New Civil Code, 1948
Site Ed: Japanese feminists placed considerable emphasis on reform of the family system and spoke up early in the Occupation period. In February and March 1946, they brought the need for reform to the attention of SCAP authorities. Lt. Ethel Weed, head of the Women’s Bureau in the Civil Information and Education Section, was sympathetic and launched extensive research with the assistance of her newly recruited Japanese aides. Moreover, reform of the Code was required under the new Constitution. The revised Civil Code, effective January 1, 1948, was a product of wide-ranging debate involving Japanese legal experts, Occupation authorities, and public hearings in the Diet. The resultant document was lengthy and detailed.
The underlying General Provision of the Civil Code was “the individual dignity and the essential equality of the sexes.” Book I promised the enjoyment of private rights, which “commenced at birth.” Book II dealt with Real Rights, such as property and ownership. Book III discussed obligations, such as contracts, leases, and the hiring of services. Book IV, entitled “Relatives,” was concerned with marriage and property and was the heart of family reform. Books V and VI dealt with Succession and Wills. The Code also established a Domestic Relations Court, an innovation in Japanese law and one which would lead to the recruitment of women as mediators in family disputes.
The key passages in Book IV, which established individual rights within the family, are quoted below. They focused on marriage, matrimonial property, divorce, parental power, adoption and guardianship.
Civil Code, Book IV
Relatives—By Blood and Marriage Article 731. A man may not marry until the completion of his full eighteen years of age, nor a woman until the completion of her full sixteen years of age.
Article 732. A person who has a spouse may not contract an additional marriage.
Article 733. A woman may not remarry unless six months have elapsed from the day of the dissolution or annulment of her previous marriage.
Article 750. Husband and wife assume the surname of the husband or wife in accordance with the agreement made at the time of the marriage.
Article 752. Husband and wife shall live together, and shall cooperate and aid each other.
Article 755. If a husband and wife have not, prior to the notification of marriage, entered into a contract which provides otherwise with respect to their property, their property relations shall be governed by the provisions of the next Sub-
Section.
Article 758. Property relations between husband and wife cannot be changed after the notification of marriage. If, in cases where one spouse manages the property of the other, such property is imperiled by mismanagement, the other may apply to the Court of Domestic Relations to be allowed to undertake the management there himself.
Article 760. Husband and wife shall share the expenses of the married life with each other, taking into account their property, income and all other circumstances.
Article 762. Property belong to either a husband or wife from a time prior to the marriage and property acquired during the subsistence of the marriage in his or her own name constitutes his or her separate property…
Article 763. Husband and wife may effect by agreement divorce.
Article 766. In case a father and mother effect a divorce by agreement, the person who is to take the custody of their children and other matters necessary for the custody shall be determined by their agreement, and if no agreement is reached or possible, such matters hall be determined by the Court of Domestic Relations.
Article 770. Husband or wife can bring an action for (judicial) divorce only in the following cases:
1. If the other spouse has committed an act of unchastity;
2. If he or she has been deserted maliciously by the other spouse;
3. If it is unknown for three years or more whether the other spouse is alive or dead;
4. If the other party is attacked with severe mental disease and recovery therefrom is hopeless;
5. If there exists any other grave reason for which it is difficult for him or her to continue the marriage…
......................... Reference
Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (Government Section). The Political Reorientation of Japan, September 1945 to September 1948. Vol. II, Appendices. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1949; 1260-1270.
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