Foreign Relations of the United States, 1946, The Far East, Volume VIII

894.011/11–546

Memorandum by the Chief of the Division of Japanese Affairs (Borton)³⁵

[Washington,] November 5, 1946.

Subject: Time and Manner of Issuance of Far Eastern Commission Policy Statement on Review of Constitution.

In my report on pending problems on Japan of November 4,³⁶ I noted that the Chairman of the FEC had requested, at the FEC meeting of November 1, that Committee #3³⁷ prepare a statement for the Chairman to use as basis for a consultative message between the Chairman and SCAP on the question of issuance. Committee #3 met on November 5 at which time the following arose:

(1) After general discussion of SCAP’s reply to FEC³⁸ in which he strongly recommended against publication of the policy decision at least for a year, the Committee decided to transmit for SCAP’s information verbatim extracts of the minutes of FEC meetings of October 31 and November 1, with a view to informing him of the reasons why several members of the Commission favor issuance by SCAP of the FEC decision in the immediate future.

(2) The United Kingdom member proposed that a policy decision of the Commission be transmitted to SCAP as follows: “The Commission considers that it is now necessary to acquaint the Japanese with the terms of the policy decision of October 17th and request the United States Government to direct SCAP to communicate the terms of the Commission policy formally to the Japanese Government before the date of the meeting of the special session of the Diet on November 25.”

(3) There was considerable difference of opinion as to whether discretion should be left to SCAP and the Japanese Government to determine whether the Japanese people should be told that any such decision was that of the Far Eastern Commission. No decisive vote was taken on this point.

(4) Representatives of China, the Netherlands, the Philippines, and the United States concurred in the proposal that further consultation be undertaken with SCAP on the time and manner of issuance of the policy decision and that his views be obtained on the various alternative methods as to how the statement might be issued.

(5) This proposal was opposed by other members of the Committee who argued that such consultation had already taken place and had produced no favorable result, that SCAP’s message disregarded the decision of the Commission and implied that he was opposed to the policy decision, and that if any action was to be taken on November 25 there was not sufficient time for consultation.

(6) The Committee voted 7 to 4 in favor of a policy decision being issued to SCAP by the U.S. Government ordering him to inform the Japanese Government of the contents of the FEC decision on review of the Constitution.

(7) The divergent views of the Committee will be presented to the Commission when it next meets, probably on November 14.

It was obvious from the tone of the discussion that many members of the Commission, notably U.K., Australia, France, New Zealand and U.S.S.R. feel strongly that a further directive should be sent to General MacArthur covering the question of time and manner of issuance of the policy on review of the Constitution. The question arises as to whether:

(1) U.S. member of the FEC should be instructed by SWNCC to veto any attempt to issue a policy decision on the question of time and manner of issuance of the review paper;

(2) SWNCC should prepare a draft of a consultative message to SCAP on this subject which would be acceptable to the United States and which could be submitted to the Commission at its next meeting;

(3) Any other alternative action should be taken.

H[ugh] B[orton]

35. Addressed to the Director of the Office of Far Eastern Affairs (Vincent) and to Mr. Ernest A. Gross, Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary of State (Hilldring).
36. Not printed.
37. Constitutional and Legal Reform, Sir Girja Shankar Bajpai of India, chairman.
38. November 1; for text, see annex to General Hilldring’s memorandum of November 7, infra.