Kono Hironaka

Kono Hironaka

Kōno Hironaka ( Japanese 河野 廣 中 ; born August 24, 1849 ( lunisolar 7.7. Kaei 2) in Miharu ( 三 春 町 , Miharu-machi ) in what is now Fukushima Prefecture ; died December 29, 1923 ) was a Japanese politician during the Meiji and Taishō periods .

life and work

Kōno Hironaka was born in Fukushima and fought against the Bakufu in the Boshin War . He played a leading role in the democracy movement in the 1870s and in 1881 he joined the Jiyūtō ( 自由 党 ), the first real political party in Japan. He was elected President of the Fukushima Prefectural Assembly in 1881, but came into conflict with Governor Mishima Michitsune the following year because of the Fukushima riots and was imprisoned in 1883.

After Kōno had been pardoned in 1889, he was elected from 1890 in the first election to the House of Representatives , the lower house of the newly created Reichstag , in what was then constituency 3 of his home prefecture and was a member of parliament for 14 consecutive legislative periods. He was one of the leading people in the Jiyūtō, but left them in 1897 and joined the rival Kensei Hontō ( 憲政 本 党 ). He then became a member of the Rikken Kokumintō ( 立憲 国民党 ), the Rikken Dōshikai ( 立憲 同志 会 ) and finally the Kenseikai ( 憲政 会 ).

In 1903 he succeeded the late Kataoka Kenkichi as President of the House of Representatives , but his opening speech, in which he called for the government to be removed from office, led to the House of Representatives being dissolved. - Konō was imprisoned again in connection with the Hibiya riots in 1905 , but was released the following year. He remained in the opposition, except for a period from 1915 to 1916 when he was Minister of Agriculture and Trade in the second Handelkuma cabinet . - His last years were filled with his commitment to the “movement for universal suffrage” ( 普通 選 挙 運動 , futsū seityo undō ), ie for the abolition of the census suffrage in force in Japan at that time .

Remarks

1. ↑ The Fukushima riots ( 福島 事件 , Fukushima jiken ) developed when the newly appointed governor Mishima Michitsune ( 三島 通 庸 ; 1835–1888, from Satsuma ) introduced a compulsory labor program. Kōno was arrested as one of the working people's supporters.

literature

• S. Noma (Ed.): Kōno Hironaka . In: Japan. An Illustrated Encyclopedia. Kodansha, 1993, ISBN 4-06-205938-X
• Hunter, Janet: Kono Hironaka . In: Concise Dictionary of Modern Japanese History. Kodansha International, 1984. ISBN 4-7700-1193-8 .

Web links

Commons : Kōno Hironaka  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

1. ↑ National Parliamentary Library : Kindai Nihonjin no shōzō ("Portraits of Modern Japanese"), Kōno Hironaka (Japanese, English )

Japanese name: As is common in Japan, the family name comes before the first name in this article . Thus, Kōno is the family name, Hironaka the first name.