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House of Peers (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-10) |
 | | Ito Hirobumi and the other Meiji leaders deliberately modelled the chamber on the British House of Lords, as a counterweight to the popularly elected House of Representatives (Shūgiin). |
 | | In 1869, the leaders of new government had the Emperor Meiji issue an imperial ordinance that merged the daimyo and the kuge into a single aristocratic class, the kozoku. |
 | | A second imperial ordinance in 1884, grouped the kazoku into five ranks equivalent to the European prince (or duke), marquis, count, viscount, and baron. |
| bopedia.com /en/wikipedia/h/ho/house_of_peers.html (280 words) |
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