Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 4.djvu/77

 Japan, arrived at the conclusion that obedience to laws could not justly be expected from people ignorant of their provisions, and that many of the offences committed throughout the country were attributable to that mistaken theory of government. He therefore directed that every law thenceforth promulgated must be read in the presence of the people, and explained to them by either the Daikwan (provincial deputies) or the headmen of villages, and must further be inscribed on notice-boards set up in conspicuous places.

Yoshimune's era, or, speaking broadly, the first half of the eighteenth century, is remarkable on account of improvements then effected in criminal laws and judicial procedure. Feudal legislation at the close of the seventeenth century was very harsh. While, on the one hand, regulations were issued providing for the kind treatment and protection of animals, birds, and even fishes, laws were enacted perpetuating one of the most terrible injustices of ancient times, the implication of children in a parent's crime. If a man or woman, sentenced to be crucified or burned, had male children above fifteen years of age, they were similarly executed, and younger children were placed in charge of a relative until they reached that age, when they were banished. Even when a parent suffered the ordinary capital punishment of beheading or hanging, it was within the discretion of the judges to execute or exile the male children. Wives and daughters