1. This paper aims at paying particular attention to the government and public labor law which contains a typical theory of the “public welfare” and which is exceedingly important indeed to the labor law and labor movement of contemporary Japan.
2. The Government Ordinance No. 201 based on the letter of Douglas Mac-Arthur to Japanese Prime Minister brought a drastic change to Japanese labor law and also to the notion of the “public welfare” prevailing before. With the incorporation of the Government Ordinance into the national law, the object and function of it have gradually been proved to be against the rights of workers.
3. Authorized by the judicial precedents of the Supreme Court, the thoery of the “public welfare” and the “servants of the whole community” made the theoretical foundation of restricting the rights and penetrated into the opinions of the lower courts.
4. On the other hand, however, the changes of economic conditions after 1959. the modernization of the government's policies towards the labor movement, the struggle of the labor unions for the ILO convention and etc. influenced the decisions of the courts of justice. Down in 1962, some of the lower courts delivered the opinions demanding the reconsideration of the meaningless theory of the “public welfare”.
5. Promoted by these changes of circumstances, on October 26, 1966, the Supreme Court in
the state v. Sotoyamm et al., 20 Sai-han Keishu
*901 (1966), overruled the decision of March 15, 1963 of the highest court, ruling in effect that public service workers can go on strike without being penalized by law. This decision of October 26, intended to overthrow the old fashioned theory of the “public welfare” and modernize the way of posing limit to the basic rights of workers. In this sense, a vigilant watch should be kept on the function and development of the decision in the field of labor law.
* Saiko Saibansho Keiji Hanreishu (A Collection of Supreme court Criminal Cases)
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