ABSTRACT
EMANCIPATION OF FARMERS FROM SERFDOM TO FREE CITIZENSHIP.- Students reading the chapter on the taxation system during the Tokugawa Age will not fail to observe the fact that all the farmers in the country were then simply serfs. They were given only the right of cultivation without any right of possession, and therefore had no freedom to sell or purchase their rice-fields or farms; in fact, they could do nothing more than pledge their right to cultivate land. While such unproductive upper classes as the Shogun, feudal lords, samurais, Court nobles and Buddhist and Shinto priests were idling away their time and enjoying an easy life on the taxes paid by the farmers either in rice or money, the farmers had to toil day and night in order to produce the rice to sustain their own families and feed the unproductive classes. Besides giving up half their total crop to the feudal lords by way of tax, they had to pay many other extra charges in addition, and, although burdened with the duty of producing all the money needed for the administration of the entire country, they were given no rights whatever. The long suffering of our farmers under such miserable conditions and their unceasing labours are unparelleled in the history of cultivators of the soil in any country, and they got no relief until the restoration of Meiji. Under this unique and peaceful revolution the position of the farmers was suddenly changed and they were elevated to such undreamed-of heights that they became the predominant element in the make-up of the state. In the prefectural assemblies and the national diet the sons and grandsons of the farmers who were so miserably oppressed during the Tokugawa Age held the ruling power, and, moreover, occupied almost all the important positions in education, the army, and commerce. The farmers are now the real backbone of the state, and some attention must be given to the cause and progress of so great a change.
