ABSTRACT
In May of 1953 in Tokyo, workmen in the impressive Diet building-the Japanese version of the British Houses of Parliament-were busily readying the premises for the sixteenth special session, which opened June 16, 1953. (A general election had just been held, in April). The Occupation had subsided into memories then a year old. Guides explained, with a sort of revived pride, features of the huge lobby, with its line of statues of the founding fathers of Meiji Japan, the young samurai turned politicians, who had a hundred years before led Japan out of isolation. The more privileged tourist could actually enter the emperor’s waiting room, where he rests before formally opening a Diet, and gape at its magnificent Momoyama-style gold-leaf ceiling. A small, elegant, solid gold clock occupied a conspicuous place before a mirror above the mantelpiece. The whole atmosphere was one of dignity and quiet, particularly in the adjacent chambers of the House of Councillors (Sangiin), where attendants were putting up the little vertical name boards for the members of the upper house.1
