Who drives political resolutions within Japan’s bar associations. This article examines claims that a minority of activist lawyers dominate decision-making and explores the structural background behind security and historical issue campaigns.

2019-01-31.
A lawyer belonging to the Osaka Bar Association confides that “a minority of left-leaning lawyers effectively control the Japan Federation of Bar Associations and local bar associations.”
Why has the Japan Federation of Bar Associations gone so far as to travel to the United Nations to promote the fabrication of the comfort women issue and to spread it throughout the international community.
A chapter I published on 2018-12-16 under this title is now ranked 15th in Ameba’s official hashtag ranking for the bar examination.
A chapter I published on 2017-04-05 under the title “A minority of left-leaning lawyers effectively control the Japan Federation of Bar Associations and local bar associations” is now among the top searches on Ameba.
The following is from today’s Sankei Shimbun front-page feature headlined “Unrealistic Anti-Security Resolution,” and “72 Years of Postwar Bar Associations.”
Emphasis in the body text and sections marked ～ are mine.
“Rather than something I cannot accept, it is something I cannot even understand.”
On May 30, 2014, at the 65th regular general meeting of the Japan Federation of Bar Associations held in Sendai City.
Hiroshi Yasunaga (77), who took the microphone to ask questions, could not hide his irritation at the executive board’s answers.
The agenda was “A resolution (draft) once again opposing the acceptance of the exercise of collective self-defense, and reaffirming the significance of constitutionalism.”
Yasunaga, taking into account China’s moves around the Senkaku Islands (Ishigaki City, Okinawa Prefecture) as it intensified military expansion, pressed the executive board for its view on how Japan should act in the event of a national emergency.
“If China attempts to occupy the Senkaku Islands, can the Self-Defense Forces resist.
Can we seek support from the United States.
Have you reached a clear conclusion before making this proposal,” he asked.
The vice president at the time replied, “The JFBA has never indicated any specific direction or way of thinking as an organization.
Given the nature of the JFBA as an organization, whether we should present such a view may itself be a matter of debate.”
While saying that “it is necessary to consider,” he added that “it is not appropriate to answer how we think at this moment.”
Yasunaga felt it was an abstract argument that refused to face “the crisis right before us.”
At the time, Yasunaga was merely a rank-and-file member, but in April 2012 he became president of the Saga Bar Association and concurrently served as a JFBA director until March of the following year.
When statements opposing collective self-defense were brought before the board, he criticized them from the standpoint of real international conditions, saying “do not avert your eyes,” but he became completely isolated.
“My opinions are always rejected by an overwhelming majority.
After the board meeting, some people whispered to me, ‘I actually agree with you,’ but…”
Yasunaga believes that since politics is fundamentally driven by law, it is in a sense natural that the views of a body of legal professionals take on political coloration.
He argues that the problem is that a conclusion is decided in one direction from the outset, and it never becomes a real debate.
“It is a path to self-destruction.”
Also present at the same 2014 JFBA general meeting was Tatsuo Suzuki (76), who spoke in favor of the resolution from a position diametrically opposed to Yasunaga.
“Let us, with the power of everyone, cut off Abe (Shinzo)’s war politics.
Is that not the attitude the people should take amid the current situation where war is about to occur,” he said.
According to Suzuki, after participating in the 1960 security treaty protests while at the University of Tokyo, he joined NHK and, in Nagasaki where he was posted, also took part in the struggle to block the U.S. Navy nuclear aircraft carrier Enterprise from entering Sasebo.
He also has the unusual background of having once been temporarily detained by the authorities, studying law out of respect for the lawyer who handled his own case, and passing the bar exam at age 48.
Suzuki, together with Toshiyoshi Takayama (76) and others who ran unsuccessfully in last year’s JFBA presidential election as the “anti-mainstream,” has formed the “Group Aiming for a JFBA of Constitution and Human Rights.”
While he evaluates the JFBA executive, composed of the “mainstream,” for opposing collective self-defense, he differs from the executive on a series of judicial reforms such as expanding the legal profession.
Though he and Yasunaga are like oil and water in outlook, he still questions the fact that the executive moved to a vote without answering properly.
“The JFBA must debate.
Not doing so is a path to self-destruction.”
As a result of the vote, the resolution was passed by a majority.
Collecting proxy forms.
Among the JFBA’s member lawyers (39,015 as of March) are people with a wide range of ideologies and beliefs from right to left.
Why, then, are strongly political resolutions, such as opposition to the acceptance of exercising collective self-defense, so easily passed.
A lawyer belonging to the Osaka Bar Association confides that “a minority of left-leaning lawyers effectively control the JFBA and local bar associations.”
Many lawyers are busy with daily work, either indifferent to the association’s management, or keeping a certain distance because they dislike anti-establishment activism.
Meanwhile, a minority that is enthusiastic about association affairs seizes the initiative, gathers proxy forms even for the general meeting—the highest decision-making body—attends in large numbers, and dominates the floor.
This very state is one in which countries with powerful intelligence agencies—such as China, South Korea, and North Korea—can easily conduct influence operations.
Or rather, it is a reality that even a grade-school-level mind can see: such operations must have been carried out continuously, and they would have achieved results perfectly.
Why has the JFBA gone so far as to travel to the United Nations to promote the fabrication of the comfort women issue and spread it throughout the international community.
Etsuro Totsuka, who held a key post in the JFBA at the time, spread to the international community the outrageous definition that they were not comfort women but “sex slaves,” and he boasted about it in magazines such as the World Times.
When I searched for him on Wikipedia, I was even more stunned.
I will introduce this in the next chapter.
There were no procedural defects in how the general meeting was conducted when the “Once again—” resolution was passed.
However, there were 691 attendees, while 8,782 attended by proxy.
With a number that did not reach even one-third of all members at the time, the “anti-security” flag was raised once again.
Can that be called the “general will” of the JFBA (honorifics omitted).