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| October Restoration | |
| Hangul | 10월 유신 |
|---|---|
| Hanja | 十月維新 |
| RR | 10wol Yusin |
| MR | 10wŏl Yusin |
TheOctober Yusin (Korean: 10월 유신;RR: Siwol Yusin) orOctober Restoration was aself-coup inSouth Korea in October 1972, in whichPresidentPark Chung Hee assumeddictatorial powers. Park had come to power as the head of theSupreme Council for National Reconstruction after theMay 16 coup of 1961, and in 1963 he wonelections and assumed office as civilian president.
On May 4, 1972, the director ofKorea Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA),Lee Hu-rak, went to North Korea and metKim Il Sung. They announced the North–South Joint Declaration with the three principles of thereunification. After the declaration, a direct phone cable was installed betweenSeoul andPyongyang. Enthusiasm for reunification was heating up. Park used it as a pretext for the amendment of the constitution.
Under theThird Republic's constitution, the president was limited to two terms in office. However, the National Assembly, dominated by Park'sDemocratic Republican Party, amended the Constitution in 1969 to allow a third term. He was re-elected in the1971 presidential election.
The 8th general election was held on May 5, 1971. Park'sDemocratic Republican Party took 113 seats out of 204. However, it did not reach the minimum condition to pass a constitutional amendment, which required the concurrence of two thirds or more of the total members of the National Assembly. Therefore, Park could not amend the constitution through the lawful procedure.
In 1969, with a one-time amendment of the constitution, the incumbent president–Park–was allowed to run for a third consecutive term.
In December 1971, shortly after winning a third term, Park declared a state of emergency "based on the dangerous realities of the international situation".
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On October 17, 1972, Park dissolved the National Assembly, suspended the constitution and declaredmartial law. Universities were also closed. The press, radio and television were subjected to censorship, and speech was significantly restricted. Work was then begun on a new constitution, which was completed on October 27 by the emergencyState Council.
The event was named after Japan's 1868Meiji Restoration. Park Chung Hee, a former officer in the Japanese-controlledManchukuo Imperial Army, admired Japanese politics, and called his self–coup Yusin (or Yushin), the Korean pronunciation of the Japanese wordIshin (restoration).
The new administration established after the coup is now called the Yusin Regime (유신체제;維新體制) or Yusin Dictatorship (유신독재;維新獨裁).
Under the Yusin regime, the Constitution of the Third Republic of Korea was replaced by the Yusin Constitution, the Constitution of the Fourth Republic.
In accordance with the Yusin Constitution, an electoral college called the National Council for Unification (통일주체국민회의,Tongil Juche Gungmin Hoeui) was set up. The conference elected the president and one-third of parliament. The presidential term was extended to six years, with no constitutional restrictions on the number of terms one could serve–effectively making Park president for life. It also allowed the president to declare "emergency measures" (긴급조치권,Gingeup Jochi), which allowed the president to promulgate lawswithout ratification by the National Assembly and suspend civil liberties.
In practice, the conference's power to appoint one-third of legislators was exercised by the president, guaranteeing him a parliamentary majority and control over parliament. Combined with his broad powers to rule by decree and curtail constitutional freedoms, the Yusin Constitution endowed the president with nearly all governing power in the nation.
Park justified his creation of a legal dictatorship by arguing that South Korea's economy was too weak to allow Western-style liberal democracy. Rather, he argued that the country needed a "Korean-style democracy" with a strong, unchallenged presidency in order to remain stable.[1]
The Yusin Regime was soon challenged by activists from groups such as college students, artists, religious leaders, and the opposition. Park suppressed these protests by force. In thePeople's Revolutionary Party Incident, eight persons were executed for treason. Their confessions, which were extracted by torture, were the only evidence and the executed are now generally considered to have been innocent. Despite this repression, the resistance to the Yusin Regime continued and caused serious social unrest.
The Yusin Regime was criticized internationally forhuman rights abuse. The AmericanCarter Administration warned that United States military forces might be withdrawn from South Korea unless Park eased off his dictatorship.
On October 26, 1979, the "10.26 Incident" occurred—theassassination of Park Chung Hee by members of theKorean Central Intelligence Agency.
Park's assassination removed the main impetus of the Yusin Regime. Although the military took power by consecutive coups (the12.12 Coup d'état and the5.18 Incident) after Park's death, there was a general consensus that the Yusin Constitution was no longer viable. Ultimately, Park was succeeded byChun Doo-hwan, who promulgated the Constitution of the Fifth Republic, which officially replaced the Yusin Constitution in 1980. This new constitution was somewhat less authoritarian than the Yusin Constitution, although it was still patterned after it and concentrated immense powers into the office of president.
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