E.H. Norman, Canada and Japan's Postwar Constitution

Abstract

T he creation of constitutional research commissions in both the upper and lower houses ofJapan's national Diet in 2000 marked a controlled resuscitation of both the historical enquiry and debate regarding the past and future ofJapan's national charter. Controversy regardingJapan's postwar constitution is nothing new. During the 1950s, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) established a similar constitutional review process. One of the aims of that initiative was to eliminate Article IX, the peace clause that theoretically forbids Japan to wage war or to maintain armed forces. Faced, however, with massive and growing popular resistance from a burgeoning peace movement in the 1950s, the LDP allowed this first attempt at constitutional revision to fade into oblivion. Much has changed in the forty years between the two inquiries but one constant impetus to revise the Constitution has been the historical recognition that Japan's constitution was initially drafted by the staff of General Douglas MacArthur, the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers (SCAP). What is less well known is that E. Herbert Norman, a historian of Japan and Canadian diplomat, waged a protracted battle to take the constitutional drafting process away from both SCAP and Japan's ruling oligarchy in order to put it into the hands of the Japanese people themselves. Norman was thwarted in this idealistic endeavor by none other than General MacArthur. Despite SCAP's imperious style in constitution crafting, Norman in the end supportedJapan's new constitution partially because no alternatives were available but also because it enshrined some of the values which he thought reflected the historical aspirations of the Japanese people.