*anese politicianIn this *anese name, the surname is Katō.

Baron Katō Hiroyuki (加藤 弘之, August 5, 1836 – February 9, 1916) was an academic and politician of the Meiji period *an.

Contents

• 1 Biography
• 2 Honours
• 3 Notes
• 4 References
• 5 External links

Biography

Katō was born on August 5, 1836 to a samurai family in Izushi domain, Tajima Province (present day Hyōgo Prefecture), and studied military science under Sa*a Shōzan and rangaku under Oki Nakamasu in Edo.

As an instructor at the Tokugawa bakufu's Bansho Shirabesho ins*ute for researching Western science and technology from 1860 to 1868, he was one of the first *anese to study German language and German philosophy.

After the Meiji Restoration, Katō wrote numerous theses recommending *anese adoption of Western forms of government, especially that of a cons*utional monarchy with a national *embly based on representative democracy. He joined the Rikken Seiyūkai political party, and was also a founding member of the Meirokusha intellectual society organized by Mori Arinori. A strong believer in social Darwinism, he drew parallels a democratic government and the natural order. As a member of the Genroin, he strongly supported Statism, a much more authoritarian version of government against the views propounded by the Freedom and People's Rights Movement.

Katō gave lectures to the emperor each week on cons*utional and international law, using translations from western texts to explain the concept of separation of powers between executive, legislative and judiciary branches of government, the history of cons*utions in Europe, and various forms of local administration.

Katō served as superintendent of the Departments of Law, Science, and Literature of Tokyo Imperial University 1877–1886, and again as president 1890–1893, and was head of the Imperial Academy 1905–1909. He was also a special adviser to the Imperial Household Agency.

Katō was appointed a member of the House of Peers in 1890, and was ennobled with the *le of danshaku (baron) under the kazoku peerage system in 1900. In addition, he became a Privy Councilor.

He died on February 9, 1916.

Honours

From the corresponding article in the *anese Wikipedia

• Baron - 1900
• Grand Cordon of the Order of the Sacred Treasure - December 1905.
• Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun - April 1906.
• Grand Cordon of the Order of the Paulownia Flowers - February 1916 (posthumous)

Notes

References

• Davis, Winston. (1996). The Moral and Political Naturalism of Baron Kato Hiroyuki. Ins*ute for East Asian Studies. ISBN:1-55729-052-0.
• Jansen, Marius B. (2000). The Making of Modern *an. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ISBN:9780674003347; OCLC 44090600
• Keene, Donald. (2002). Emperor of *an: Meiji and His World, 1852-1912. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN:978-0-231-12340-2; OCLC 46731178
• Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric and Käthe Roth. (2005). *an encyclopedia. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ISBN:978-0-674-01753-5; OCLC 58053128

External links

• National Diet Library Photo & Bio