n 1890,
accompanied by the recommendation from the Bureau of Legislation that
the draft might receive the parliamentary sanction in such a manner
that it might be possible for it to be put in effect by the year 1893.
As might have been expected from the personnel of the Commission,
consisting, in its conception, of Mr. Yeto Shimpei and the eminent
French jurist Prof. Boissonade, etc., the draft was a genuine French
code, being almost a literal translation of the Code Napoleon in all
its parts excepting the part dealing with the Law of Persons. The
question may well be asked why it took the Commission twenty long
years to produce this imitation draft code when we know that the draft
of the Code Napoleon itself was completed within the short period of
four months. The answer seems to be that the Commission spent almost
this entire time in their efforts to reconcile the principles of the
French Law of Persons with the Japanese laws and customs bearing on
that subject.

As has been the case with many other draft codes this draft Civil Code
of Japan was destined to go into oblivion. As soon as it was submitted
to the Parliament there ensued a most desperate fight against its
adoption. As figuring most prominently among the champions of the
opposition I may mention the names of Mr. Kazuo Hatoyama, the present
Speaker of the House of Commons of the Imperial Japanese Parliament,
and His Excellency Mr. Toru Hoshi, the present Japanese minister at
Washington.[3] Inspired by these and other eminent jurists of the
English school the entire bar was set against the adoption of the
draft code. This was not a case of a bar accustomed to one set of
rules and formulas opposing the adoption of a new code for fear that
they might be compelled to learn a new set of rules and formulas. On
the contrary, the bar was composed of men who had studied law as a
science, and science for the sake of science. The spirit of their
opposition was very plainly shown by the objections they raised
against the code. They said:--"The draft Code was a blind imitation of
a foreign Code which itself was far from being free from defects. It
abounded in definitions, illustrations, and examples, and presented an
appearance more becoming to a text-book of law than the Civil Code of
a great nation. It went into too minute details and left too little
room for voluntary development of jurisprudence. It incorporated, like
the French Code, the law of evidence into the b