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January 3, 1868 (9th day of the 12th month of Keiō 3)
Kyoto Imperial Palace, Kogo-sho (Small Hall)
Forces
Satsuma Domain and Radical Court Nobles
Former Shogunate and Yoshinobu Supporters
About 18 min read
On the 14th day of the 10th month of Keiō 3, Tokugawa Yoshinobu returned political power to the imperial court through the return of power (taisei hōkan). He petitioned to resign as shogun on the 24th day of the 10th month. However, at this point the concrete organization and policy of the new government had not been decided, and a political vacuum emerged. Yoshinobu sought to preserve his real power by participating in a deliberative assembly of domain lords (kōgi seitai ron). If things continued this way, the Tokugawa house might remain at the center of power.
Saigō Takamori and Ōkubo Toshimichi of Satsuma and Iwakura Tomomi, a radical court noble, saw this as dangerous and quickly devised countermeasures. They had already secretly obtained an imperial edict for the overthrow of the shogunate (tōbaku no mikkyo), which secured the legitimacy of the use of armed force. But once the return of power removed the pretext of overthrowing the shogunate, Satsuma and Chōshū decided to stage a coup under a different pretext: the "Restoration of Imperial Rule" (ōsei fukko).
Before dawn on the 9th day of the 12th month of Keiō 3, Iwakura Tomomi, Saigō Takamori, Ōkubo Toshimichi, and others coordinated to have troops from five domains—Satsuma, Tosa, Aki (Hiroshima), Owari, and Echizen (Fukui)—seal the nine gates of the Kyoto Imperial Palace. They blocked pro-shogunate court nobles from entering the palace and created the appearance of an imperial court deliberation held with the emperor present. This method was in effect a coup, but it was justified under the pretext that it was done "by the emperor's own will."
The proclamation that was issued declared the following. First, the abolition of the offices of regent (sesshō) and chief adviser (kampaku), which put an end to a regency system that had lasted more than a thousand years since the mid-Heian period. Second, the abolition of the shogunate, which brought the 265-year Edo shogunate to a definitive end. Third, the establishment of a new government made up of the Three Posts of Sōsai, Gijō, and Sanyo, which gave birth to a provisional government in which domain lords, court nobles, and political activists were mixed together. Furthermore, through the phrase "based on the beginning of the founding by Emperor Jinmu," a return to direct imperial rule was loudly declared as an ideal.
That same night, a Three Posts conference (the Kogosho Conference) was held at the Kogosho in the Kyoto Imperial Palace. Representatives of Satsuma, Tosa, Aki (Hiroshima), Echizen (Fukui), and Owari gathered, and the treatment of Tokugawa Yoshinobu was placed on the agenda. Specifically, the question was whether he should resign his office as Inner Minister (naidaijin) and return his domains (nōchi).
Yamauchi Yōdō of Tosa, aided by the momentum of heavy drinking, strongly insisted that "Lord Yoshinobu should be allowed to participate in the conference." In response, Iwakura Tomomi calmly countered that "Yoshinobu's sincerity is what is being tested," and the hard-line stance of Iwakura and Satsuma prevailed. In the end, Yoshinobu's resignation from office and surrender of domains were decided. This decision was a decisive containment of Yoshinobu's rise to power and was the de facto end of the Edo shogunate.
The 12th month of Keiō 3, when the Imperial Restoration Proclamation was issued, was the final phase of the turmoil of the bakumatsu period. The swords worn by the domain troops of Satsuma and others who guarded the nine gates of the palace were nothing other than "symbols of real power" that backed by force the pretext of a coup "by the emperor's own will." For the radical faction of court nobles led by Iwakura Tomomi, the military strength and blades of Satsuma and Chōshū were an indispensable backing for making their political will a reality.
What deserves special mention in the sword culture of the bakumatsu period is the existence of the elite blades used by activists of the sonnō jōi movement (reverence for the emperor and expulsion of foreigners). The new swords of the late bakumatsu period forged by smiths such as Katayama Munetsugu and Minamoto no Kiyomaro were widely cherished by Restoration activists and functioned as blades that literally "cut open" the turning point of the age.
Meanwhile, the Aizu domain, led by Matsudaira Katamori, maintained its loyalty to the shogunate throughout the bakumatsu period. The fate of the Aizu domain, which was labeled "enemy of the imperial court" (chōteki) after the Battle of Toba-Fushimi, and the story of the famous Aizu-transmitted swords that embodied the domain's warrior spirit, symbolize the tragic side of the sword culture of the bakumatsu period. In the subsequent Boshin War and the Aizu War, many Aizu domain retainers lost their lives, and the swords they carried were passed down to later generations as the pride of the defeated.
On the 3rd day of the 1st month of Keiō 4, about 25 days after the Imperial Restoration Proclamation, the Battle of Toba-Fushimi broke out. When the new government forces raised the "Imperial Banner" (nishiki no mihata), the sign of the imperial army, and faced the forces of the former shogunate, many domains, fearing that they would become "enemies of the court," defected to the imperial army, and the situation was suddenly reversed. The effect of the "Imperial Banner" clearly demonstrated the political power of the legitimacy centered on the emperor that the Imperial Restoration Proclamation had been designed to create. Tokugawa Yoshinobu withdrew from Osaka Castle by sea to Edo, and sought to avoid full-scale war by showing a submissive attitude.
The Boshin War spread, drawing in the Tōhoku and Hokuriku regions, and continued through the formation of the Ōuetsu Reppan Dōmei (Alliance of the Ōu and Echigo Domains), the tragedy of the Byakkotai at the Aizu War (1868), and the Battle of Hakodate Goryōkaku (1869). The Aizu War in particular became the most tragic battle, and history records that the Japanese swords carried by Aizu domain retainers proved powerless against modern rifles. The scene in which the young members of the Byakkotai took their own lives at the end was an instance in which the sword of the warrior was used as a blade that literally announced the end of an era. The Imperial Restoration Proclamation was not a "peaceful transition" but was also the prologue to a prolonged civil war. Yet in the course of history that led to the bloodless surrender of Edo Castle on the 11th day of the 4th month of Keiō 4, the Imperial Restoration Proclamation holds an unshakable place in Japanese history as the starting point of modern Japan.
While proclaiming the ideal of "direct imperial rule," the Imperial Restoration Proclamation was in reality a political coup led by Satsuma and Chōshū. This duality was deeply inscribed in the power structure of the Meiji state. The structure in which Satsuma and Chōshū politicians held real power while the emperor was placed at the center of the nation, the so-called "clan politics" (hanbatsu seiji), became the basic form of the subsequent Meiji government and continued through the return of domain registers and fiefs to the throne (1869), the abolition of the domains and establishment of prefectures (1871), and the enactment of the Meiji Constitution (1889). The ideal of "a return to direct imperial rule" that the proclamation declared continued to influence the foundations of Japan's view of the state, even into the politics of the early Shōwa period. With its enormous historical weight, both its achievements and its failures, the Imperial Restoration Proclamation is the absolute starting point of modern Japanese history.
On the night of the 9th day of the 12th month of Keiō 3, when the Kogosho Conference was held, Yamauchi Yōdō and others strongly insisted on Yoshinobu's attendance, the debate became chaotic, and a recess was called. At this time, Saigō Takamori encouraged Iwakura Tomomi by saying, "All that is needed is one dagger (aikuchi, a short blade, or tantō)." When these words were relayed, no one opposed the discussion when it resumed, and the resignation from office and surrender of domains were decided. This anecdote, which cited a single short blade, symbolizes that this political change was not merely a political declaration on paper but a seizure of power backed by real force. The episode in which Yamauchi Yōdō protested in the momentum of drunken fury also remains in history as a scene in which human drama seeps into the tension. At this historic turning point of the Restoration, the custom of the warrior class of wearing swords continued to serve as a cultural symbol coloring the last night on which the old order and the new order intersected.
Iwakura Tomomi, who led the Restoration, came from the court nobility and was not originally a warrior. However, the realization of the coup depended on the military strength of Satsuma and Chōshū, that is, the power of warriors armed with swords and guns. This "union of the court's ideals and the warrior's real power" was the essence of the Restoration. The structure in which the ancient ideal of direct imperial rule was supported by modern military force embodies the duality of the power of the Meiji state. Afterward, Iwakura led the Iwakura Mission (1871–1873) on an inspection tour of Europe and America and was also involved in the enactment of the Sword Abolition Edict (haitōrei) (1876). It is a historical irony that among the central figures of the government that abolished the custom of warriors wearing swords were descendants of the Satsuma troops who had sealed the imperial palace with swords on the night of the Restoration.