ABSTRACT
A strong opposition to the government was thus born, presided over by figures who had prior to that point been central figures in the new government. The government issued the Assembly Ordinance in April 1880 in response to the rise of the people's rights movement. Modern international relations take the sovereign state as their fundamental structural unit. The Ryukyu Ocho had effectively been under the control of Satsuma since the seventeenth century, but because its tributary relationship with China had been beneficial for Satsuma, it had publicly treated it as a tributary state independent from Japan. Okubo Toshimichi truly was the cornerstone of the Meiji government from the time of the seikanron debate on, personally taking on and resolving every difficult problem the government faced. It was Okubo who became the central figure of the new government and went to work against this eruption of antigovernmental forces.
