Site Ed note: We do not yet have the voices of the young women involved in the Ōmi Kenshi Mills dispute in 1954. But we do have the next best thing, the testimony of a prominent union leader, Takita Minoru (1912-2001). Trained as an electrical engineer in a technical college, he began his working life in Japan's prewar textile industry and during the Occupation, 1948, rose to head of the Japanese Federation of Textile Workers' Unions. Takita presented the following remarks in the form of a lecture in 1983 to a senior graduate seminar at Chiba University (located near Tokyo). That same year, he was decorated by the emperor for his achievements.

From the time immediately after the war until the present day I have been actively involved in the Japanese and the international labor movements, especially that of Asia, sometimes at risk to my life. I was chairman not only of Dōmei [acronym for the Japanese Confederation of Labor], but also of the Asian Regional Organization of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions; moreover, I was vice chairman of the ICFTU. While in my lecture I concentrate on the events connected with the labor conflict of the Ōmi Kenshi Mills, I also refer to my own experiences as a worker in the textile industry and to my activities in the domestic as well as the international labor movement.

In 1931 I was first employed by a spinning mill. It was a big company called Nisshin Boseki. The female workers received 40 sen per day, and I got 95 sen because I had attended school.

The conditions in the living accommodation of the Ōmi Kenshi Mills were actually exactly the same as those which I had seen in my own company when I was a foreman. At five o'clock in the morning the machines in the factory were switched on, but in the morning after a holiday many of the female workers did not show up. They had used the little money they had on drinking too much ice water and eating too much udon the previous day. On such days I, as the person in charge, had to go to their quarters and cry out in a loud voice "All of you who have no medical certificate, get up!," and even if I had to tear them from their futons [floor mattresses] by force, I got them ready for work.

When, later, after the war, I became an active participant in the labor movement, I was overcome by a feeling of shame every time I remembered my former experiences; in that respect they turned out to be very useful. There are many possibilities for a leading union official: he may become a member of parliament or an important manager of some company. But to me, all this means nothing. The only thing that counts for me is not to leave the straight path. In my opinion, a union official's role is more relevant to society than that of a member of parliament or a manager.

The pain I felt when I witnessed how badly the female workers were treated during the period from the beginning of the Showa era until the end of the war has become the main motivation for my continuing involvement in the labor movement.

Historically speaking, to my mind female workers have been the main victims of oppression under Japanese capitalism. At the beginning of the Meiji period, spinning mills were founded everywhere in Japan. They formed the basis for the development of Japanese capitalism. The Japanese textile industry has been built on the exploitation and misery of country people and female workers. On a smaller scale, this fact became apparent during the strike at the Ōmi Kenshi Mills.

Because the name of the company was "Ōmi Kenshi," the strike is often referred to as the Kinken strike. At the beginning of the strike, I personally invented this name. But when the events unfolded and the attention of the whole nation focused on this dispute, the newspapers called it a “fight for human rights” because it differed from normal labor disputes and was not merely a strike for economic ends. Normally, unions try to achieve an improvement of labor conditions with economic goals as their main objective. But the Kinken strike was no conflict over economic matters, it did not occur because of dismissals or demands for a wage increase. It really had the character of a fight for human rights. I think I must tell you more about the background of this conflict. The Ōmi Kenshi Mills had been founded in 1916 with an original capital of 500,000 yen, but when the conflict erupted, their stock capital had grown to 1 billion yen! According to official sources, the company employed 11,753 persons at that time. Its headquarters were in Ōsaka. The company had production facilities at Hikone, Ōgaki, Tsu, Nakatsukawa, Nakahama, Fujinomiya and Kishiwada; as the name 'Ōmi' tells you, they were mostly located in Shiga prefecture.

The company reputedly had plans to hire 4,000 new employees each year. But the actual number of newly employed was about 3,500. However, because working conditions were extremely bad, most of them soon took to their heels. In spinning mills it was normal practice that someone packed his bundle and climbed over the fence, making a face as if he just intended to take a stroll. But at the Ōmi Kenshi Mills conditions were so dismal that within one year of 3,500 newcomers 3,000 left the company or simply vanished into the night. The fluctuation in the work¬force is a clear indicator of just how poor working conditions were at the Ōmi Kenshi Mills, a fact which became quite prominent during the strike.

When I am giving a lecture, people often ask me to say something about the problems of personnel management. My standard answer is that the relationship between workers and managers is like a mirror image. If the boss thinks about one of his subordinates, "My God, what a fool!" the latter will be inclined to think the same about his boss. During the time after the war it often happened that some company boss came to me and told me he had a problem because a union had been founded in his company. He then came to ask for my advice: "Can't we just somehow get rid of the union again?" he would ask me. And when I asked him whether a union was such a bad thing, he would answer: "No, I don't think unions are bad, but I had never thought there'd be one in my company. How on earth can I get rid of it again?" I often had to deal with such questions, and I used to tell these people: You know, the most important thing about labor relations within a company is that the employees are treated as human beings and that they get a fair share in the company's profits. When working conditions are good, the employees will stick with the company, but if they are bad, they'll simply leave, even though their boss may think that they will not dare to give up their jobs. It is the duty and the responsibility of any real entrepreneur to create good working conditions for his employees and to show his sympathy towards them. That is the right way of dealing with people, and it will automatically put an end to a high rate of personnel fluctuation. It is a clear indication of incompetence on part of an entrepreneur if he acts differently.

Natsukawa Kakuji, the boss of the Ōmi Kenshi Mills, turned out to be a man not devoid of any charm once the strike was over, but he was not easy to handle. In April 1954, the average wage of a male worker at five other spinning mills roughly the same size as the Ōmi Kenshi Mills was 18,711 yen, while a female worker received 7,837. The difference was because the men's period of employment was usually longer and they had received a better education. But the Ōmi Kenshi Mills paid only 5,981 yen to men and 4,909 to women, which was less than half the pay they would get in other companies of the industry. Moreover, at Ōmi Kenshi they had to do night shifts, and employees were obliged to work overtime. Consequently, the standard of working conditions was less than half as good as in other companies. President Natsukawa Kakuji once wrote in an article which was published by the magazine Kaizō (August 1954): `If you do not put the workers on the same level as pigs or cows, you cannot make any profit.' Therefore he exploited the female workers in every conceivable way. On the other hand, he used to invite geishas to his house and then he would throw a big party. That is the way most of them behaved, those company bosses of the pre-war type.

When I joined my company in 1931, the situation was just as that shown in the TV series Oshin [popular and long-running 1973 series about a young prewar farm girl who works in a textile mill; it was revived and just as popular in 2002]. The country girls who were a financial burden on their families were sold as prostitutes to the brothels or sent off to the spinning mills to earn some money. When the strike broke out in 1954 [June 3], the American magazine Time published an article on the subject, in which it was said: The Ōmi Kenshi Mills, a company which only seven years ago had a value of only about $30,000 dollars, has managed to raise its value to about $3 million dollars today. The reason for this growth is simple: it is the management practices of its President Natsukawa who violates each and every labor law. Before the war such practices were not restricted to the Ōmi Kenshi Mills but were usual in this industry. However, after the war, the big companies changed their ways, and only the Ōmi Kenshi Mills refused to accept the sign of the times. If you compared the Ōmi Kenshi Mill with a wooden post in a stream, the strike was the water which finally swept it away.

In 1954 Japan was just at the beginning of a period of high economic growth. Japan was not yet an affluent country. In the years 1952 and 1953 there was a series of big strikes in the key industries, for example the labor disputes in the coal mining and the energy supply industry which continued for a long time. These strikes mainly concerned economic demands or were launched as resistance against rationalization measures which would eventually lead to dismissals. However, they were guided by the spirit of class struggle. It was a generally accepted notion among labor leaders that problems between workers and entrepreneurs could only be resolved by force and that the capitalist system had to be changed. The strikes were actually encumbered with revolutionary theory. The Communist Party of Japan resorted to an illegal strategy, and the unions in important industrial sectors were guided by Marxist and Leninist ideas.

I want to give you a somewhat broader picture. In 1950 the union federation Sōhyō, which still exists today, was established. In February of the previous year the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions had been founded. This is an international organization of labor unions of free countries. Because the World Federation of Trade Unions which had been established in 1945 had come under the domination of the Soviet Union, the labor unions of the free countries left it and formed their own organization.

When Sōhyō was founded, it was expected to join the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions. But as only four years after its establishment Sōhyō took a sharp turn to the left, a split occurred and Zenrō Kaigi (today's Dōmei) was founded. I was elected its chairman. Precisely at that time the labor conflict of the Ōmi Kenshi Mills broke out. After so many strikes which had been guided by the theories of class struggle, now for the first time there was a labor dispute which was led by a free and democratic labor movement. But although this fight for human rights had, as it were, the character of a pre-modern struggle the left-wing labor movement would have loved to lead, our approach to this dispute of the Ōmi Kenshi Mills was fundamentally different from that of the labor disputes which were influenced by left-wing ideology.

Of course, during the strike many bitter confrontations occurred, in that respect it was in no way inferior to the struggles guided by left-wing theories. I myself was twice almost killed. One day when I was in the office of the Central Labor Relations Commission and was having a chat with someone, suddenly a black-clad guy entered the room with a dagger in his hand and asked "Is Chairman Takita around?" I kept my head and answered him, "Yeah, he just left through that door over there," and off he went. The other time I was in Osaka during the strike. A waitress in a restaurant by chance overheard a conversation of some members of the extreme right: "This time we'll give Takita the bullet. As soon as he's finished, the strike will be over." She contacted me and told me what she had heard. There were also quite a number of cases in which striking workers committed suicide or suffered a nervous breakdown. You will realize just how violent a struggle it was by taking into account what one, as its highest-ranking leader, had to go through.

In those days there were many bosses of small and medium sized companies who did not treat their workers as human beings. There will still be some of those around. I believe that the Ōmi Kenshi Mills can serve as a representative example. Therefore I was convinced that if we fought with all our energy and managed to achieve a victory, our struggle would have a lasting effect on Japanese labor relations in general. Because of this conviction, my sole aim in leading the strike was to achieve a victory. Nearly all labor conflicts in which left-wing ideology had played a major role had ended in a defeat. The strikers had not been able to push through their demands, or their organization had gone to pieces so that nobody wanted to take part in such a conflict again. Right from the very beginning of the strike until the ultimate settlement, I was fully aware of the fact that we wanted to conduct a labor conflict based on a democratic labor movement and totally free of the hitherto dominating class struggle ideology. When the settlement had finally been sealed, I called all the leading members of the Ōmi Kenshi union together and told them: "Tomorrow you'll get back to work. And nobody should be late, not even by a single minute! And you should work even harder than before the strike." They all were drunk because they had celebrated the end of the strike, and there were some who protested, "Take it easy, we can't switch back to normal just like that!" But I replied: "You can, and you will. Your demands have been fulfilled, and now you must show your solidarity with each other on the job!" And I made them "switch back."

During the strike it often happened that angry strikers came to me and urged me to "get down to some real action!" Others made remarks such as "The only proper place for Kakuji Natsukawa to be is six feet under the ground!" But even when there were suicides and cases of nervous breakdown, I firmly rejected and prevented any violent actions on the part of the strikers and kept them on the straight path.

The establishment of the Union of the Ōmi Kenshi Mills occurred on 25 May 1954 when a local group of Zensen Dōmei was founded in the company's head offices. This was a matter of life and death: immediately after the management had been notified of the union's founding, its members were fired and attacked by hired thugs.

But of course this was not the only reason for the strike to break out. Zensen Dōmei had already been trying to gain a foothold in the company for six or seven years. Nobody has kept a record of how many times they formally appealed to the management for permission to organize a union in the normal fashion. They also tried to talk with employees outside the company's premises or exchange letters with people inside, but all of their attempts were thwarted. If the person concerned was not to be influenced either by soothing words or by intimidation, the company tried to have his parents convince him not to cooperate with the union. Six or seven years passed until the situation had become so tense that the founding of a union in the head offices of the company would automatically lead to an uprising of the workers in all production facilities. When all preparations had been made with due consideration given to the mood in the workplace, the working conditions, the president's behaviour, the intensive surveillance of the workers and other factors, a union was founded in the head offices of the company. On the following day, union groups were formed in all production sites.

I believe that at this point in time the employees simply had had enough. The company was violating all legal regulations. Between 1948 and 1954, the year the union was founded, the company committed 147 registered offences against the labor laws alone. After the war I was a member of the commission which drew up the law on labor standards. The supervisory authority often warned the company, but the management never heeded these warnings. If you add up the number of legal offences and criminal cases which occurred during the strike alone, there were fifty-four lawsuits filed against the company. In all cases the courts judged in favour of the union. But even this did not help. To sum it up: the strike was caused by the inhuman treatment of the workers by President Natsukawa Kakuji, and this is why the strike became a fight for human rights.

The whole labor dispute can be divided up into three phases. During the first phase, the demands were on the table and both sides fought a grim battle against each other. In the second phase, the Central Labor Relations Commission tried to find a solution to the dispute, while at the same time the fight continued on a legal level in the courts. In the case of the Ōmi Kenshi strike, there were even attempts to end the conflict by issuing a cabinet decree. Political pressure was put on the company. Against this background, the Central Commission was preparing plans for a settlement, while on the other hand a fight against the company's legal offences was launched. Of course, the confrontation between both sides continued unabated. During the third and final phase the big question was which factor would in the end decide our victory or defeat in this struggle. In my opinion, this decisive factor was the public support which we enjoyed. Because the Yomiuri newspaper wanted to publish an account of the events, on the same day the conflict was settled I sat down and made some notes on them. I remember that I wrote: "The determining factor in this struggle was public opinion. It was the common sense of the people which in the end carried the day."

History has seen a number of great labor conflicts, but in all cases the factor determining defeat or victory was whether the demands were rational or not. And here public opinion comes in: does the union stand alone with its demands, or do they appear just to everybody? In my opinion, the unions intrinsically have a "correct standpoint": as one worker alone is too weak, he enters into an association with other workers which is called a union. The desire for justice and fairness is the basis of union activities, and this must be explained to the public. To give you some examples: the magazine Shūkan Asahi carried an interview between me and Musei Tokugawa about the strike. Because of his character, my interviewer had no sympathy for the strike, but nevertheless he told me: "Mr. Takita, I really hope that you will win." Also Mr. Abe Shinnosuke, at that time the head of NHK, the Japanese broadcasting service, and the commentator on economic affairs, Mr. Obama Ritoku, shook my hand and told me with tears in their eyes: "Whatever some may say, Mr. Takita, this is a just fight, and you must win it". And Abe Shinnosuke added: "I am not a rich man, but I would like to contribute a little, Mr. Takita, if it only helps you to win. But apart from President Natsukawa Kakuji, there's another one whose downfall I pray for. It's Yoshida Shigeru [Prime Minister] and his cabinet that we of the press want to see brought down."

The only major labor dispute which can be compared with the Ōmi Kenshi strike is the Mitsui-Miike struggle [coal mine strike, 1959-1960]. Well, it resembles the Ōmi Kenshi strike in that it also concerned wage raises and dismissals, but the strike leadership followed a different course which was guided by the attitude: "Even if because of this strike the coal mines and the company go bankrupt, we still have gained a victory." I had a different opinion: "If we don't ask ourselves how we can save the coal mining industry, then in the final analysis the workers will lose, although they apparently may have won the class struggle." This was because even if the strikers won their battle, crude oil would replace coal as an energy source. If new applications for oil and other energy sources were developed, the coal mining industry would not survive. If this happened, the victory of the workers would only be temporary and there would be no guarantee that they would be able to enjoy its fruits also in the future.

In a documentary on the strike at the Ōmi Kenshi Mills ("The Revolt of the Female Workers") there is one scene in which female workers are shown eating o-nigiri. Workers supporting the strike each had brought one o-nigiri as emergency food aid for the female workers. The company had closed down all canteens and the female workers were deprived of their normal rations. The hungry women were therefore fed by their male colleagues. Whenever workers watch this scene, some of them break out in tears. I encouraged such action because I believed: "When I am the responsible leader of a strike, I have to find a way of securing the livelihood of the strikers during their battle. If I cannot do that, I must not call a strike." For the whole 106 days the livelihood of those involved in strike action was secured by the donations of other organized workers. Each of these workers gave approximately 60 per cent of his wage to the strikers.

During the Mitsui-Miike struggle, there were groups of supporters who came and agitated, but they did not help a bit in securing the strikers' livelihood. When the strike was over, the union members had all accumulated high debts. At that time I first realized that donations by organized workers and financial relief for those involved in a strike are important factors for achieving a victory in a long-term conflict. Therefore during the Ōmi Kenshi dispute I collected money among the organized workers so that the female workers could go on strike without having to worry about their financial situation. I think that even years later this labor conflict still served as a model of how to organize support in a major dispute.

In contrast to the union, President Natsukawa Kakuji not only antagonized the unions but in the end was at odds with his colleagues in the leading companies as well. A short while ago there was a party given in commemoration of the publication of the book Hidden Post-War History by Mr. Shikauchi Nobutaka, the President of Fuji Television and the Sankei newspaper. In his book he says: "If today Japan is an affluent country, there are two factors which brought this about: the common and high level of education, and the good Japanese labor relations." A major labor dispute must have a rationale which wins the support of public opinion, which goes beyond economic demands; it must not be seen merely as a clash between two sides. This is one reason why President Natsukawa did not receive the support of business circles.

Apart from the attempts by the Central Labor Relations Commission, there were quite a number of initiatives by business people and politicians which aimed at a speedy settlement of the conflict. But Natsukawa was unwilling to listen to anyone. We therefore developed a strategy which concentrated on destroying the life-support system of the company by cutting the capital supply from the banks. However, we did not only think of money but also made an effort to interrupt the supply and transport of raw materials and finished goods. The unions of companies which transported these raw materials and goods decided to boycott Ōmi Kenshi. Whenever the Ōmi Kenshi Mills now tried to sell their products in order to make some money, they found it impossible to get them shipped. Even when they resorted to hiring groups of thugs to do the job, they still could not get the dock workers to load the products on to ships. At our instigation, products to be sold in foreign countries were no longer accepted. At that time I had a leading function in the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, and I went to the American and European unions for help. Thus at home as well as abroad, the company was totally isolated.

When even these measures had no effect, we decided to put pressure on the banks. Kosaka Zentarōō was then Minister of Labor, and as he was a friend of mine, I asked him to lend a hand, and he spoke with representatives of the banks. First the president of the Sumitomo Bank, then the president of the Mitsubishi Bank and afterwards other influential members of financial circles tried to persuade Mr. Natsukawa Kakuji to give in. However, all their efforts were in vain. When the president of the Sumitomo Bank, Shōzō Hotta, asked me for a meeting, we met secretly in Osaka. After our talks, Mr. Hotta went to President Natsukawa and told him: "If you don't fulfill the demands of Zensen Dōmei, the Sumitomo Bank will cease all business contacts with your company."

Earlier when the banks were still reluctant to help us, we had cooked up a devious strategy. We asked all 320,000 members of the textile workers' unions to withdraw their savings. These amounted to 2 billion yen at that time. And in order to put additional pressure on President i Natsukawa Kakuji and to give the banks some more trouble, we resorted to another trick: you went to the bank with 1 yen. This 1 yen you paid into your bank account. Then the next union member went in and withdrew 1 yen from his account. When a couple of hundred persons played the game, the banks became extremely busy, but they were unable to resist. We went on with this wicked game until the bank people told us: "If the whole federation of textile workers does this to us, we may as well close down for good!" But they never regarded us as their enemies, and I think this was because our demands were supported by the public.

I have spent my whole life serving the labor movement. A leader of a strike or a union must choose his steps with great care when planning his strategy in a labor conflict. There are some criteria for measuring the success or failure of a labor dispute. First, after a major strike you have to look back and see whether the demands were actually fulfilled. There have been many strikes which did not achieve their goals. A second consideration is whether the organization was strengthened by the conflict or not. Many labor conflicts have resulted in a division of the union involved or even its destruction. And, third, you must ask yourself whether or not the strike has encouraged workers to think: "Wow, why don't we do something like that here, too?" This is the so-called "radiation effect." But a reaction such as "Oh god, we're really fed up with such a strike" is disastrous.

After the Ōmi Kenshi dispute, many other unions were encouraged by the Ōmi Kenshi strike to adopt the same demands. In nearly all small and medium-sized enterprises the workers won their battles. And the entrepreneurs feared, "If they repeat with us what they have done at Ōmi Kenshi, we're in deep water." They arrived at the conclusion, "If we continue with management practices which are unacceptable to the workers, they'll do to us what they did at Ōmi Kenshi!" And they said: "Beware of another Ōmi Kenshi strike." The result of the labor conflict at the Ōmi Kenshi Mills was that the workers gained courage and the bosses had to reconsider their practices. This was really a great success which went far beyond our expectations.

We have conducted a survey of the changes which the strike has brought to the company and its employees. Previously, within six months of their employment many of them suffered from loss of appetite and other diseases and left the company. Today they tend to stick with the company, they do not lose their appetite and stay healthy. The female workers have experienced an improvement of their financial and living conditions even in areas which were not concerned with the demands.

The current president of the Ōmi-Kenshi Silk Mills, Natsukawa Tetsunosuke, is the younger brother of the former president, Natsukawa Kakuji. Sometimes I meet him, but we do not talk about what happened during the strike. To my mind, once the fight is over, arms must be laid down. His behavior towards me is very polite.

When the end of the strike drew near [mid-September 1954], the most important point of the mediation proposal put forward by the Central Labor Relations Commission was a clause by which the company accepted the closed-shop principle. This principle requires every new employee of the company to join the union established by Zensen Dōmei. Until that time the company had tried its utmost to prevent the founding of any union. Now they were even prepared to agree to the closed-shop clause.

Zensen Dōmei had to raise about 154 million yen. The union members organized by the Federation first paid a monthly contri¬bution for the strike of 100 yen, later this amount rose to 170 yen. All additional costs of the strike were paid by the Federation. Furthermore we received donations from various sympathetic groups and unions. During the Mitsui-Miike strike it sometimes happened that people from Sōhyō arrived carrying bags full of money, but later I learned that they had received it from the banks as a loan raised by the Mitsui-Miike union. We on the other hand did not burden the Ōmi Kenshi union with a single sen of debt. The receipts which prove this are still available.

When the mediation proposal had finally been accepted, we, the representatives of Zensen Dōmei and of the Union of the Ōmi Kenshi Mills ran outside, threw our arms into the air and shouted "Banzai!!" This was a success which really gave the workers a feeling of having won a great victory.

I now want to remark on a number of points which we observed during this strike. First of all, no persons who were not members of Zensen Dōmei were allowed to take a leading role in the strike. Of course it was a conflict in which outside organizations were also involved; when Zensen Dōmei is engaged in a labor dispute, there are always many political groups who want to join in as supporters. However, if they are given an actual say, outside pressure will grow too strong. If a union engaged in a strike is dragged into such a quagmire, it may lose its independence for good. In such a case it often happens that in the end nobody really knows any more what the strike is all about and who is the responsible leader. I use to call this an "encircled strike." It is characterized by the fact that people gather only to form agitation groups which have no real responsibility, and once a settlement is at hand, serious problems may arise. During the Ōmi Kenshi strike we managed to avoid such a situation and the independence of Zensen Dōmei was maintained throughout, which led to positive results.

And one further point: the Ōmi Kenshi strike mainly involved female workers, and we took great care to identify the best way of leading women in a strike – how they must be organized. I have been involved in many strikes, and I have to admit that when the going gets tough, women are stronger than men. In the beginning, the men show a great deal of energy too, but they tend to go to the wall too soon. In drawn-out conflicts especially, married men with families have a hard time. During the strike they do not receive their wages, and when their wives start nagging at them and keep saying, "You've got to put an end to this, we're running out of money!" they tend to give in. In later conflicts we often fought for minimum wages for female workers, but the first to turn tail were always their male colleagues. They have a big mouth alright, the men, haven't they? But women are more liable to act on the spur of the moment, and once they have made up their minds they are awfully hard to discourage. This was exactly what happened in the Ōmi Kenshi strike.

Kawanishi, Hirosuke (ed.). The Human Face of Industrial Conflict in Post-War Japan. New York, NY: Kegan Paul International, 1999; pp. 181-194.