Meiji Constitution followed by The Constitution of Japan
Outline
The Meiji Restoration in 1868 provided Japan a form of constitutional monarchy based on the Prusso-German model, in which the Emperor of Japan was an active ruler and wielded considerable political power over foreign policy and diplomacy which was shared with an elected Imperial Diet. The Diet primarily dictated domestic policy matters.
After the Meiji Restoration, which restored direct political power to the emperor for the first time in over a millennium, Japan underwent a period of sweeping political and social reform and westernization aimed at strengthening Japan to the level of the nations of the Western world. The immediate consequence of the Constitution was the opening of the first Parliamentary government in Asia.The Meiji Constitution established clear limits on the power of the executive branch and the Emperor. It also created an independent judiciary.  Civil rights and civil liberties were allowed, though they were freely subject to limitation by law. Free speech, freedom of association and freedom of religion were all limited by laws. The leaders of the government and the political parties were left with the task of interpretation as to whether the Meiji Constitution could be used to justify authoritarian or liberal-democratic rule. It was the struggle between these tendencies that dominated the government of the Empire of Japan. Franchise was limited, with only 1.1% of the population eligible to vote for the Diet. Universal manhood suffrage was not established (under law) until the General Election Law, which gave every male aged 25 and over a voting right, was enacted in 1925.
The Meiji Constitution was used as a model for the 1931 Constitution of Ethiopia by the Ethiopian intellectual Tekle Hawariat Tekle Mariyam. This was one of the reasons why the progressive Ethiopian intelligentsia associated with Tekle Hawariat were known as "Japanizers".By the surrender in the World War II on 2 September 1945, the Empire of Japan was deprived of sovereignty by the Allies, and the Meiji Constitution was suspended. During the Occupation of Japan, the Meiji Constitution was replaced by a new document, the postwar Constitution of Japan. This document replaced imperial rule with a form of Western-style liberal democracy. To preserve legal continuity, these changes were enacted as a constitutional amendment per Article 73 of the Meiji Constitution. After garnering the required two-thirds majority in both chambers, it received imperial assent on 3 November 1946 and took effect on 3 May 1947.
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