Chapter IV relates to the ministers of state and envy councillors. There is, possibly, no question of constitutional law further from so lution than that dealing with the responsibility of ministers — and to what extent their respon sibility reaches, and to whom the ministers are really responsible.
In almost every country governed by a con stitution it is acknowledged by custom or usage that the ministers are responsible to the Parlia ment for the management of national affairs, and by this means the Parliament has already gained the whole power of sovereignty, or is endeavoring to gain it at •he expense of minis terial stability.
From this article we infer that the Japanese ministers are responsible only to the emperor not to the Parliament— for the management of national affairs; and ministerial responsibility arises simply from the advice they have given to their sovereign as councillors. But when we examine their position• toward the Parliament from a practical point of view, we find the ministers with a twofold responsibility,—one, direct, to the emperor, and The other, indirect, to the Parliament. Notwithstanding the fact that the ministers of state are appointed by the sovereign personally, and their official posi tion is entirely dependent upon the royal pleas ure, Parliament, by means of an address to the emperor, controls the conduct of ministers in regard to national policies. This indirect re sponsibility comes from the position of the ministers toward the Parliament in relation to questions of law and the national budget.
The Privy Council is the supreme delibera tive body attached to the sovereign, whom it advises whenever it is consulted upon important questions of national policy. Its function is, first, to decide disputes arising from the inter pretation of the Constitution, or the quasi constitutional laws, such as the Law of the Houses, the Election Law, the Law of Finance, and the like, or disputes in regard to the budget or other financial measures; and, second, to deliberate upon amendments to the Constitu tion, or amendments to the quasi-constitutional laws. Thus the Constitution creates the two media in the system of governthent through which the national affairs are managed: the one, the ministers of state, who guide the na tional policy and transact all the administrations of government ; and the other, the Privy Coun cil, which advises the sovereign whenever he consults with that body.
We now come to Chapter V. According to the system which prevailed in Japan during the time of feudalism, the Department of Justice was under the control of the state, and judges were dependent upon the Minister of Justice. But as the influence of the military class under the feudal system increased, all the political powers passed into their bands, and consequently judi cial power was under the guidance of the chief of police, and so continued till the time of the imperial restoration in 1868. Immediately after,
however, the judicial authority was centred in the emperor. Thus the Japanese fully recog nized the legal maxim that the sovereign is the fountain of justice, and that all judgments should be pronounced in his name; and this recognition is dearly stated in Article 57 of the Constitution, which says that "the judica ture shall be exercised by the courts of law, according to law in the name of the Emperor.° The judicial organization of Japan is much the same as that of the Western nations, for the court is divided into the following classes, namely: first, the District Court; second, the Provincial Court; third, the Court of Appeals; and fourth, the Court of Cassation. The judges are appointed by the emperor; but he can select only those who possess the proper qualifica tions according to the provisions• of law. In order that a trial may be conducted with justice and impartiality, the judges are appointed for life, independent of dismissal either by the em peror or by the Parliament, and they can 'be dis charged from their office only by a sentence passed by the criminal court, or upon the dis ciplinary trial, whose rules and proceedings are to be decided by law.
Chapter VI deals with finance. The Con stitution attaches great importance to financial affairs, for it has made many improvements on European systems which have been the result of the keen observation of the most practical financiers. For instance, the national budget is first presented to the House of Representatives in a form similar to that of most constitutional countries in Europe; but the House of Peers has the same right to examine it and vote upon it as the Lower House; and by these means, while giving the Upper House more power than a mere adoption or rejection of the budget in bane, it restricts the absolute power of the House of Representatives over the annual bud get. In this respect, the Japanese Constitution more resembles that of the United States than that of Great Britain. A careful investigation of the English parliamentary control over the national budget has shown that there was a time when that Constitution allowed the same right to the House of Lords as to the House of Commons; but in the course of years the latter gradually gained a full sway over the question of national finance. Yet since the peers pay as heavy taxes to the treasury as the commons, they should not be deprived of the right to vote on this question. This is one of those anomalies of the English Constitution which can be ex plained only by its peculiar history and tradi tion. Therefore it is unnecessary to fallow the example of Great Britain in a new country like Japan, as she has her peculiar history and a different condition of national finance.