Hermann Roesler and the Making of the Meiji State. Johannes Siemes

The person of the Emperor is sacred and inviolable.

      This article defines the sovereign rights of the Monarch with regard to His person. It rests upon the notion of the divine nature and origin of the supreme power which is testified by the Christian as well as by every other religious belief and is only denied by philosophical freethinkers. It is an express rule of the Christian faith that submission is due to the supreme power because it is instituted by God himself. The Emperor holds His power from Heaven through the medium of His glorious ancestors, but not from any human authorization or concession; consequently He cannot be held responsible to His subjects, but to Heaven alone.

      This article is found in most European constitutions. In the Belgian Constitution the person of the King is declared inviolable, but the declaration of his sacredness has been omitted, probably on account of that constitution declaring all powers of the state to emanate from the people, and the King being entitled only to the exercise of the special powers expressly conceded to him. Thus there is in the Belgian Constitution a mixture of monarchical and democratic principles which is quite inadmissible in Japan.

      In a more legal sense, the Emperor is declared sacred because He is the most exalted person in the Empire, invested with a power of divine nature the reflection of which on His august person must be acknowledged by the laws of the country. Any offense therefore committed against His person is an aggravated offense to be repressed by a higher punishment than similar offenses committed against subjects. Any attentate against His person is to be punished as high treason, and most other offenses against Him are to be punished as crimes. It consequently does not conform with true constitutional principles if in the existing penal code of Japan offenses against the Emperor are simply assimilated to offenses against a father, as the relations between a father and his children are only of a private nature and do not reach the exalted position of the Monarch over His subjects. It is to be observed that even in Belgium these legal consequences of the personal sacredness of the King, though not expressed in the constitution, are nevertheless recognized in the penal code.