Major redefinition of agricultural policy in the United States appears imminent. Appropriate committees in both houses of Congress held exhaustive hearings during 1947 on both the content of agricultural policy (revision of parity, manner of price supports, regulation of marketing, and production control) and the manner of organization of agricultural administration. In its last hours, the Eightieth Congress revised parity and price supports, postponing the effective date to January 1, 1950. But, significantly, Congress could not agree on a reorganization of agricultural administration. There was no lack of proposals. Major farm organizations and the Department of Agriculture presented recommendations, and sweeping measures were introduced by Senator Aiken (and others) and Congressman Hope. But the Hope and Aiken bills were diametrically opposed in a manner reflecting basic divergencies among powerful interests. In part, of course, the failure of the Eightieth Congress to reorganize the administrative framework appears to mark the strategic success of Congressman Hope's efforts to insure the next secretary of agriculture some freedom in the matter. But the failure certainly underlines the controversial nature of the subject; indeed, the manner of administration in agriculture is hardly less controversial than the content of agricultural policy.

Since there exists philosophy, there exists the attempt to bring it in relation with politics; and this attempt has succeeded in so far as it is today recognized to the degree of a truism that political theory and that part of philosophy we call ethics are closely connected with each other. But it seems strange to assume—and this essay tries to verify this assumption—that there exists an external parallelism, and perhaps also an inner relationship, between politics and other parts of philosophy such as epistemology, that is, theory of knowledge, and theory of values. It is just within these two theories that the antagonism between philosophical absolutism and relativism has its seat; and this antagonism seems to be in many respects analogous to the fundamental opposition between autocracy and democracy as the representatives of political absolutism on the one hand and political relativism on the other.

I

Philosophical absolutism is the metaphysical view that there is an absolute reality, i.e., a reality that exists independently of human knowledge. Hence its existence is objective and unlimited in, or beyond, space and time, to which human knowledge is restricted. Philosophical relativism, on the other hand, advocates the empirical doctrine that reality exists only within human knowledge, and that, as the object of knowledge, reality is relative to the knowing subject. The absolute, the thing in itself, is beyond human experience; it is inaccessible to human knowledge and therefore unknowable.

To the assumption of absolute existence corresponds the possibility of absolute truth and absolute values, denied by philosophical relativism, which recognizes only relative truth and relative values.

When we consider the problem of governments collaborating through international organizations, we tend to think only in terms of foreign policy and of issues involving conflict among countries. This is, of course, natural since these are the questions uppermost in the news. But there is another side to international collaboration. If international organizations are to be successful in dealing with world problems, the policy organs through which negotiations are conducted and the secretariats which handle the administrative work must be properly organized and administered. Successful international administration depends upon efficient organization and management, much like any governmental or private endeavor depends upon them.

From the standpoint of the national legislature, the constitution of Japan which became effective on May 3, 1947, contains the following significant reforms: (1) popular sovereignty replaces the sovereignty of the emperor; (2) the Diet is the chief branch of government; (3) an elected House of Councillors supersedes the House of Peers; (4) the cabinet is responsible to the Diet; (5) the “invisible government” of crown agencies is abolished.

The preamble to the new constitution begins: “We, the Japanese people, acting through our duly elected representatives in the National Diet…, do proclaim that sovereign power resides with the people.” As for the once sacred and inviolable emperor, he does “not have powers related to government,” but functions merely as “the symbol of the state and of the unity of the people, deriving his position from the will of the people with whom resides sovereign power,” performing, “with the advice and approval of the cabinet,” only such acts as promulgating laws, convoking the Diet and dissolving the House of Representatives, proclaiming general elections, attesting the appointment of officials, and awarding honors.

In normal times and as to normal countries, the study of the continuity of political party life would be of interest mainly to the political scientist. But these are not normal times, and Japan today is not a normal country. In 1948, the subject holds far more than academic interest, and it is intimately affected by the supervision of Japanese administration by the Allied Powers.

Allied policy affecting the continuity of political influence is shown in the famed “purge directive” of January 4, 1946, known as SCAPIN 550, “The Removal and Exclusion of Undesirable Personnel from Public Office.” This article, however, is not concerned with that directive but with the character of the pre-war political influence that remains after the purge has cut out affected elements. It is concerned with the element of pre-war political leadership present in the founding of the two major postwar conservative parties, the effect of the purge directive upon their leadership, their organizational and institutional character, the political influence of governmental bureaucracies, and the problem of party finance. Finally, attention is given to the possibility of a merger of the prewar elements into one post-war organization.

The two conservative parties contending for political supremacy today are the Democratic-Liberal party (Minshu Jiyu-to), and the Democratic party (Minshuto), respectively the direct lineal descendants of the Liberal party (Jiyuto) and the Progressive party (Shimpoto), both of which were organized in November, 1945.

The development of Japan's Socialist party since V.J. Day may logically be considered in three periods. The first period, that of reorganization, began in August, 1945, and continued until the first post-war election in April, 1946. The second period comprised the months between April, 1946, and June, 1947, during which Socialists were gathering strength in the chief opposition party. The third period, from May, 1947, to February, 1948, saw the revolutionary passage of Japan's government into the hands of a Socialist-led cabinet.

Left-Wing Realignment: August, 1945–April, 1946. Against a background of military defeat, dissolution of war-time political agencies, and resulting efforts at political realignment should be set the movement which led to formation of the present Shakaito (Social Democratic party). By late August of 1945, the political ferment was active; by early September, Tokyo papers were reporting that remnants of the old proletarian and agrarian organizations—Ronoto (Laborers' and Farmers' party), Nominto (Farmers' party), and Shakai Taishuto (Social Mass party)—were already drawing the lines of the new party formation.