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120 It was on October 12, 1881, that the Emperor issued his memorable proclamation that a National Assembly should be opened in 1890. That proclamation read as follows:—

"We therefore hereby declare that we shall, in the 23rd year of Meiji, establish a Parliament, in order to carry into full effect the determination we have announced, and we charge our faithful subjects bearing our commissions to make, in the mean time, all necessary preparations to that end. With regard to the limitations upon the Imperial prerogative, and the constitution of the Parliament, we shall decide hereafter, and shall make proclamation in due time."

From that time on there was progress, "steadily, if slowly, in the direction of greater decentralization and broader popular prerogative."

The year 1889 was a red-letter year in the calendar of Japan's political progress. On February 11 was promulgated that famous document which took Japan forever out of the ranks of Oriental despotisms and placed her among constitutional monarchies; and on April 1 the law of local self-government for city, town, and village went into effect.

The Japanese Constitution has very appropriately been called "the Magna Charta of Japanese liberty." It was not, however, like the famous English document, extorted by force from an unwilling monarch and a cruel tyrant, but was voluntarily granted by a kind and loved ruler at the expense of his inherited