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The political scientist Tiana Norgren recounts the evolving status of abortion in Japan in her book Abortion before Birth Control: The Politics of Reproduction in Postwar Japan. Before World War II<\/em>, abortion was illegal in Japan. Prohibiting abortion was in Japan\u2019s first modern penal code of 1880. Japanese laws and public policies meant to discourage abortion date back even further \u2013 in 1667, the shogun, Japan\u2019s military ruler, restricted abortion advertising. Early in the 20th century, certain Japanese groups argued for legal abortion, but made little progress. Doctors were permitted in 1923 to perform abortions to save the mother\u2019s life, but this was about the extent of the change.<\/p>\nConcerns for an unborn child\u2019s life played a role in historical Japanese abortion opposition. At times, Japanese officials had condemned abortion, along with infanticide, as murder.<\/p>\n
Yet nationalism also played a role. A large population was seen as necessary to national strength and imperial conquest. Official government policy in the early 20th century encouraged population growth. During the war, from 1941 to 1945, the number of reported abortions fell, from 18,000 to 1,800.<\/p>\n
Nevertheless, national ambition predictably proved a less reliable protection for the unborn than concern for human life. Defeat in World War II brought a dramatic change in Japan\u2019s fortunes and the accompanying attitude toward abortion. The war shattered Japan\u2019s economy. Industrial and farm production were devastated, Japan could no longer import resources from its former Asian colonies. Millions were at risk of starvation. American bombing had not only killed roughly 400,000 Japanese but also destroyed a fifth of Japanese housing, leaving millions homeless.<\/p>\n
Abortion for Population Control<\/h3>\n
Japan\u2019s population increased during the immediate post-war years, both because of high birth rates (which peaked in 1947) and because of all the soldiers and civilians sent back home from former colonies. Japan\u2019s population grew from 72.2 million to 83.2 million in five years. Although American aid prevented starvation, post-war policymakers faced a longer-term problem: how to manage such a large population in a now-impoverished country.<\/p>\n
The notion of using abortion (and other methods) to control Japan\u2019s population was raised in November 1946 by a group advising the Japanese government on population policy. The next year, socialist members of the Japanese Diet [parliament] introduced a bill to allow abortion in various circumstances. Kato Shizue, one of the bill\u2019s sponsors, justified these means by economic necessity: \u201cI believe that the voices of today\u2019s women [are saying] \u2018We want to have our beloved children in a little while, once the problems of housing, fuel, and food have eased up.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
The 1947 bill didn\u2019t pass, but the decisive step came the following year. Another Diet member, Dr. Taniguchi Yasaburo, an obstetrician\/gynecologist, introduced the Eugenic Protection Bill. Its stated purpose was \u201cto prevent the birth of eugenically inferior offspring and to protect maternal health and life.\u201d The bill legalized abortion under certain conditions, including if the pregnancy resulted from rape or if the mother or her husband had a \u201cmental illness, mental deficiency, psychopathic disorder, hereditary physical ailment or a hereditary physical deformity.\u201d Taniguchi emphasized the eugenic theme in public statements, warning of increasing numbers of \u201cinsane and [congenitally] blind persons\u201d and \u201cimbecile child vagrants.\u201d He promised the proposed law would \u201cprevent the births of 800,000 undesirable elements.\u201d<\/p>\n
The bill passed in July 1948, becoming the Eugenic Protection Law, and opened the door to further expansions of Japanese abortion access. Concerns about Japan\u2019s economy grew. The prime minister declared in May 1949 that partly \u201cto surmount the stringent economic times,\u201d the Japanese must \u201cpractice the principles of birth control.\u201d That same month, Taniguchi, invoking the need \u201cto curb the rapidly increasing population,\u201d sponsored an amendment to the Eugenic Protection Law, which allowed abortion if \u201cthe continuation of pregnancy or childbirth is likely to seriously harm the mother\u2019s health for physical or economic reasons.\u201d The amendment passed, dramatically increasing abortions.<\/p>\n
The American Occupation<\/h3>\n
What was the role of American occupation authorities in abortion\u2019s legalization? Officially they were neutral. An internal occupation document stated \u201cany expression of opinion by [occupation authorities] with regard to general population policy would be interpreted as an unwise imposition of Western ethical, religious or social ideas upon an essentially different Oriental civilization.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nevertheless, Americans feared overpopulation as a threat to post-war reconstruction and desired a decreased Japanese birth rate. General Crawford Sams, head of the occupation\u2019s Public Health and Welfare section, may have urged Taniguchi to introduce the Eugenic Protection Law. In January 1949, Dr. Warren Thompson, a demographer advising the occupation, warned, in comments widely reported in the Japanese press, that Japan must curb its population growth to avoid Communism\u2019s rise or the U.S. cutting off aid.<\/p>\n
Americans might also have contributed to the push for abortion in a very different, more personal way. The presence of 600,000, later 200,000, Allied troops in a beaten, poverty-stricken Japan led to rampant liaisons with Japanese women.<\/p>\n
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Not all these relationships were consensual.<\/a> An estimated 40 rapes and assaults on Japanese women occurred per day in the second half of 1945 and rose to over 300 per day by early 1946. This increased the likelihood of distressed pregnancies.<\/p>\n Most important, American authorities did nothing to stop abortion\u2019s legalization in Japan. Although they criticized the advisory group\u2019s 1946 policy recommendations, authorities allowed the introduction of the 1947 and 1948 bills. By contrast, the Americans vetoed 1948 regulations to discourage contraception. Non-intervention proved less important than population control.<\/p>\n Americans might also have been reluctant to stop abortion legalization because they believed, as one internal document said, \u201cAs modern contraceptive knowledge is disseminated . . . it is believed that the provisions for abortion will become of little consequence, as they will fall into disuse.\u201d This prediction proved wildly inaccurate.<\/p>\n Reported abortions rose steadily, from 264,104 in 1949 to 489,111 in 1950, 805,524 in 1952, and 1,068,066 in 1953. Between 1955 and 1960, 1 million abortions were performed annually \u2014 662 to 716 abortions per 1,000 live births.<\/p>\n Official statistics were probably underestimates. Performing abortions was lucrative. Japanese ob-gyns underreported the counts to avoid income taxes. Researchers at a Japanese hospital estimated the actual number in 1953 was between 1.8 and 2.3 million.<\/p>\n To put these numbers in perspective, consider: even with low official statistics, a single year of abortions killed more than twice as many Japanese as the American wartime bombing campaign. Two or three years of abortions killed as many Japanese as died in the entire Second World War.<\/p>\n Nevertheless, legalizing abortion fulfilled Japanese and American policymakers\u2019 plans to curb population growth. The average number of children born plunged in the years after the Eugenic Protection Law, from 4.54 in 1947 to 2.04 in 1957. This was a greater drop than in the previous 25-odd years (from 5.24 to 4.54) or subsequent 30-odd years (from 2.04 to 1.38).<\/p>\n Abortion likely played the primary role in cutting births. Contraception was less readily available in this period and after (in contrast to the ob\/gyn lobby\u2019s support for abortion access, advocacy for contraception was far weaker and less organized). Abortion became part of Japanese culture. In the late 1950s, a Housewives\u2019 Federation official said young women would get abortions \u201clike they were going to get a perm\u201d and many women had repeat abortions.<\/p>\n Widespread abortion did create a need to cope with the act\u2019s psychological consequences. Centuries-old Buddhist practices of mourning aborted children, known as mizuko (\u201cwater child\u201d or \u201cunseen child\u201d), have been a significant part of post-war Japanese society.<\/p>\n Jizo statues<\/p><\/div>\n Samuel Coleman, in Family Planning in Japanese Society, notes that several shrines to Jizo, the guardian of aborted children\u2019s souls, have been constructed in Japan since World War II, three in Tokyo-area temples. A common practice is for mothers who have had abortions to place small Jizo statues at these shrines, in memory of their children. The Hase Temple in Kamakura began offering such statues to worshippers in 1974; three thousand statues marked the temple grounds by 1976.<\/p>\n One reporter described these mourning rituals<\/a> from the 1990s:<\/p>\n They dress up the mizuko figurines like little newborns, wrapping them with bibs, hand-knit sweaters, booties or hats against the cold. And they pour water over the childlike figurines to quench their thirst.<\/p>\n “I pray for its spirit to safely enter the other world, which it can’t do easily because it died from my own negligence, my mistakes,” said a middle-aged Japanese woman who has been coming for the last 10 years to comfort her mizuko jizo.<\/p>\n The father of an aborted child commented, \u201cThe fact that you have murdered someone will be with you all your life \u2014<\/span> it will not disappear.”<\/p>\n Viewed 70 years later, the Eugenic Protection Law (revised as the Maternal Protection Law in 1996) appears to have fulfilled post-war policymakers\u2019 intentions all too well.<\/a> Japan\u2019s birth rate is now so low\u2014fewer than one million Japanese children were born in 2016, in a country of 127 million\u2014that the country\u2019s future is clouded. Japan\u2019s population is projected to fall by one-third in 50 years, when almost 40% will be over 64 years old. The country is now grappling with labor shortages and elder care costs.<\/p>\n The growing elder population means more Japanese must fend off neglect and loneliness<\/a>. Cleaning out apartments of elderly people who died alone is now a professional specialty in Japan. Chieko Ito, a 91-year-old widow whose only daughter pre-deceased her, observed \u201cIf this child were here now . . . there would be nothing to worry about.\u201d Of how many other children, who were killed before birth, could that also be said?<\/p>\n Japan isn\u2019t unique in having low birth rates and an aging society\u2014many nations face similar conditions. Nor, of course, is Japan the only nation plagued by abortion. Japan is striking, however, for the extent to which low birth rates are the result of abortion becoming legally available.<\/p>\n In contrast to many other countries, legalized abortion in Japan was the direct result of war. We can see that the now 70-year-old Eugenic Protection Law, even more than the bombs dropped at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, has proved to be a weapon of mass destruction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by John Whitehead \u201cI hate Japs. I\u2019m telling you men that if I met a pregnant Japanese woman, I\u2019d kick her in the belly.\u201d — Remark attributed to Admiral William Halsey, commander of U.S. naval forces in the South Pacific during World War II \u201cTsubachan, I\u2019m sorry I couldn\u2019t give birth to you. I… <\/p>\nAbortion Numbers Grow<\/h3>\n
Coping<\/h3>\n
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Clouded Future<\/h3>\n