The both Diets enacted the controversial war bills unfairly with the majority, rejecting overwhelming objection of people. A step to come for people is to fight for the Upper House election scheduled in July 2016; firstly strike harshly the ruling parties of the Liberal Democratic Party and the Komeito as well as other parties which supported the war bills, and then win as many seats as possible for MPs who advocate the Constitution.


SOVEREIGN RIGHT LIES IN PEOPLE, WHO CONTINUE STRUGGLES


The voting right will be given to those older than 18 years old of age from the coming election of the House of Councilors. Many young people took part in the recent campaign to oppose the war bills, which illustrates a bright future of the country. It is certain that struggles against wars have impacted a lot on people’s consciousness.


Let’s Get back to Days before Cabinet Decision of July 2014


Former Presiding Judges of the Supreme Court ruled the controversial legislation as unconstitutional. Lawsuits will be filed against the war legislation and people will watch a response of the judiciary’s. It is right to support such campaigns. However, it is anticipated that a role of the Supreme Court may change as the Cabinet Legislation Bureau has been transformed to abandon its mission. It used to represent the Supreme Court which judges laws in light of the Constitution,


If the judicial organ oversees laws that clearly violate the Constitution, balance among the separation of powers will collapse, or that means a suicide of judiciary. In other words the guard of Constitution will violate the Constitution, denying its existence.


Lawsuits have been already filed against the unconstitutional war legislation. People have launched abrogation campaigns. We should keep fighting together with Professor-emeritus Kobayashi Setsu, Keio University, who told ‘the war legislation to execute the right of collective self-defense violates the Constitution’ from the ground of the right of individual self-defense.


As Professor Mizushima Asaho, Waseda University, tells, it is essential to go back to ‘the stage of the exclusively defensive right’. We had witnessed it until the Cabinet made a decision to approve the right of collective self-defense in July, 2014.


In Japan there are hundreds of thousands of foreign residents who are obliged to pay taxes but do not enjoy the sovereign right. If Japan commits in a war abroad, these people will be affected, too. The recent campaign in which the elderly, the youth, men and women, and boys and girls rose up to protest the government must be developed to integrate minority citizens, like foreign residents and physically impaired people.


Be Aware of Constitutionalism


What result did the people’s anti-war campaign produced? When the legislation passed the House of Representatives, Prof. Sugita Atsushi, Hosei University, told to Prof. Hasebe Yasuo, Waseda University, in their dialogue (the Asahi Shinbun Newspaper dated July 19):


‘People have deepened consciousness on significance of constitutionalism and value of democracy in the process of Diet’s debates on the bills.


The Constitution exists to bind the state’s power. To enact a law that violates the Constitution is equal to overturning a political system. People understand that better. Such consciousness spreads in the society. This fact is a big achievement that may change politics from the depth. If people firmly maintain the sovereign right as a sovereign, struggles will continue.’


A sovereign should be a sovereign ? that means people should think over for themselves what should be done to defend their life, livelihood and rights and act accordingly.


October 20, 2015