Kiroku Hayashi

2019/09/05

Image: Kiroku Hayashi (Keio University Fukuzawa Memorial Center for Modern Japanese Studies collection)

Eikichi Kamata served as President for 25 years, the longest in Keio University history after the death of Yukichi Fukuzawa. Shinzo Koizumi was the President who supported Keio during the pre-war and wartime years. Sandwiched between them, Kiroku Hayashi supported Keio as President for 10 years from the Taisho to the Showa era. He steadily built the foundations for the future, including the reconstruction from the Great Kanto Earthquake and the initiation of the campus expansion plan to the Hiyoshi Campus.

As a scholar, he was the author of works such as "Modern European Diplomatic History," which is hailed as a pioneer in the field of European diplomatic history. He was also such a gifted orator that Sei'ichiro Takahashi remarked, "There is probably no greater orator among the teachers at Keio University," and he was a "liberalist" who demonstrated his power in the political world as well.

Kiroku Hayashi was born in 1872 in Tano Village, Higashimatsuura District, Nagasaki Prefecture (now Karatsu City, Saga Prefecture) as the fourth son of Seishiro Nakamura. Around the age of 10, he went to Tokyo with his older brother, who ran a school for French studies. However, he caught the eye of Ryuzaburo (Chikudo) Hayashi, who ran a school for Chinese classics nearby. In the spring of his 11th year, he accompanied Chikudo to Takamatsu, Kagawa Prefecture, where he received seven years of instruction. Favored by Chikudo, he studied in a position similar to a head student, "learning and teaching" at the same time, unlike other students. Partly because Takamatsu was a place where the Freedom and People's Rights Movement was active, he became interested in political theory from the age of 16 or 17, occasionally attending meetings and sometimes "audaciously" appearing at public speaking events. It is said that his interest in politics was greatly nurtured during this boyhood.

In 1889, following the advice of his brother Yoshizaburo, who worshipped Yukichi Fukuzawa, and with the approval of Chikudo, he entered Keio University. He later recalled that the announcement of the plan to establish a college at that time was "unprecedented for a private school" and was a great stimulus. During this period, Kiroku was adopted by Chikudo and took the surname Hayashi.

In his "Record of My Upbringing," Hayashi mentions that a characteristic of Keio at the time was the Japanese composition assignments given twice a month. These topics were set by the top executives, and by addressing real-world issues, students developed the habit of reading the "Jiji Shinpo" daily as if it were a textbook, nurturing living common sense. Furthermore, the Mita Public Speaking Event held twice a month, where seniors and students mingled, "truly became an important educational institution of the Juku." He also recalled that Yukichi Fukuzawa's lectures there were "more important than anything else."

After graduating from the regular course in 1892, Hayashi went on to the Department of Literature in the college, which had been established in 1890. Since many Keio students at the time thought the traditional curriculum was sufficient, Hayashi was reportedly the only one among his 27 classmates to proceed to the college.

After graduating at the top of the Department of Literature in the college in 1895, Hayashi became a teacher at Keio. At that time, the college was underperforming and the relationship between the traditional curriculum and the college remained complicated. According to Hayashi, "Educational reform and the renewal of academic affairs were actively discussed among the young teachers, and I was one of them." He sometimes visited Yukichi Fukuzawa alone to "boldly present various opinions."

Ultimately, through educational reform, a 16-year integrated education system was established in 1898, consisting of 6 years of Yochisha, 5 years of the Ordinary School, and 5 years of the University (the following year, the Ordinary School was renamed the Keio Futsubu School and the University was renamed the college). In the flow of this reform, the generation of Tokujirō Obata, who had supported the early years, stepped back from the front lines. Personnel were refreshed with Eikichi Kamata as President and a new generation of college graduates at the center. Academic deans were appointed as heads of each department, with Kiroku Hayashi becoming the head of the Keio Futsubu School, and Torajiro Kanbe, Teiichi Kawai, and Kanju Kiga becoming the heads of the Department of Law, Literature, and Economics in the college, respectively.

Hayashi later reflected, "Having just reached the age of 27, I strove to take the lead and plan all progress as the person responsible for being the head. I must have appeared quite audacious," and "That Yukichi Fukuzawa gave the position of head to such a youngster... looking back in my old age, I feel deep gratitude that he was able to carry it out."

A famous episode from his time as head of the Keio Futsubu School is his reading of the "Address for the Turn of the Century" at the Century Transition Ceremony held on the night of December 31, 1900, at Mita Hilltop Square. According to Masafumi Tomita, this address was an extraordinary piece of writing that "recounted the political, military, social, and cultural changes of the 19th century and the figures who emerged like a revolving lantern, overflowing with youthful passion and loudly proclaiming the spirit of Keio as the chosen warriors of a new civilization," which enthralled the entire audience.

It was also during his time as head that the "Shūshin Yōryō: Fukuzawa's Moral Code," which summarized Fukuzawa's thought into "independence and self-respect," was announced. Because it differed from the reactionary and Confucianist "Imperial Rescript on Education," it received much criticism from the public. In response, Hayashi published "Reading Mr. Tetsujiro Inoue's Critique of the 'Shūshin Yōryō'" in the "Keio Gijuku Gakuho." Against Inoue's criticism that "independence and self-respect" might cause one to lose the virtue of following others, Hayashi argued that it is most important to "first recognize one's own independence and self-respect" and then act with "the judgment of free will," and that one must not "confuse servile blind faith with free choice."

In 1901, he left his position as head of the Keio Futsubu School and was sent to the "École Libre des Sciences Politiques" in Paris (today's Sciences Po) as a Keio University overseas student to study European diplomatic history. This was a system that had just begun with the aim of nurturing college faculty from Keio graduates, as the college had previously relied on visiting lecturers. His study in Europe was originally planned for three years, but it was extended by one year because Keio University added comparative constitutional law to his research subjects, and he returned to Japan in 1905. After returning, he became a professor in the Department of Politics in the college.

Hayashi became a member of the House of Representatives in 1912. Thereafter, he was elected four consecutive times until he assumed the post of President in 1920. He was also deeply involved in politics, participating in the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, serving as a counselor for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the Hara Cabinet in 1920, and attending the Washington Conference as part of the plenipotentiary delegation in 1921-22.

Among his political activities, his questioning speech to Prime Minister Gonbe'e Yamamoto is of great significance in Japanese political history as a turning point from clan-based politics to the era of party cabinets. Hayashi pursued the limits of the party cabinet by pointing out to Yamamoto that the appointment of Army and Navy Ministers being limited to active-duty officers was "an obstacle to the operation of constitutional government." As a result, the eligibility for military ministers was expanded, and the atmosphere of the political world shifted.

This was also Hayashi's maiden speech in the Diet. Later, Kikuo Nakamura, a professor in the Faculty of Law, evaluated it in a paper titled "The Taisho Political Crisis and Kiroku Hayashi," stating: "His intention was to establish a party cabinet system within the framework of the Meiji Constitution. [...] This was only possible for him, who had acquired liberal intelligence and culture at Keio University. What led Hayashi to make such a resolution was his liberal education and intelligence, but what made him boldly stand up and make this demand was the power of the masses who rose up to impeach the Katsura Cabinet."

Furthermore, this liberalist thought did not change during the World War II period. Yasunosuke Hoshino recalled in a memorial that at the "Hayashi-kai," a group of volunteers who admired Hayashi, he would always curse Hitler, saying, "I cannot die until I see Hitler's end," and "he did not compromise his principles as a liberalist."

In November 1923, Hayashi became President, replacing Eikichi Kamata, who had resigned the previous year to become Minister of Education. However, according to Sei'ichiro Takahashi, there seems to have been internal dissatisfaction regarding this, and it was a somewhat unpleasant succession drama, with Ikyunosuke Kadono and Ichitaro Fukuzawa intentionally serving in between to provide a cooling-off period before his appointment.

In his inaugural address, Hayashi set forth three points that had been Keio's educational policies since Yukichi Fukuzawa: "independence of learning," "practice of learning," and a "free and steady academic style." Furthermore, in terms of practical matters, he spoke specifically about wanting to resolve issues such as the reorganization of Mita Hilltop Square, the relocation of the School of Commerce and Industry, the improvement of research laboratories, the addition of new university faculties, the expansion of the School of Medicine, and the recovery from earthquake damage. In fact, he took the step of issuing Keio's first school bonds to restore the damage suffered within Keio from the Great Kanto Earthquake, and he made great efforts to open a new campus in Hiyoshi, despite the fixed idea that Keio meant Mita.

However, the councilors at the time were very vocal, which caused him much worry. He reportedly told Takahashi, "I felt truly pained, caught between the two elders (Kamata and Kadono)." He stepped down as President in 1933, and Takahashi notes that at this time, too, there was pressure from "old seniors" who "disliked how overly straightforward he was."

Finally, I would like to touch upon the personality of Kiroku. First, as a teacher, he was extremely enthusiastic, researching and preparing until late at night for every lecture. Takahashi notes that while his lectures were very fast-paced, they were delivered in a "masterful tone" and were "truly interesting." On the other hand, he was so meticulous regarding student research reports and exam answers, reading them in such detail that "the students were practically surrendering in fear" (Tsunetada Oikawa).

This meticulous nature apparently did not change even after he became President. For example, he not only wrote most of the documents issued by Keio himself, but even for those written by administrative staff, he would always add corrections, which made the staff in charge feel very small.

Furthermore, Kogoro Yoshida, who later served as the head of the Yochisha, wrote that after the President changed to Hayashi, "for every spring and autumn excursion, we had to submit the schedule to the President, and he would start meddling with small details, saying things like 'this is too far, make it somewhere closer'" ("History of the Yochisha"). While this is an extreme description, it suggests a personality that paid attention to small things.

Even after resigning as President, Hayashi continued to give lectures on diplomatic history while serving as the Chairman of Kojunsha and a Director of the Toa Dobun-kai, among other roles. After the war, he served as a Privy Councilor and the first President of Aichi University. During this time, he evacuated to Shikoku toward the end of the war, where he completed "Recent European Diplomatic History," which Shinzo Koizumi praised as the "vigorous health of a scholar." He passed away in 1950 at the age of 78, three years after its publication.

In 1907, Kiroku wrote in the "Keio Gijuku Gakuho" that "looking at the character of Yukichi Fukuzawa, the word 'liberal' is the most appropriate description," and that "the most appropriate word to describe the academic style of the Juku is 'liberal'." He further stated, "It is precisely the calling of our party to send the fresh and refreshing air of liberalism toward our country's society, where the awakening from narrow-minded and bigoted thoughts has not yet finished." What would Hayashi, who cherished that mission throughout his life, think of today's society?