The Constitution of Japan as adopted November 3, 1946, and effective May 3, 1947, did not leave to implication or debate, the question whether the judicial power would include the authority to adjudicate the constitutional validity of legislation enacted either by the Diet or by any of the subordinate legislative organs of the state. Article 81 explicitly provides that "The Supreme Court is the court of last resort with power to determine the constitutionality of any law, order, regulation or official act." Although this provision unquestionably resolves the most fundamental problem of all with regard to the appropriate role of the judiciary in preserving constitutional rights, it suggests at least two other jurisdictional issues basic to a system of constitutional adjudication. The first is whether the very explicitness of the provision with regard to the Supreme Court, and the absence of any similar provision with respect to the inferior courts, implies that the power of the Supreme Court "to determine the constitutionality of any law, order, regulation or official act" is any different from the power of the inferior courts to make similar determinations. The second is whether the power of the Supreme Court to determine constitutional questions is qualified or inhibited by conceptions comparable to those which have been developed in American constitutional law under the rubrics of "the nature of judicial power" or the meaning of "case or controversy" under Article III. Although these questions are closely related to each other, the answer