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Government official, statesman. Born in Yamagata, the son of a samurai of the Yonezawa clan. After graduating from the Daigaku Nanko (predecessor of Tokyo University), he participated in the Iwakura mission in 1871 and stayed in Germany to study. He studied at Heidelberg University and elsewhere and returned to Japan in 1876. After serving as okura-gonsho-shokikan and dajokan-gonsho-shokikan concomitantly, he became documentation bureau director of the Grand Council (Dajokan). Later, he became legislation bureau director. In 1890, he was selected as a member of the House of Peers by Imperial command. He successively held important posts including chief secretary of the Privy Council, director-general of the Legislation Bureau, privy councillor, agriculture and commerce minister in the first Katsura cabinet, home minister in the second Katsura cabinet, provisionary diplomatic investigation board member, and Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal. He was an influential Yamagata-clique official, and also engaged in the movement of local area reforms, an industrial cooperative program, and a poor people relief project.
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Hirata, Tosuke 
