Misplaced Pages

You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Japanese. (November 2021) Click for important translation instructions. View a machine-translated version of the Japanese article. Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Misplaced Pages. Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article. You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing Japanese Misplaced Pages article at ]; see its history for attribution. You may also add the template {{Translated|ja|黒田清隆}} to the talk page. For more guidance, see Misplaced Pages:Translation.

Junior First Rank CountKuroda Kiyotaka
黒田 清隆
President of the Privy Council
In office 17 March 1894 – 23 August 1900
Monarch	Meiji
Preceded by	Yamagata Aritomo
Succeeded by	Saionji Kinmochi
Prime Minister of Japan
In office 31 August 1896 – 18 September 1896 Acting
Monarch	Meiji
Preceded by	Itō Hirobumi
Succeeded by	Matsukata Masayoshi
In office 30 April 1888 – 25 October 1889
Monarch	Meiji
Preceded by	Itō Hirobumi
Succeeded by	Sanjō Sanetomi (Acting)
Personal details
Born	(1840-11-09)9 November 1840 Kagoshima, Satsuma Domain (now Kagoshima, Japan)
Died	23 August 1900(1900-08-23) (aged 59) Tokyo, Japan
Cause of death	Intracerebral hemorrhage
Political party	Independent
Signature
Japanese name
Kyūjitai	黑田 淸隆
Shinjitai	黒田 清隆
Transcriptions Romanization Kuroda Kiyotaka

Count Kuroda Kiyotaka (黒田 清隆, 9 November 1840 – 23 August 1900) was a Japanese politician and general who served as prime minister of Japan from 1888 to 1889. He was one of the genrō, or senior statesman of the Meiji era. Born in the Satsuma Domain to a samurai family, Kuroda was involved in the colonization of Hokkaido, the Japan–Korea Treaty of 1876, and the suppression of the Satsuma Rebellion in 1877. After his tenure as prime minister, which ended due to his inability to revise the unequal treaties imposed on Japan, Kuroda also served as Minister of Communications and President of the Privy Council.

Biography

As a Satsuma samurai

Kuroda was born to a samurai-class family serving the Shimazu daimyō of Kagoshima, Satsuma Domain, in Kyūshū.

In 1862, Kuroda was involved in the Namamugi incident, in which Satsuma retainers killed a British national who refused to bow down to the daimyo's procession. This led to the Anglo-Satsuma War in 1863, in which Kuroda played an active role. Immediately after the war, he went to Edo where he studied gunnery.

Returning to Satsuma, Kuroda became an active member of the Satsuma-Chōshū joint effort to overthrow the Tokugawa shogunate. Later, as a military leader in the Boshin War, he became famous for sparing the life of Enomoto Takeaki, who had stood against Kuroda's army at the Battle of Hakodate.

Political and diplomatic career

Under the new Meiji government, Kuroda in 1870 became a pioneer-diplomat to Sakhalin, then known in Japanese as Karafuto and claimed by both Japan and the Russian Empire. Terrified of Russia's push eastward, Kuroda returned to Tokyo and advocated quick development and settlement of Japan's northern frontier.

In 1871, he traveled to Europe and the United States for five months, and upon returning to Japan in 1872, he was put in charge of colonization efforts in Hokkaidō.

In 1874, Kuroda was named director of the Hokkaidō Colonization Office, and organized a colonist-militia scheme to settle the island with unemployed ex-samurai and retired soldiers who would serve as both farmers and as a local militia. He was also promoted to lieutenant general in the Imperial Japanese Army. Kuroda invited agricultural experts from overseas countries with a similar climate to visit Hokkaidō, and to provide advice on what crops and production methods might be successful.

Kuroda was dispatched as an envoy to Korea in 1875, and negotiated the Japan–Korea Treaty of 1876. In 1877, he was sent as part of the force to suppress the Satsuma Rebellion. In 1878, he became de facto leader of Satsuma Domain following the assassination of Ōkubo Toshimichi.

Shortly before he left office in Hokkaidō, Kuroda became the central figure in the Hokkaidō Colonization Office Scandal of 1881. As part of the government's privatization program, Kuroda attempted to sell the assets of the Hokkaidō Colonization Office to a trading consortium created by some of his former Satsuma colleagues for a nominal price. When the terms of the sale were leaked to the press, the resultant public outrage caused the sale to fall through. Also in 1881, Kuroda's wife died of a lung disease, but on rumors that Kuroda had killed her in a drunken rage, the body was exhumed and examined. Kuroda was cleared of charges, but rumors of his problems with alcohol abuse persisted.

In 1887, Kuroda was appointed to the cabinet post of Minister of Agriculture and Commerce.

Prime minister

Kuroda Kiyotaka became the 2nd Prime Minister of Japan, after Itō Hirobumi in 1888. During his term, he oversaw the promulgation of the Meiji Constitution. However, the vexing issue of Japan's inability to secure revision of the unequal treaties created considerable controversy. After drafts of proposed revisions drawn up by his foreign minister Ōkuma Shigenobu became public in 1889, the plan to appoint foreigners as judicial officers to abolish consular jurisdiction met with great opposition, and on 18 October a bombing occurred. In response to this, nearly all cabinet members abandoned amending the treaty, and Kuroda had no choice but to agree. On 25 October, Kuroda was forced to resign. He was succeeded by Sanjō Sanetomi as acting prime minister. Then, on 24 December 1889, Yamagata Aritomo, an army Field Marshal (Gensui) became the next prime minister of Japan.

Later life

Kuroda served as Minister of Communications in 1892 under the 2nd Ito Cabinet. In 1895 he became a genrō, and chairman of the Privy Council.

Kuroda died of a brain hemorrhage in 1900 and Enomoto Takeaki presided over his funeral ceremonies. His grave is at the Aoyama Cemetery in Tokyo.

Honours

From the corresponding Japanese Misplaced Pages article

• Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun (2 November 1877)
• Count (7 July 1884)
• Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun with Paulownia Flowers (20 August 1895)
• Grand Cordon of the Order of the Chrysanthemum (25 August 1900; posthumous)

See also

• List of Ambassadors from Japan to South Korea

References

1. "黒田清隆｜近代日本人の肖像". 近代日本人の肖像 National Diet Library (in Japanese). Retrieved 2 March 2022.

Further reading

• Auslin, Michael R. (2006). Negotiating with Imperialism: The Unequal Treaties and the Culture of Japanese Diplomacy. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-01521-0; OCLC 56493769
• Jansen, Marius B. (2000). The Making of Modern Japan. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ISBN 9780674003347; OCLC 44090600
• Keene, Donald. (2002). Emperor of Japan: Meiji and His World, 1852–1912. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 978-0-231-12340-2; OCLC 46731178
• Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric and Käthe Roth. (2005). Japan encyclopedia. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-01753-5; OCLC 58053128
• Sims, Richard L. (2001). Japanese Political History Since the Meiji Renovation 1868–2000. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 9780312239145; ISBN 9780312239152; OCLC 45172740

External links

Media related to Kiyotaka Kuroda at Wikimedia Commons

v t e Prime ministers of Japan (list)
Empire of Japan (1868–1947)	Meiji era (1868–1912) H. Itō Kuroda Sanjō (caretaker) Yamagata Matsukata H. Itō Kuroda (acting) Matsukata H. Itō Ōkuma Yamagata H. Itō Saionji (acting) Katsura Saionji Taishō era (1912–1926) Katsura Saionji Katsura Yamamoto Ōkuma Terauchi Hara Uchida (acting) Takahashi To. Katō Uchida (acting) Yamamoto Kiyoura Ta. Katō Wakatsuki Shōwa era (1926–1947) G. Tanaka Hamaguchi Shidehara (acting) Hamaguchi Wakatsuki Inukai Takahashi (acting) Saitō Okada Gotō (acting) Okada Hirota Hayashi Konoe Hiranuma N. Abe Yonai Konoe Tōjō Koiso K. Suzuki Higashikuni Shidehara Yoshida
State of Japan (1947–present)	Shōwa era (1947–1989) Katayama Ashida Yoshida I. Hatoyama Ishibashi Kishi Ikeda Satō K. Tanaka Miki T. Fukuda Ōhira M. Itō (acting) Z. Suzuki Nakasone Takeshita Heisei era (1989–2019) Uno Kaifu Miyazawa Hosokawa Hata Murayama Hashimoto Obuchi Aoki Mori Koizumi S. Abe Y. Fukuda Asō Y. Hatoyama Kan Noda S. Abe Reiwa era (2019–present) Suga Kishida Ishiba
Category

• 1840 births
• 1900 deaths
• 19th-century prime ministers of Japan
• Government ministers of Japan
• Japanese generals
• Kazoku
• Boshin War
• Meiji Restoration
• People from Kagoshima
• People from Satsuma Domain
• People of Meiji-period Japan
• People of the Boshin War
• Samurai
• Shimazu retainers
• Burials at Aoyama Cemetery