Go figure. Just a few weeks after I wrote about how Japanese courts try to avoid doing anything dramatic, on June 4 the Supreme Court ruled that a section of the Nationality Law was unconstitutional. Such rulings being so rare, I steeled myself for a big helping of highfalutin' Japanese legalese and read the opinion (which is available on the Supreme Court Web site).

At issue in the case was the provision of Japan's Nationality Law that created a seemingly bizarre distinction between children of unmarried Japanese fathers and non-Japanese mothers. Children whose paternity was recognized by their Japanese father in utero were able to receive Japanese citizenship automatically, while those who were recognized after birth were not, unless the parents subsequently married. The plaintiffs in the case were a group of Filipino women, including one who, as a result of this distinction, had one child who was Japanese and one who was not. The plaintiff group claimed that this discriminatory treatment violated the constitutional guarantee of equal treatment under the law.

A majority of the court's 15 justices agreed with her. The Justice Ministry is now working on amendments to the Nationality Law in accordance with the decision. This is all well and good, of course, but I was shocked by a concept that was quite clearly stated by the court in its opinion in a number of places: in the majority opinion, in the concurring opinions, and in the dissenting opinions. There were, in fact, a lot of different judicial views on the subject overall, but one of the things that all of the justices seemed to agree on was this: Japanese citizenship has great significance from the standpoint of receiving protection of fundamental human rights in Japan.