Kido Takayoshi (木戸 孝允; born Wada Kogorō (和田 小五郎); August 11, 1833 – May 26, 1877), formerly known as Katsura Kogorō (桂 小五郎), was a Japanese statesman, samurai and shishi who is considered one of the three great nobles who led the Meiji Restoration.
Born Wada Kogorō on August 11, 1833 in Hagi, Chōshū Domain (present-day Yamaguchi Prefecture) as the son of a samurai physician Wada Masakage (和田 昌景) and his second wife Seiko (清子). In 1840, due to his brother-in-law already being the head of the Wada family, he was later adopted into the Katsura family at age seven and was known as Katsura Kogorō (桂 小五郎).
The Katsura family's stipend was originally 150 koku, but due to the late nature of his adoption which took place as his adoptive father Katsura Takako (桂 孝古) was already on his deathbed, who died ten days later, it was reduced to 90 koku. Katsura Kogorō thus became the head of the Katsura family. A year later in 1841, his adoptive mother also died, months later he was returned to his old home. In 1848, he lost his mother and elder half-sister Yaeko to illnesses.
Katsura was educated at Meirinkan, in which he later became increasingly unhappy with and defied his father in order to be educated at Shōka Sonjuku in 1849, the academy of Yoshida Shōin, from whom he adopted the philosophy of Imperial loyalism. In 1851, his father had died.
In 1852, Katsura went to Edo (present-day Tokyo) to study swordsmanship, established ties with radical samurai from the Mito Domain (present-day Mito, Ibaraki Prefecture), learned artillery techniques with Egawa Tarōzaemon, and (after observing the construction of foreign ships in Nagasaki and Shimoda), returned to Chōshū to supervise the construction of the domain's first western-style warship.
After 1858, Katsura Kogorō was based at the domain's Edo residence, where he served as a liaison between the domain bureaucracy and radical elements among the young, lower-echelon Chōshū samurai who supported the Sonnō jōi movement. Coming under suspicion by the shogunate for his ties with Mito loyalists after the attempted assassination of Andō Nobumasa, he was transferred to Kyōto. However, while in Kyōto, he was unable to prevent the 30 September 1863 coup d'état by the forces of the Aizu and Satsuma domains, who drove the Chōshū forces out of the city.
According to his personal diary regarding the Ikedaya incident, Katsura was at the loyalist meeting with the Ishin Shishi at the Ikedaya inn in the evening on July 8, 1864. He claimed that they had only met to discuss how to rescue Furutaka Shuntaro from the Shinsengumi. Katsura later left the inn earlier, before the attack by the Shinsengumi troops on that night.
However, there were rumors varied that Katsura was tipped off by his geisha lover Ikumatsu (幾松), that the Shinsengumi were coming for him and wisely chose not show up for the meeting, or that he climbed out the window of the upper floor of the inn during the attack by the Shinsengumi and escaped over the roofs.
He spent the next five days in hiding under Nijō Bridge along the Kamo River, posing as a beggar, his lover would bring him rice balls from the shop of the Chōshū merchant Imai Tarōemon and later aided in his escape.
Katsura was involved but not present in the Hamaguri Gate Rebellion on 20 August 1864, with the unsuccessful attempt to capture Emperor Kōmei by the Chōshū forces at Hamaguri Gate in order to restore the Imperial household to its position of political supremacy, the Chōshū forces clashed with Aizu and Satsuma forces who led the defense of the Imperial palace. During the attempt, the Chōshū rebels put Kyoto on fire, starting with the residence of the Takatsukasa family, and that of a Chōshū official.
The rebellion resulted in 28,000 houses being burnt down, with casualties of about 400 from the Chōshū forces, including his adopted son Katsuzaburō, and only 60 from Aizu and Satsuma forces, forcing Katsura into hiding again with his geisha lover. He would later use the name Niibori Matsusuke as an alias in 1865 to continue his work against the Tokugawa bakufu.
After radical elements under Takasugi Shinsaku gained control of Chōshū politics, Katsura, under the new name Kido Junichirō (木戸 準一郎) was instrumental in establishing the Satchō Alliance with Saigō Takamori and Ōkubo Toshimichi through the mediation of Sakamoto Ryōma in 1866, which proved to be critical in the Boshin War and the subsequent Meiji Restoration. Around the same time, he adopted Shojirō, another nephew who was the second son of his younger sister, Kuruhara Haruko, as his heir.
Following the overthrow of the Tokugawa bakufu in 1868, Kido claimed a large role in the establishment of the new Meiji government. As a san'yo (Imperial Advisor) he helped draft the Five Charter Oath, and initiated policies of centralization and modernization. He helped direct the Abolition of the han system. In August 1868, he had his lover Ikumatsu adopted into a samurai family of Okabe Tomitarō, and later made her his wife. He was later renamed to Kido Takayoshi (木戸 孝允) in 1869.
Kido was a vocal opponent of hereditary privilege, advocating for appointments based on merit rather than social rank. In his diary, he warned that hereditary systems would lead to "stagnation in future generations," and resisted the notion of passing on rank or stipend to his descendants, even when personally offered a significant merit award. Despite accepting the stipend in 1869, he remained critical of the class-based limitations of Meiji governance.
On 23 December 1871, he accompanied the Iwakura Mission on its round-the-world voyage to America and Europe, and was especially interested in Western educational systems and politics. On his return to Japan on 13 September 1873, he would become a strong advocate of the establishment of constitutional government. Realizing that Japan was not in any position to challenge the Western powers in its present state, he also returned to Japan just in time to prevent an invasion of Korea (Seikanron).
In his later years, Kido became increasingly critical of excessive centralization and showed deep concern for those affected adversely by rapid modernization. He criticized policies that impoverished the shizoku (former samurai) and the peasantry, and called for relief efforts and localized development to aid his former comrades in Chōshū. Kido expressed guilt over the suffering of Restoration-era soldiers and advocated that foreign and domestic policy should prioritize the needs of "the suffering masses." His opposition to the 1874 Taiwan Expedition and the 1873 Korea invasion proposal stemmed in part from this concern.
Kido lost his dominant position in the Meiji oligarchy to Ōkubo Toshimichi, and resigned from government in protest of the Taiwan Expedition of 1874, which he had strenuously opposed.
Following the Osaka Conference of 1875, Kido agreed to return to the government, and became chairman of the Assembly of Prefectural Governors that the Ōsaka Conference had created. He was also responsible for the education of the young Emperor Meiji.