tioned in every town and village; they force their presence even into private household parties. Their acts are backed by the Japanese gendarmerie, and woe to the native who dares to resent their intrusion! He will be charged with treason as opposing the government authorities! The Japanese enlist as sub-spies a large number of the worst scoundrels in the country. These incorrigibles are paid good salaries and in many cases given rewards for the merit of their work; not infrequently the well-to-do natives are blackmailed by these spies, and the government winks at the crime. It is not only an opportunity for petty and venal natures to vent personal enmities and spites, but also a chance to gather a handsome fortune for a scoundrel who is not fit for anything else.

Such abuse of the method might naturally be expected, but the worst feature of it all is that it is often used as a machine by the government in relentlessly crushing out the spirit of nationalism. If a Korean is suspected of keeping alive the spirit of his forefathers,-not rebellion, for that would be a hopeless thing at present,-the government instructs its spies to bring certain charges against him. Upon the witness of the spies, he will be imprisoned, his property will be confiscated, and he will be punished in such a way as to be disabled for life; or he may even be

executed on the charge of treason." Like the mediæval" Ironwoman" that crushed its victim without bloodshed, this spy system of the Japanese administration in Korea removes from the country the ablest and best educated Koreans without technically violating the regulations of the colonial policy of the Japanese Empire.

The sad feature of the Korean case is that, although the Korean suffers the same hard fate as did the Poles and the Armenians before the European War, his story is unknown to the outside world. The only time when he had a partial hearing before the world's court of public opinion was during the late wholesale arrest and trial of the Korean Christian leaders on the charge of conspiracy against the life of Governor-General Terauchi. This time the news leaked out because it involved several prominent foreign missionaries."

"For Japanese prison tortures in Korea, see the Continent, June 13, 27, 1912; Sengman Rhee, "The Christian Persecution in Korea" (Korean, published in Honolulu, T. H.).

"For full account, see the Report sent to the Continuation Committee by the missionaries in Korea. Also, consult Arthur Judson Brown, "The Korean Conspiracy Case" (1912); Sengman Rhee, "The Christian Persecution in Korea" (Korean); "A Korean View of Japan's Policy in Korea," Missionary Review of the World, 36:450-453, June, 1913.

I'

II

THE GOVERNMENT CENSORSHIP

1. PRESS CENSORSHIP

T is only half a century since Japan abol

ished feudalism, but the basis of it-loyalty

-still remains. This furnishes a fertile ground for the growth and fruition of the political philosophies of Machiavelli and Hegel-the suppression of the individual for the sake of the state. The individual Japanese is not a free citizen, but a tool of the state. He has no conscience of his own except national conscience; he has no liberty except his share in national liberty. The Japanese scholar or publicist is only a mouthpiece of his government. The individuals are for the state, but the state is not for the individuals, as it is in America and Western Europe.' This doctrine of individuals -existing for the sake of the state brings about that unity of purpose and simplicity in ends which are the direct correlatives of national

1

'See W. E. Griffis, "The Mikado-Institution and Person" (1915).

efficiency. Japan is an ambitious climber and an efficient worker.

With this state-supremacy doctrine in view, we can understand-incredible though it may seem to the Western mind-that in Japan the government outlines its policies, and then forms the public opinion to support them. Practically all the publications in the country are more or less under the control, direct or indirect, of the government. The native press receives orders from the government as to the kinds of news that it should print or suppress. Rigid censorship is in force all the time-not only when Japan is at war but when Japan is at peace. "They suppress not only governmental matters but anything that, in the light of their opinion of their standing outside, will tend to lower that estimate which they think the rest of the world has of them." The following is a typical order issued by the government with reference to something the government does not want printed. In this case it happens to be one concerning the navy, but its precision and thoroughness are typical of all orders concerning even the least important matters.

"By an official order of the Navy Department the following additions have been made to the clauses of the press censorship: Matters con

"New Republic, November 18, 1916, p. 66.
'Saturday Evening Post, May 22, 1915, p. 53.

cerning the naval movements of the ally in war, which have some reference to the naval strategies of the Empire; plans of war; organizations of fleets and ships, their duties, present condition and movements; employing of transports, their crews, their present condition and their movements; whereabouts of fleets and transport ships, and their departure and arrival; as to goods ordered for service; the naval preparations and defenses in naval stations and along the coast; present condition of the various companies engaged in manufacturing war materials for the navy by order of the naval arsenal and the Navy Department; the positions and names of the bases or gathering places; the same regulations as to aeroplanes. Beside the foregoing, anything that has not been made public by the government and has direct or indirect reference to naval secrets."

99 4

Such a thing as a constitutional guarantee of a free press is an unheard-of liberty in Japan. After the Japanese occupation of Korea, all the Korean dailies and magazines were suppressed under one pretext after another, and were gradually abolished. In their places the government established one subsidized daily published

Order issued in September, 1914, quoted by Samuel G. Blythe, Saturday Evening Post, May 22, 1915.

See Park, The Tragic History of Korea" (Chinese edition, Shanghai), Sec. 3, chap. 36.