October 24, 2013
The state secrets protection bill which the Abe Cabinet is set to submit to the current Diet session stipulates that the information designated as classified by state authorities can be provided to lawmakers only at “secret meetings” in the Diet. Prewar Japan had a similar system.
Article 57 of the current Japanese Constitution requires the Diet to open its deliberation to the public in principle. To hold a secret meeting, it needs an endorsement from more than two-thirds of the parliamentarians in attendance. The administration has no right to call secret meetings.
Under the prewar Meiji Constitution, secret meetings could be convened at the request of the administration or by a decision made by the majority of the Diet. The Imperial government was able to make the parliament call a closed-door meeting at any time in disregard of Diet members.
Japanese Communist Party member of the House of Representatives Akamine Seiken said that the Imperial Diet held a total of 41 secret meetings in the Upper and Lower Houses. Of them, 31 were held in response to the government’s demand.
Some items on the agenda at those closed meetings are as follows: four cases related to the suppression of free speech, including the major crackdown on the JCP in 1928; nine matters concerning Japan’s war of aggression, such as the 1931 Manchurian Incident and the following full-scale invasion of China; and two reports about the damage from aerial bombings by the U.S. forces, including the Great Tokyo Air Raid of March 10, 1945.
One of the key roles of the parliament is to prevent the government from operating without restraints. The prewar parliament’s history clearly shows that by making use of secret meetings, the power concealed information from the public, turned the Diet into a rubber-stamping organ, and pushed the people into accepting and even supporting the war of aggression.
Article 57 of the current Japanese Constitution requires the Diet to open its deliberation to the public in principle. To hold a secret meeting, it needs an endorsement from more than two-thirds of the parliamentarians in attendance. The administration has no right to call secret meetings.
Under the prewar Meiji Constitution, secret meetings could be convened at the request of the administration or by a decision made by the majority of the Diet. The Imperial government was able to make the parliament call a closed-door meeting at any time in disregard of Diet members.
Japanese Communist Party member of the House of Representatives Akamine Seiken said that the Imperial Diet held a total of 41 secret meetings in the Upper and Lower Houses. Of them, 31 were held in response to the government’s demand.
Some items on the agenda at those closed meetings are as follows: four cases related to the suppression of free speech, including the major crackdown on the JCP in 1928; nine matters concerning Japan’s war of aggression, such as the 1931 Manchurian Incident and the following full-scale invasion of China; and two reports about the damage from aerial bombings by the U.S. forces, including the Great Tokyo Air Raid of March 10, 1945.
One of the key roles of the parliament is to prevent the government from operating without restraints. The prewar parliament’s history clearly shows that by making use of secret meetings, the power concealed information from the public, turned the Diet into a rubber-stamping organ, and pushed the people into accepting and even supporting the war of aggression.
