Hara Takashi
| Hara Takashi | |
|---|---|
| 原 敬 | |
 |
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| 19th Prime Minister of Japan | |
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In office 29 September 1918 – 4 November 1921 |
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| Monarch | Taishō |
| Preceded by | Terauchi Masatake |
| Succeeded by | Kosai (Acting) |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
9 February 1856 Morioka, Nanbu Domain, Japan |
| Died | 4 November 1921 (aged 65) Tokyo, Japan |
| Political party | Rikken Seiyūkai |
| Alma mater | Imperial University (Incomplete) |
| Religion | Roman Catholicism |
| Signature |  |
Hara Takashi (原 敬?, 9 February 1856 – 4 November 1921) was a Japanese politician and the 10th Prime Minister of Japan from 29 September 1918 until his assassination on 4 November 1921. He was also called Hara Kei informally. He was the first commoner appointed to the office of prime minister of Japan, giving him the informal title of "commoner prime minister" (平民宰相 heimin saishō?). He was also the first Japanese Christian Prime Minister.
Hara was born in a village of the feudal Morioka domain in Mutsu Province, (present-day Iwate Prefecture). He was the son of a samurai-class family which had resisted the Meiji Restoration and the establishment of the very government which Hara himself would one day lead. Due to his association with a former enemy clan of the new Imperial Government, which was dominated by the feudal clans of Chōshū and Satsuma, Hara for long remained an outsider in the world of politics.
He left home at the age of 15 and went to Tokyo by boat. He failed the entrance examination of the prestigious Imperial Japanese Naval Academy, and instead joined the Marin Seminary, a French-established, free parochial school. It was here that he learned to speak French fluently. Soon after that he joined the law school of the Ministry of Justice (later University of Tokyo), but left without graduating to take responsibility for a student protest against the school’s room and board policy.
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