The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1908-05-05
THE MEN WHO
GUIDE JAPAN
Who the Elder Statesmen Are
and What Duties They
Perform.
advertiser Correspondence, Copyright
by Frederic J. Haskin.)

by Frederic J. Haskin.)
TOXIC, April 15.-Occupying a po-
sition absolutely unique in modern
statecraft, the Elder Statesmen of Japan
exercise an influence that is all but su-
preme in the affairs of their country.
This remarkable group of old men has
no legal status, and their existence is
not recognized by the constitutional
form of government. They are the sur
vivors of the young Nipponese patriots
who fifty years ago undertook to bring
their country into the family of ma
tions and induce their people to adopt
! Western civilization. The japanese
nation recognizes their success and de-
fers to them in all questions of great
moment, much in the same fashion that
| the American nation might defer to-
| day to the opinions of George Wash
| ington, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas
Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton if
those men were still in the land Of the
| living.
The Genro, as the Elder Statesmen
group is called in japanese, is not
sharply defined. Historically consider
ed, the Japanese recognize six living
men as Elder Statesmen, but in recent
politics the active group is limited to
four. Prince Ito, Prince Yamagata,
Marquis Matsukata and Marquis Inouye
are the controlling spirits today. Mar
shall Prince Oyama is military man,
and he declined to sit in the political
eonelaves of the Genro. Count Okuma
is one of the Elder Statesmen histori- |
cally, but he has been for many years
the leader of the Opposition in Japan
csc politics, and therefore has not par
ticipated in the work of the Elder
Statesmen as a group
The domestic revolution which pro- |
duced modern Japan was not the work |
of any one great leader, but the stimuli |
taneous action of great many young |
men who responded to the force of long
accommodating dissatisfaction at home,
and to the newly felt pressure from
abroad The leaders of the revolution /
which deposed the Shogunate and re-
stored the Emperor to actual as well as
nominal power, were Okubo, KIDD and
Saigo. They have all passed away, but
the six living Elder Statesmen were
closely associated with them in the
early days, and afterward bore the
brunt of the political battle which re-
suited in a constitutional form of gov
eminent.
The most interesting of the living
Elder Statesmen are Prince. Ito and
Count Okuma, the one supreme in
power and the other insistent in cpposi-
ton. Prince Ito is better known to
foreigners than any other Japaneset
statesman. He is now nearing the
sixty eighth mile-post of life, and is
the Power behind the Throne, the di-
rector of cabinets and closest personal
adviser of the Emperor. In 1863, when
be was twenty-five years old, he evad-
ed the authorities and escaped from
Japan to England, in company with
Count Inouye, another of the living
Elder Statesmen. Both were disguised
IS sailors. They were provided with
plenty of money when they left home, !
but they gambled with the sailors on {
.he way, and when they arrived in Lon {
Ion they had but one silver dollar. Ito,
always master of the art of shifting ,
for dangerous under \
.aking, sent Inouye ont with the dollar
o buy something to eat. He went into
bakers shop and. not knowing :
| word of English, pointed to a loaf of L
'read and held up his dollar The shopI :
woman gave him the loaf, took the
lollar, and ended negotiations. The :
wo boys lived on this loaf of bread I
lntil the next day, when some friends, a
Eho knew of their mission, found them r
about London. :
/
elf IN a precarious position, his for a
lgn-hating elansmen despising him for
is English learning and the foreigners :
t the ports distrusting his intentions. .
But the great KIDD trusted him, and
invited him into the councils Of those
zen who were about to bring on the
evolution. When the Shotgun was
verthrown, and the Nikado came into
is own, Ito acted as interpreter for
he boy Emperor when he first saw the
representatives. of the foreign powers
n 1868; the first occasion in an IN
roken history of $500 years that the
Emperor of Japan had recognized theI
light Of embassy. It was Ito who had
lueh to do with the preparation Of the
imperial Edict which granted to the
apanese people a voice in government