A Brief Review of the Labour Movement in Japan/Part 3/Chapter 4

by Sanzō Nosaka

CHAPTER IV.

Legal Position of Trade Union.

There is no law directly prohibiting the formation of the Trade Unions nor recognizing them. Convinced of the impossibility of wiping out the workers' combinations, the government is now drafting a bill which is expected to be brought forward at the session of the Diet in 1922, in order to restrict the sphere of labour movement and to destroy the true proletarian Union.

Although Japanese workers have never experienced such a brutal suppression of their associations as the British workers did in 1800–1824, and the Russian in 1874, the Article 17 of Police Law (1900), which punishes the instigation for strikes and for the increase of Trade Union membership, is effective enough to hamper the Trade Union activities. The following figure shows, how many strike leaders are thrown into prison every year by the Law.

Year.	Imprisoned.		Strikes.
	Cases.	Men.	Cases.	Strikes
1914	4	14	50	7,900
1915	4	50	65	7,850
1916	16	40	108	8,500
1917	21	155	311	50,600
1918	34	375	417	66,500

If we count the victims arrested under the charge of „breach of peace“, etc. by Criminal Law and Press Law, they reach a considerable number.

 

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