao Isobe, head priest (gūji) of Shirasaki Hachimangū in Iwakuni City,
Yamaguchi Prefecture, came to Hawaiʻi to assume the head priestship of

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49

Hawaii Kotohira Shrine.17 Later, his brother, Naohisa Isobe, joined him andserved as the head priest of Kakaʻako Kotohira Shrine.
In the 1930s, Hawaii Kotohira Shrine accepted a spirit of the deity ofthe main shrine (gobunrei) from Shirasaki Hachimangū in Iwakuni City
brought by “Mr. and Mrs. Takichi Kunikiyo” of Hawaiʻi, who had visited
the shrine. The divided spirit of Otaki Shrine in Otake Town, Hiroshima
Prefecture, also moved across the Pacific with “Mr. Ryuichi Ipponsugi,”
who temporarily returned to Otake Town, his birthplace, from Hawaiʻi. The
divided spirits of Shirasaki Hachimangū and Otaki Shrine were installed
and enshrined at Hawaii Kotohira Shrine.18
In 1931, Hawaii Kotohira Shrine purchased a 578,320-square-footparcel of land at Kama Lane in Honolulu from the Bishop Trust byusing individual donations, and the shrine moved to the new location thefollowing year. By 1941, it had grown into the largest Shinto shrine in
Hawaiʻi, with a torii gate, a temizusha absolution water basin, a pair ofkoma-inu lions and tōrō lanterns, a community center, a martial arts center,a kyudo archery range, an outdoor theater, a kendo training facility, anda sumo ring.19 Its annual festival in 1941 attracted approximately 12,000
families.20
The island of Oʻahu had other sea deities. Ebisu, a kami of prosperity

Hawaii Kotohira Shrine annual festival, pre-Pearl Harbor
Photograph courtesy of Hawaii Kotohira Jinsha–Hawaii Dazaifu Tenmangu

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MANAKO OGAWA

and traffic safety, was enshrined in Haleʻiwa, ʻAiea, and Kakaʻako toensure a rich haul and safe navigation.21 Suitengū and Watatsumi Shrine in
Honolulu were also revered as enshrining guardians of the sea.22 In Maui, at
Ma‘alaea, Ebisu Kotohira Shrine was built in 1914 by Japanese fisherfolk,boat builders, and villagers, according to a story passed down by word of
mouth among local residents.23 In Kauaʻi, Kapaʻa had Itsukushima Shrine,
although detailed records of its origin remain unavailable.
These Shinto deities of the sea reflected the prosperity of the Japanesefishing industry in Hawaiʻi. Unlike at sugarcane plantations, where Japanese
workers were in a position of economic dependency, the Japanese at sea
held a firm grip on the fishing industry, which had expanded into thethird-largest sector of the islands’ economy behind the sugarcane andpineapple businesses.24 The territorial government of Hawaiʻi and local
business leaders protected the Japanese at sea in order to stimulate fishingand increase the local food self-sufficiency rate, which had dropped toapproximately 30 percent in the 1930s.25
THE FBI INVESTIGATION and RISING SUSPICIONS of SHINTO
During the 1930s, the number of Japanese settlers and their descendants
in Hawaiʻi grew to 139,621, approximately 38 percent of the total island
population of 368,336.26 In addition to the numerical predominance of
the Japanese population, the demand for labor for plantation fields, thebenevolent paternalism of plantation management, and the Japanesecontribution to the fishing industry nullified the Japanese exclusion drivefrom the land and sea of Hawaiʻi.
Deteriorating US-Japan relations beginning in the late 1930s, however,produced suspicions of the Japanese population in Hawaiʻi and on the West
Coast of the United States. The federal government in Washington, DC, andthe FBI, in particular, paid special attention to Shinto shrines as the spiritual
backbone of Japanese militarism. In 1939, “confidential informant N”
provided information about the history of Shinto to the FBI.27 N was a selfproclaimed “logical white man to act as a go-between for the Japanese andAmericans.” Most of his informants were not experts on Japanese culture,including Seishiro Okazaki, Japanese marshal art master popularly known as“Professor Henry S. Okazaki”; a former University of Hawaiʻi student who
studied with an exchange professor from Kyoto; a participant in a sukiyaki
dinner held by an undersecretary of the Japanese consulate; and an informant
who eavesdropped on conversations of elderly Japanese who frequently met

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51

at Shinto shrines to “discuss matters that were certainly un-American” and“plots against the future welfare of the United States.”28 By heavily relying
on these biased informants, N concluded that the fundamental principle of
Shinto was “to conquer the entire world in order to impose Japanese culturein accordance with the divine [the emperor’s] will.”29
After the outbreak of war in December 1941, the FBI intensified its
scrutiny of Shinto shrines on US soil.30 Agent Edmund D. Mason in
Los Angeles gave a much more detailed description of Shinto than N
had. His report made in May 1942 frequently referred to works writtenby the leading Japanologists of the day, such as William George Aston,
British diplomat and scholar of Japanese and Korean languages; George
Foot Moore, Harvard professor of religion; D. C. Holtom, an ethnologist
teaching at various universities in Japan; and Genchi Kato, professor ofreligion at Kokugakuin University in Tokyo.
These professional names added an authentic tinge to Mason’s report,
although his description of Shinto remained overly simplistic. According to
Mason, in 1882, the Japanese government divided Shinto organizations into
two categories, state Shinto and sect Shinto, but the “Kami of Sect Shinto
and those of State Shinto are for the most part one and the same.”31 State
Shinto was not a religion but “merely a National patriotic fever” teachingthat “Japan is God’s nation and the origin of other countries,” while sect
Shinto could “pay homage to the Emperor” and be “loyal in times of crisis
to any Government but [the government of] Japan.”32
While Mason did not refer to Shinto shrines in the United States, John
Sterling Adams, another FBI agent dispatched to Hawaiʻi, prepared moredetailed and exhaustive studies on Shinto and Shinto shrines in Hawai‘i.
In his report in September 1942, Adams asserted that Shintoism was“not a true religion but a Japanese nationalist and propaganda cult” thatexisted to assist “Japanese military and economic domination.”33 Much of
his information derived from a series of articles published in 1943 in the
Honolulu Star Bulletin. The author of these articles, Shunzo Sakamaki,
assistant professor of history at the University of Hawaiʻi, asserted thatstate Shinto was nationalistic in its nature and that its expansion overseas
accompanied the exportation of Japanese political and racial ideologies.34
Adams’s report began with a brief history of Shinto by referring to Kojiki(712) and Nihon-shoki (720), the mythological cosmogony beginning withthe separation of heaven from earth along a vertical axis, and continuing
to its evolution into a “tool of statecraft” of modern Japan.35 Whileemphasizing the self-sacrificing loyalty of adherents of the divine imperial

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line and the preeminence of Japan as the core principle of Shintoism, heargued that state Shinto shrines were “state institutions,” financed andsupervised by the government, and “ever [sic] Japanese is born a Shinto.”36
He roughly divided thirty-nine Shinto shrines in Hawai‘i into state Shinto
and sectarian Shinto; the former group included Kotohira shrines while thelatter included the shrines of Izumo Taisha and Tenrikyo.37
Adams’s report included personal information about Misao Isobe, theforty-eight-year-old head priest of Hawaii Kotohira Shrine, who was sentfrom the “headquarters of this shrine located in the Kagawa Prefecture.”
As Adams mentioned, Isobe was interned with his brother Naofumi
immediately after the outbreak of the war.38 Prior to the Pacific War, Army
Intelligence (G-2), the FBI, and the Honolulu Police Department had
already prepared lists of individuals considered “potentially dangerous”
to the United States. Buddhist and Shinto priests, Japanese language
school officials, members of various organizations and societies, Japanesebusinessmen, and kibei (US born but educated in Japan), were listed.
Soon after Japan’s Pearl Harbor attack, those on the list, including Misao
Isobe, were apprehended at the Honolulu Immigration Station together
with approximately three hundred ethnic Japanese.39 Thereafter, Isobe wastransferred to Sand Island Detention Camp in Honolulu, Camp McCoy in
Wisconsin, Camp Forrest in Tennessee, and finally Camp Livingston in
Louisiana. In November 1943, he was sent back to Japan by an exchange
ship.40
Two-and-half months after submitting the first report, Adams sent
an additional report from Honolulu to Washington, DC. By relying on
information from Shunzo Sakamaki again, he reiterated the assumptionthat the core principle of Shinto was “Mikadoism,” or emperor worship.41
Although he mentioned that the deity of Kotohira shrines sought to protect“sailors and fishermen” from “the dangers of the sea,” he restated that
Shinto in general had “military and aggressive aspects” and was “deeply
rooted in the soul of national spirit and patriotism.”42
SECT SHINTO and STATE SHINTO
These FBI reports lumped together all Shinto shrines in Hawai‘i as cultinstitutions promoting Mikadoism and Japan’s militarism, and they treated
all the Japanese as Shintoists while obscuring followers of other faiths,
such as Christianity or Buddhism. Their rough definitions of state Shinto
and sect(arian) Shinto also need further examination. When the MeijiKONPIRA-SAN AS ENEMY ASSET

53

government mandated separation of Shinto from Buddhism, it designatedthirteen religious groups as Shinto sects (kyōha Shinto). The Shinto
sects had developed teachings that had not necessarily included Shintoinfluenced religious tradition.43 Some founders of these sects, in particular,
Tenrikyo and Konkokyo, had resisted the transformation of their creeds into
a form of Shinto even though their resistance brought severe suppression.44
At the same time, the Meiji government invented state (kokka) Shinto
by reorganizing various types of Shinto shrines (jinja), placing them under
its administration. Along with the imperial family’s supposed genealogicalties to Amaterasu, the sun goddess, the government placed Ise Shrine at theapex of a shrine hierarchy and divided other shrines into three types: official
shrines (kansha), prefectural shrines (fukensha), district shrines (gōsha),village shrines (sonsha), and unranked shrines (mukakusha). The official
shrines were divided into imperial (kanpeisha), national (kokuheisha),and special shrines (bekkaku-kanpeisha); the imperial and national shrines
were further subdivided into three grades: major, middle, and minor.45
Complying with a series of government policies on religion, Kotohiragū
was classified as a national (kokuhei), minor shrine (shōsha) in 1871. It waselevated to the rank of middle grade shrine (chūsha) in 1885.46
Because the government ostensibly rejected the idea of state religion
and yet treated state Shinto as national religious service (kokka no saishi),the definition of state Shinto has remained controversial among Shinto
scholars.47 In his influential book, Kokka Shinto, Shigeyoshi Murakami
treated state Shinto as a state-sponsored creed to inculcate an attitude ofunquestioning obedience to the state and mobilize Japanese nationals for
empire building.48 Hardacre used “state management” as a synonym forstate Shinto and explored how it had expanded “intellectual, political,
and social influence, its permeation of the educational system, and theimbrication of shrine management with local government and business.”49
The formation of state Shinto accompanied the promotion of theemperor’s divinity as a descendent of Amaterasu by integrating ritualsof the imperial family, and its process accompanied the constructionof the modern emperor system (kokutai).50 With the expansion of theJapanese empire and the rise of militarism after the 1930s, state Shinto
gained formidable influence over various aspects of Japanese life. But
the relationship between Shinto and the Japanese was never simplistic, as
Susumu Shimazono has argued, because many Japanese embraced a “dualstructure of religious landscapes,” with state Shinto and a variety of otherfaiths. State Shinto represented by ceremonies conducted at schools and54

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other public spaces could not eliminate other religions and creeds embraced
by people in the private sector, such as in traditional communities, inhomes, or individuals.51
Such layered complexities of religious landscapes in Japan were notincorporated in the FBI reports, and the distinction between Shinto
shrines in Japan and those in Hawai‘i remained obscure. Nevertheless, theinformation amassed by the FBI agents reached high officials in the US
Department of Justice and was uncritically accepted and integrated into
federal policy toward Shinto shrines in Hawaiʻi.52 The Internal Security
Section of the Department of Justice listed “Shinto temples” as subversive
organizations in accordance with Executive Order 9300 issued in February
1943.53 In early 1943, the Internal Security Section attempted to prosecute“Shinto priests and priestess for subversive activities, especially in the
Territory of Hawaii,” but they could not “establish a clear violation of ournational laws.”54 With the suspicion that Shinto “teachings were calculated
to create a loyalty of the Japanese people to their emperor” and that “theseteachings produced a seditious result,” the US Department of the Treasury
dissolved Hawai‘i Izumo Taisha in Honolulu and Hawai‘i Daijingū in Hilo,
while many other shrines voluntarily disbanded themselves.55
THE CONFISCATION of HAWAII KOTOHIRA SHRINE as an ENEMY ASSET
During the war, the Japanese and their descendants were prohibitedfrom fishing operations in Hawaiian waters, and their fishing boats wereconfiscated by the US Navy. Without the operation of the fishing fleets,
the Japanese fishing industry in Hawaiʻi was on the verge of extinction.56
Kotohira Shrine at Kakaʻako disappeared with the decline of its adjoining
fishing community, while Hawaii Kotohira Shrine stopped its religious
services and kept functioning as a gathering space for its members andneighbors to engage in volunteer activities. Without its head priest, theshrine officers decided to temporarily close it on April 6, 1946.57
After the end of hostilities in August 1945, Japan, except for Okinawa,
Amami, and Ogasawara, was placed under the occupation of the GHQ/
SCAP. In December 1945, the GHQ issued the “Abolition of Governmental
Sponsorship, Support, Perpetuation, Control and Dissemination of State
Shinto (Kokka Shinto, Jinja Shinto)” directive, or simply the Shinto
Directive. The directive required abolition of governmental sponsorshipof shrines; forbade all perpetuation of militaristic ideology in Shinto
doctrines, practices, rites, and ceremonies; and stopped dissemination ofKONPIRA-SAN AS ENEMY ASSET

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Shinto doctrines in schools. No shrine was to be closed, however, if it wasdivorced from its affiliation with the government and divested of militaristic
and ultranationalistic elements. The Japanese government swiftly compliedwith the directive sufficiently to satisfy the GHQ/SCAP.58 In his New Year’s
rescript of 1946, Emperor Hirohito denied his divinity, which had been thecentral tenet of state Shinto.59
The Shinto Directive convinced the US Department of Justice that
“State Shintoism was abolished by General MacArthur.”60 In 1947, the US
attorney general Tom C. Clark designated “Shinto Temples” as totalitarianorganizations under US Executive Order 9835, generally known as the
Loyalty Order, to conduct loyalty checks on federal employees to root out
members of totalitarian, fascist, Communist, or subversive organizations.61
Complying with the interpretation of Shinto shrines as totalitarianorganizations, the Honolulu Advertiser started an anti-Shinto campaign.
It published articles in which US war veterans and Christian ministers
accused Shinto shrines of being dangerous institutions under the control ofJapan.62 On June 1, 1948, federal officers raided Hawaii Kotohira Shrine
under the authority of the Trading with the Enemy Act (although the war
was over) and seized the shrine, asserting that the shrine was an agent “forthe spread of Japanese nationalism, and that for this reason the property
should be subject to permanent confiscation.”63 In March 1949, the shrine
was put up for sale. On March 31, shrine members filed a suit against
Attorney General Clark, the Territory of Hawaiʻi, and the Federal Office of
Alien Property for misusing section 9 of the Trading with the Enemy Act
against a civilian organization.64 On August 24, President Harry Truman
appointed Sen. J. Howard McGrath as the US attorney general. Hereafter,
this case became known as Kotohira Jinsha v. McGrath.65 The first trial in
the US District Court in Hawaiʻi was scheduled for June 15, 1949, but it
was extended a couple of times.66 The rapid postwar revival of the fishingindustry and the prosperity of Japanese fishing communities enabled theshrine members to finance the costly court struggles that lasted for years.67
THE JOINT INVESTIGATION in JAPANFaced with a lawsuit, the US Department of Justice turned to the GHQ/
SCAP for help. With the permission of the court, the department dispatched
Leon R. Gross, attorney and manager of the Hawaiʻi Office of the Officeof Alien Property for the US Department of Justice, to Tokyo to undertakea joint investigation with GHQ officers.68 At the preliminary conference,

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Gross and the GHQ officers shared information that Hawaii Kotohira
Shrine had enshrined a guardian deity of fishermen, but the shrine was“actually controlled by agencies in Japan or acting directly or indirectly
for the benefit of Japanese interests.”69 They recognized that Kotohiragū
in Kagawa Prefecture had a period of ryobu, or dual aspects of Shinto andBuddhism, and that Shinto gained ascendancy over Buddhism after the
Meiji Restoration in 1868. Despite such fundamental changes, they did notsee substantial change in the cult of the shrine, because it accepted imperial
envoys giving money, gifts, and making repairs, as well as accepting
small grants from the government as a national shrine of medium grade.70
Although Kotohira shrine in Hawai‘i was a private institution outside ofJapan’s jurisdiction, they assumed that Kotohiragū “aided and abetted” itsbranch shrine in Hawai‘i to “further the nationalistic aspects of Shinto” and“the interests of Japan in the Territory of Hawaii.”71
The joint investigation of Leon R. Gross and the GHQ officers, however,
betrayed their expectations to confirm such assumptions. When Gross,Frank T. Motofuji of the GHQ Civil Information and Education Section,and six staff members of GHQ Kobe and the Shikoku Region visited
Kotohiragū in Kagawa Prefecture, they met Mitsushige Kotooka, the headpriest. Kotooka denied institutional connections between his shrine andHawaiʻi. He stated that Kotohiragū had only five branch shrines: in Kobe,
Shimane, Osaka, Aichi, and Tokyo; other shrines in Japan and abroad were
“established without the sanction of the head shrine.”72 Kotohiragū sent
proxy prayers, charms, and amulets to Honolulu on request “in a manner
no different from any other similar request.”73 Kotooka impressed on theinvestigation team that he had “no prior knowledge of the litigation in
Honolulu and that the existence of Kotohira shrines in Honolulu was amatter of very little importance.”74 In addition, his words did not indicatethat Hawaii Kotohira Shrine was “a direct instrumentality used to further
the interests of Japan in the Territory of Hawaii.”75
Tamotsu Kaneseki, veteran negi (priest) of Kotohiragū, gave moredetailed and objective information regarding the shrine’s history,
relationship with the government, and overseas shrines. First, hesummarized the evolution of Konpira as the patron deity that protectedseafarers since ancient times, emphasizing that the number of its yearly
worshippers was second only to that of Ise Shrine. After the outbreak of the
Pacific War, Kotohiragū conducted an emergency ceremony to notify thekami of the declaration of war at the instruction of the Kagawa Prefecture
School Affairs Department chief. Thereafter, the priests added a “prayer forKONPIRA-SAN AS ENEMY ASSET

57

the exaltation of Imperial power and eternal success in Japan’s arms” at theend of the norito, or the address to the kami, during major ceremonies. He
also detailed the amount of governmental grants in the forms of monetaryofferings to kami (kyōshinkin) and expenses for kami offerings and symbols(shinsen-heihakuryo) from 1941 to 1945.76 He added that “the militarists
used the shrine as an instrument to give reality to their idea of ‘all thenations of the world under one rule (hakko ichiu),’” although it did notmean that “we were subjected to the influence of the military clique.”77
Kaneseki explained that Kotohiragū served as “spiritual food for the
inhabitants” of distant places, including Hawai‘i. Although Kotohiragū
did not dispatch its priests to Hawai‘i, Japanese residents there looked toit as the object of their faith and asked for small talismans to pray for theirown health and safety even after the war. He concluded his interview byhighlighting the distance of Kotohiragū from the Japanese government andemperor; the government repeatedly rejected its promotion to a national
major shrine due to a “lack of relationship with the Imperial Household andits lack of relationship from the national aspect.”78
Yaichi Kurokawa, who retired as negi of Kotohiragū after forty yearsof service, stated that Hawaii Kotohira Shrine was established without the
involvement of Kotohiragū. Kurokawa became acquainted with Misao
Isobe when Isobe visited Kotohiragū, and he asked Kurokawa to write arecommendation letter to attend Kōten Kōkyūjo, a training institution for
Shinto priests. Thereafter, Kurokawa had not heard from Isobe during his
tenure as head priest of Hawaii Kotohira Shrine.79
Kotooka and Kaneseki asserted that Kotohiragū had a certain distancefrom the Japanese government and the imperial household, as indicatedby its middle shrine status, despite its fame and popularity. F. T. Motofuji
of the GHQ recorded that Kotooka “ruefully admitted that it had been
wishful thinking on his part that a shrine dedicated to the patron deityof fishermen and seafarers could have been so honored.”80 Moreover,
Kotooka, Kaneseki, and Kurokawa unanimously denied an institutional
relationship between Kagawa and Hawaiʻi and insisted on the spontaneity
and autonomy of Hawaii Kotohira Shrine. Kaneseki guessed that there were
probably a total of “ten thousands” of Kotohira shrines within and outsideof Japan, including in Hawaiʻi but that they were “established upon theirown option” after receiving a talisman from Kotohiragū.81 The investigationteam collected the leaflets and archival records regarding the branch shrinesof Kotohiragū, and these documents confirmed their testimony.
In Iwakuni City, Yamaguchi Prefecture, Leon R. Gross and the GHQ

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officers conducted a more exhaustive interrogation of Misao Isobe bytelephone and in person; at that time, he resided in Toyoura County, hisbirthplace in Yamaguchi Prefecture. They asked Isobe about his personal
history and the membership, festivals, and rituals observed at Hawaii
Kotohira Shrine, and about his relationship with the Japanese consulatein Honolulu, the Japanese military force, and Kotohiragū in Kagawa
Prefecture. They carefully examined whether he engaged in the propagationof emperor worship and the militarism of Japan during his tenure in
Honolulu.
Isobe reconfirmed the absence of institutional ties between Kagawa
and Hawaiʻi and the autonomy of Hawaii Kotohira Shrine. He received
no guidance or instruction from Kagawa, except private correspondencewith a priest at Kotohiragū. As for emperor worship and militarism,
Isobe asserted that “the militarists utilized the shrines as an instrument toinculcate the idea of loyalty to Emperor, love of nation and the total unityof church and state to the Japanese subjects,” but he propagated teachingsfor “the prosperity, betterment, welfare and happiness of the congregation
and worshippers in general,” not emperor worship. Moreover, he denied
instructions from Japan or the Japanese consulate in Honolulu relative to histeachings and ceremonies and asserted that his travel expenses to Hawaiʻiand salary came from the shrine members and worshippers, not from theJapanese government.82 The shrine premises served as welcome reception
grounds for the Japanese naval-training squadron, and the shrine members
collected donations of comfort bags (imon bukuro) and comfort money(imonkin) for Japan prior to the war. Isobe denied any further contributions
to the Japanese military.83 He concluded the interrogation with the remarkthat “the former Emperor Sutoku is deified at the Kotohira Shrine in
Kagawa Prefecture but is not enshrined at the Kotohira Shrine in Hawaii.”84
The joint investigation team additionally visited Toshio Imaji, headpriest of Shirasaki Hachimangū in Iwakuni City, and Yoshihiko Tokoro,
head priest of Otaki Shrine in Otake Town.85 In addition, they met
with Masaatsu Nogami, ritual section chief at Ise Shrine, and Japanese
government officials of the Religious Affairs Section of the Ministry of
Education. The team visited Genchi Kato, a prominent Shinto scholar,
whom FBI agents often referred to in their reports.86 All of them agreed
that the Japanese government did not administer Shinto shrines outside its
jurisdiction.87 As for the dissemination of ultranationalistic propaganda,
presumably conducted by Kotohiragū, Genchi Kato stated that Hachiman,
a tutelary deity of warriors, could be nationalistic but “the Kotohira deity

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59

was the patron god of fishermen and of seafarers,” tacitly denying its
ultranationalistic elements.88
THE TRIAL
After coming back from the field trip empty handed, Leon R. Grosswrote to Howard K. Hoddick, US assistant attorney general, to “useShunzo Sakamaki as [an] expert witness” because the “connection between
Japanese and Hawaii shrines was ideological because of [the] inherent
nature of Shinto practiced at Hawaii Kotohira Jinsha.”89 Without evidenceof governmental control and the ostensible promotion of emperor worshipat the shrine, an “ideological” connection between Japan and Hawai‘iseemed the last resort to justify themselves at the trial.
In court, the defense represented by Hoddick, Gross, and Ray J. O’Brien,
US attorney for the Territory of Hawaiʻi, submitted exhibits including
Shunzo Sakamaki’s newspaper articles in 1943, a memorandum preparedfor “certain Intelligence Agencies” of the US government, and a typewritten
copy of the Shinto Directive by the GHQ/SCAP; the records and documents
of investigations that Gross obtained in Japan were excluded from the list.90
Shunzo Sakamaki took the witness stand for the defense and repeated his
own view of Shinto shrines in Hawaiʻi and state Shinto in Japan.91 In themeantime, Kotohira Jinsha (Shrine), the plaintiff, represented by attorneysof Robertson, Castle & Anthony, submitted exhibits including a certified
copy of its charter in which the purposes of Hawaiʻi Kotohira Shrine were
defined as “purely those of religion, charity and education.”92 The plaintiff
also contended that it was “primarily [a] tutelary shrine of fishermen“
and that it never advocated “Emperor worship” or “called for its members
to commit acts of sabotage or espionage or otherwise against the UnitedStates.”93 They testified that there were no official connection between
Japanese and Hawaiian shrines and that the Shinto Directive did not affectHawaiian shrines.94
On May 18, 1950, Judge J. Frank McLaughlin of the US District Court
in Hawaiʻi handed down a decision in favor of the plaintiff. The essential
part of his judgment was not regarding emperor worship, even though theplaintiff’s witnesses “respected the Japanese Emperor as a descendant of a
god rather than as a god in living human form.”95 Instead, he stressed theimportance of the Constitution’s First Amendment guaranteeing freedomof religion. No matter “how primitive, absurd or strange such beliefs mightseem to others,” it did not allow for the US government to take away the

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MANAKO OGAWA

shrine’s property, he stated.96
As for “the control, financial, doctrinal, or otherwise of any state Shinto
shrine in Japan or of the Japanese government,” the evidence submitted
by the defense was not convincing enough to discredit the plaintiff.97
The Shinto Directive of the GHQ on December 15, 1945, functioned ascounterevidence for the defendants. Even if the shrine was controlled by
Japan, the directive in December 1945 technically ended “the control ofthis shrine by Japan.” “As of June 1, 1948, the date of the Vesting Order,
there was no enemy taint.”98 In the opinion attached to the court decision,
McLaughlin denied that “this little insignificant shrine in Hawaii, with not
more than 500 members, should be deemed to be an economic, military, oreven ideological threat to the United States,” and he went as far as to statethat “all the Shinto shrines in the United States (not many) put together
would not threaten the United States.”99 Therefore, the alleged danger of theshrine had “no other basis than emotion and fear.”100
Because the US Department of Justice did not appeal to a higher court,
Hawaii Kotohira Shrine won the case. In March 1951, it regained all theconfiscated properties.101 In 1952, Misao Isobe came back to Honolulu andresumed the shrine priesthood. Inspired by the victory of Hawaii Kotohira
Shrine, Hawai‘i Izumo Taisha and Hawai‘i Daijingū followed its path andregained their own properties.
CONCLUSION
In this article I have presented a description and explanation of how the
worship of Konpira, a highly mobile and autonomous sea deity in Japan,
crossed the Pacific and came to Hawaiʻi and how the US government
interpreted and dealt with the beliefs and practices associated with its
worship from the 1930s to 1951. Without noticing the distinguishing traitsof Hawaii Kotohira Shrine, the US Department of Justice interpreted
it exclusively in the context of state Shinto, which they defined as animmobile and monolithic ideological apparatus manufactured by theJapanese government to justify its imperial aggression. After the war, theUS Department of Justice attempted to confiscate Hawaii Kotohira Shrine
as an enemy asset, asserting that the believers had propagated “Mikadoism”
and conducted subversive activities under the direction of the Japanese
government and Kotohiragū in Japan. Behind the confiscation of what
Judge McLaughlin called “this little insignificant shrine in Hawaii” were
exaggerated “emotion and fear,” fueled by the biased conclusions of FBI

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61

agents and a stretched interpretation of the Shinto Directive by the GHQ/
SCAP.102 The joint investigations conducted by the US Department ofJustice and the GHQ confirmed the ideological distance of the Kotohiradeity from the emperor and the decentralized nature of its worship; all
the key witnesses in Japan and Hawaiʻi unanimously stated that Kotohira
shrines were established at the will of fisherfolk and seafarers seeking
their own “prosperity, betterment, welfare and happiness,” as Misao Isobe
asserted.103 Hawaii Kotohira Shrine was far beyond the control of its “headshrine” in Japan or of Japanese government authorities. Without rational
evidence other than Shunzo Sakamaki’s biased statements against Shinto in
general, the Department of Justice lost the case.
After the trial, Konpira-san in Hawaiʻi added variegated stories to its
history. In 1952, the divided spirit of Dazaifu Tenmangū arrived from
Fukuoka Prefecture at the request of the local prefectural society, Fukuoka
Kenjinkai, and the shrine renamed itself Hawaii Kotohira Jinsha–Hawaii
Dazaifu Tenmangu. A little while later, the shrine absorbed Palama Inari
Shrine, Watatsumi Shrine, and Suitengū in Honolulu. Although it lost
two-thirds of its lands due to the construction of Lunalilo Freeway (H-1),
it has survived the postwar upheaval of society, such as the dissolutionof Japanese fishing communities and the drastic demographic changes in
Honolulu.104 Nowadays, it attracts more than ten thousand visitors on New
Year’s Day alone, and many of them are not ethnic Japanese. Irene Isa
Takizawa, wife of the head shrine priest Masahiko Takizawa, considers that
Kotohira Shrine, by enclosing a deity of the sea, is universally appealing
to a wide variety of people beyond Japanese ethnic enclaves and for thisreason Konpira-san has survived well into the twenty-first century.105
NOTES
This article was supported by the Japan Society for the Promotionof Science, Grant-in-Aid for Scientiﬁc Research (KAKENHI) number
21K00930.
In this article I use “Hawaiʻi” to describe the populated islands of the
Hawaiian Archipelago. The Hawaiian Kingdom, established in 1810, wasoverthrown by a pro-US faction in 1893 and replaced by a republic in thesame year. In 1898, the US annexed the Republic of Hawaiʻi and made ita territory. In this article I use “Japanese” to describe Japanese settlers/
immigrants in Hawaiʻi and their descendants. Because this research includes

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both Japanese nationals and Japanese Americans, their names are writtenwith the personal name ﬁrst, followed by the surname, in order to avoid
confusion.
1

Michio Nakajima, “Shinto Deities That Crossed the Sea: Japan’s ‘Overseas Shrines,’
1868 to 1945,” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 37, no. 1 (2010): 31; Manako Ogawa,Sea of Opportunity: The Japanese Pioneers of the Fishing Industry in Hawaiʻi (Honolulu:
University of Hawaiʻi Press, 2015), 18.
2
Kotohira is sometimes called Konpira. The diﬀerence between the two derives from
diﬀerent kanji expressions for the same shrine. In addition to Kotohira or Konpira, there are
a number of other sea deities in Japan, such as Watatsumi, Sumiyoshi, Munakata, Benzaiten,and Ebisu. Hachiman, Izumo, Kashima, Kumano, and Ise are also deeply related to the sea.
Fabio Rambelli, “General Introduction: The Sea in the History of Japanese Religions,”
in The Sea and the Sacred in Japan: Aspects of Maritime Religion, ed. Fabio Rambelli(London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2018), xiv, xviii.
3
In’nan Toshihide, “Sumiyoshi shinkō kara Konpira shinkō-e [From the worship of
Sumiyoshi to Kotohira],” in Setouchi no kaijin bunka [The culture of sea people in Seto
Inland Sea], ed. Taryō Ōbayashi (Tokyo: Shōgakkan, 1991), 195–98. Ōmono-nushi-nomikoto was believed to have promoted agriculture, seafaring, ﬁsheries, medicine, andvarious other productive industries. Emperor Sutoku was exiled to Sanuki (Kagawa) after the
Hogen Insurrection (1156). He deeply worshiped Konpira. Kotohiragū, “Yuisho,” accessed,
August 5, 2021, http://www.konpira.or.jp/articles/20200814_history/article.htm.
4
Hokkaido Jinchachō, ed., Karafuto no Jinja [Shinto shrines in Sakhalin] (Tokyo:
Jinjashinpōsha, 2012), 405; Peter M. Nakahara, “Report,” undated, National Archives andRecord Administration, College Park (NARA), record group (RG) 331, box (B) 5774.
5
The English name of the subject shrine was “Hawaii Kotohira Jinsha,” not “Jinja, ” forphonetic reasons. I primarily address it as Hawaii Kotohira Shrine, but Jinsha or Jinja aresometimes used, following the description of primary sources. Both jinsha and jinja mean
“shrine.”6
Maeda Takakazu, Hawai no jinjashi [History of Shinto shrines in Hawaiʻi] (Tokyo:Ōzorasha, 1999).
7
Shimada Noriko, Sensō to imin no shakaishi: Hawai Nikkei Americajin no
Taiheiyōsensō [The social history of the war and immigrants: The Paciﬁc War of JapaneseAmericans in Hawaiʻi] (Tokyo: Gendaishiryō shuppan, 2004).
8
Ibid., 189–91; Maeda, Hawai no jinjashi, 216.
9
Helen Hardacre, Shinto: A History (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017), 2.
10
Fabio Bambelli, “Bloomsbury Shinto Studies,” accessed March 9, 2021, https://www.
bloomsbury.com/uk/series/bloomsbury-shinto-studies/.
11
Nakajima, “Shinto Deities That Crossed the Sea,” 40.
12
Ibid., 431; Nakajima, “Shinto Deities That Crossed the Sea,” 22–23.
13
Nobutaka Inoue, Umi wo watatta Nihon shūkyō: Imin shakai no uchi to soto [Japanesereligion across the seas: Within and outside of immigrant society] (Tokyo: Kōbundō, 1985),
54–55.
14
Rambelli, “General Introduction,” xiii–xiv.
15
For the development of Japanese ﬁshing, see Ogawa, Sea of Opportunity, 33–59.
16
Maui Shinbun, February 25, 1941, 2.
17
F. T. Motofuji, “Interview with Mr. Isobe,” April 8, 1950.
18
Hawaii Kotohira Jinsha–Hawaii Dazaifu Tenmangu, “History of the Shrine,” accessed,
August 5, 2021, http://www.e-shrine.org/history.html. F. T. Motofuji, “Interview with

KONPIRA-SAN AS ENEMY ASSET

63

Mr. Isobe,” April 8, 1950; Frances T. Motofuji, “Report of Field Trip to Yamaguchi andHiroshima Prefectures,” April 19, 1950, NARA, RG331, B5774.
19
Ibid.
20
Ibid. Three distinct supporters’ groups formed around the shrine. The Kotohira Jinja
Believers’ Association comprised about ﬁve hundred regular members who paid monthly
dues and about two thousand occasional members who paid dues once a year. Otaki
Shrine had its supporters’ association with approximately forty members, and Shirasaki
Hachimangū had approximately two hundred supporters. They paid twenty-ﬁve cents amonth. F. T. Motofuji, “Interview with Mr. Isobe,” April 8, 1950.
21
Ogawa, Sea of Opportunity, 84.
22
J. Sterling Adams, FBI, “Shinto Sects in the Territory of Hawaii,” September 15, 1942,
NARA, RG60, entry (E)146-10, B5, 20.
23“Mäʻalaea Fishing Shrine: An Evolving Tradition,” accessed August 7, 2021, https://www.thehawaiiherald.com/2015/10/20/maalaea-ﬁshing-shrine-an-evolving-tradition/.
24
Ogawa, Sea of Opportunity, 6.
25
Casey Hayes, “Food Administration in Hawaii during Wartime,” (master’s thesis,
University of Hawaiʻi at Manoa, 1942), 11, 15.
26
Ryūkichi Kihara, Hawai Nihonjin-shi [The history of Japanese in Hawaiʻi] (Tokyo:
Benseisha, 1935), 41.
27
FBI, “Shinto Religion in Hawaii,” March 16, 1940, NARA, RG 60, E146-10, B5.
28
Ibid., 7.
29
Ibid., 5.
30
From J. Edgar Hoover to Wendell Berge, “Shinto Sects in the Territory of HawaiiInternal Security,” November 10, 1942, NARA, RG60, E146-10, B5.
31
Federal Bureau of Investigation, “The Shinto Cult,” made by Edmund D. Mason, May
30, 1942, NARA, RG60, E146-10, B5, 12.
32
Ibid., 1, 2.
33
J. Sterling Adams, FBI, “Shinto Sects in the Territory of Hawaii,” September 15, 1942,
NARA, RG60, E146-10, B5, 1.
34
Shimada, Sensō to imin no shakaishi, 171.
35
Adams, “Shinto Sects in the Territory of Hawaii,” September 15, 1942, 10.
36
Ibid., 11.
37
Ibid., 14–25.
38
Adams, “Shinto Sects in the Territory of Hawaii,” September 15, 1942, 17, 27.
39
Dennis M. Ogawa and Evarts C. Fox Jr., “Japanese Internment and Relocation: The
Hawaii Experience,” in Japanese Americans: From Relocation to Redress, rev. ed., ed.
Roger Daniels (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1986), 135–37.
40
P. M. Nakahara, “Translation: Statement by Misao Isobe,” April 5, 1950, NARA,
RG331, B5774.
41
John Sterling Adams, FBI, “Shinto Sects in the Territory of Hawaii,” November 29,
1942, NARA, RG60, E146-10, B5, 3.
42
Ibid., 22.
43
Shigeyoshi Murakami, Kokka Shinto [State Shinto] (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1970),
120–25.
44
Ibid., 110–11; Hardacre, Shinto, 422.
45
Hardacre, Shinto, 374; Murakami, Kokka Shinto, 95–96.
46
In’nan, “Sumiyoshi shinkō kara Konpira shinkō-e,” 195, 228. Shirasaki Hachimangū
and Otaki Shrine were classiﬁed as a district shrine and a village shrine, respectively.
Frances T. Motofuji, “Report of Field Trip to Yamaguchi and Hiroshima Prefectures,” April
19, 1950, NARA, RG331, B5774.

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47
Tadanobu Kawamura, Kingendai Shinto no houseiteki kenkyū [The legal study of Shinto
in the premodern and modern era] (Tokyo: Kōbundō, 2017), 319.
48
Murakami, Kokka Shintō.
49
Hardacre, Shinto, 357, 404.
50
Murakami, Kokka Shinto, 118–19.
51
Susumu Shimazono, Kokka Shinto to Nihonjin [State Shinto and the Japanese], (Tokyo:
Iwanami Shoten, 2010), vi, 51.
52
From J. Edgar Hoover to Wendell Berge, Assistant Attorney General, November 10,
1942, NARA, RG60, E146-10, B5; Harold I, Baynton and James M. McInerney, “Kotohira
Jinsha,” April 11, 1950, NARA, RG60, E146-10, B5.
53
Executive Order 9300 was revoked by Executive Order 9835 in 1947.
54
Harold I. Baynton and James M. McInerney, “Kotohira Jinsha,” April 11, 1950, NARA,
RG60, E146-10, B5; US District Court, Hawai‘i (Ter.), “Motion of Defendant for Summary
Judgement Kotohira Jinsha, A Hawaiian Eleemosynary corporation, Plaintiﬀ vs. Tom C.
Clark, Attorney General of the United States.” Hawai‘i-Paciﬁc Collection (HPC), Hamilton
Library, University of Hawai‘i at Manoa.
55
Ibid.; Shimada, Sensō to imin no shakaishi,171, 176.
56
Ogawa, Sea of Opportunity, 100–106, 114.
57
Hawaii Kotohira Jinsha–Hawaii Dazaifu Tenmangu, “History.”
58
Hardacre, Shinto, 444–46.
59
Ibid., 449.
60
“Shinto Temples,” August 31, 1955, NARA, RG60, E146-10, B5.
61
Ibid., “Executive Order 9835,” accessed, July 30, 2021, https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/
library/executive-orders/9835/executive-order-9835.
62
Shimada, Sensō to imin no shakaishi, 174–77.
63
F. T. M, “Memo for the Record,” undated, NARA, RG331, B5774.
64
Hawaii Kotohira Jinsha–Hawaii Dazaifu Tenmangu, “History.”
65
Ibid.
66
Maeda, Hawai no jinjashi, 216.
67
Ogawa, Sea of Opportunity, 116–24.
68
J. Frank McLaughlin, “Opinion,” US District Court, Hawaii, HPC, 2.
69
F. T. Motofuji, “Shrine Property in Hawaii,” March 6, 1950, NARA, RG331, B5774.
70
Ibid.
71
Frances T. Motofuji, “Report of Field Trip to Kagawa Prefecture,” March 31, 1950,
NARA, RG331, B5774.
72
Ibid.
73
Ibid.
74
Ibid.
75
Ibid.
76
Peter M. Nakahara, “Report,” undated, NARA, RG331, B5774. The amount ofkyōshinkin increased from $550 in 1941 to $700 in 1945, and shinsen-heihakuryo from $195
in 1941 to $325 in 1945.
77
Nakahara, “Report.”
78
Ibid.
79
P. M. Nakahara, “Statement by Yaichi Kurokawa,” April 13, 1950, NARA, RG331,
B5774.
80
Motofuji, “Report of Field Trip to Kagawa Prefecture.”81
Nakahara, “Report.”
82
Isobe said that his net income was approximately $4,000. P. M. Nakahara, “Statement by
Misao Isobe,” April 5, 1950, NARA, RG331, B5774.

KONPIRA-SAN AS ENEMY ASSET
83

65

Ibid.; F. T. Motofuji, “Interview with Mr. Isobe,” April 8, 1950, NARA, RG331, B5774.
Nakahara, “Statement by Misao Isobe.” As of August 2021, Emperor Sutoku wasworshiped at the shrine.
85
Francis T. Motofuji, “Report of Field Trip to Yamaguchi and Hiroshima Prefectures,”
April 19, 1950, NARA, RG331, B5774.
86
F. T. Motofuji, “Some Aspects of Shinto,” April 21, 1950, NARA, RG331, B5774.
87
F. T. Motofuji, “Interview with Religious Aﬀairs Section Oﬃcials,” April 4, 1950; F. T.
Motofuji, “Interview with Mr. Nogami,” April 6, 1950, NARA, RG331, B5774.
88
Motofuji, “Some Aspects of Shinto.”
89
From Leon R. Gross to Howard K. Hoddick, April 13, 1950; from Leon R. Gross to
Howard K. Hoddick, April 17, 1950, NARA, RG331, B5774.
90
US District Court, Hawai‘i (Ter.), “Motion of Defendant for Summary Judgement.”91
Shimada, Sensō to imin no shakaishi, 184.
92
“In the Matter of the Charter of an Incorporation of the Kotohira Jinsha, to the
Honorable E. S. Smith, Acting Treasurer of the Territory of Hawaii,” HPC.
93
F. T. M., “Memo for the Record”; “Plaintiﬀs,” undated, NARA, RG331, B5774.
94
Outgoing message from Leon R. Gross to Howard K. Hoddick, April 17, 1950, NARA,
RG331, B5774.
95“Opinion, Kotohira Jinsha, Plaintiﬀ, v. J. Howard McGrath, Attorney General of theUnited States, Defendant,” 5, HPC.
96
Ibid., 12–14; “Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law, Kotohira Jinsha, Plaintiﬀ, v. J.
Howard McGrath, Attorney General of the United States, Defendant,” 3, HPC.
97
“Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law,” 6.
98
Ibid., 6.
99“Opinion,” 10.
100
Ibid., 12.
101
Maeda, Hawai no jinjashi, 217.
102
“Opinion,” 10, 12.
103Nakahara, “Statement by Misao Isobe.”
104
Hawaii Kotohira Jinsha–Hawaii Dazaifu Tenmangu, “History.”
105
Manako Ogawa, Umi o meguru daiarōgu Hawai to Nihon suisangō kara no apurōchi[Dialogue over the sea between Hawaiʻi and Japan: An approach from the ﬁshing industry](Tokyo: Hanawa shobō, 2019), 196–97.
84