So long as Japan remained an absolute monarchy, in which the Legislature was concentrated within a narrow circle, the Choshiu and Satsuma Ministries succeeded each other without any noisy opposition; but when in 1890 Parliamentary Government was established, an immediate collision occurred between the Lower Chamber, which is composed of representatives from all parts of the country,[19] and the Cabinet, dominated by the Sat-Cho combination. Although according to the Constitution, analogous to that of Prussia, the Ministers are not responsible to the Chambers, but to the Emperor alone, and although the Budget of the current year, if the finance bill is not voted in due time, becomes by law that of the following year also, the irreconcilable opposition which manifested itself from the beginning greatly embarrassed the first Matsukata Ministry in 1891 and 1892, and the Ito Ministry which succeeded it. This latter, whose plans for the extension of the Navy were obstinately rejected by the Chamber, twice dissolved it: in December, 1893, and again in May, 1894. After the war patriotic feeling ran so high that people cared very little about the Government and its measures, and projected laws were adopted without the least opposition; but when affairs began to settle down it was otherwise. In 1897 and 1898 there were two dissolutions, and in the latter year the Ministry in power was the ninth since December, 1885, and the seventh since the establishment of the Parliamentary system. This gives an average of about two years for each Cabinet, and even less for the Chamber, of which not one has yet attained its legal term. The reason for this persistent conflict is due in the first place to the popular assembly being hostile to the Government of the clansmen, and in the second because it is displeased that the Ministers are not responsible to it. Whilst professing the greatest respect for the Emperor, the Chamber considers that the Government should possess a Parliamentary majority in order to retain power. It, moreover, complains of a certain lack of respect, Ministers rarely troubling to appear before it, and that it is seldom, if ever, addressed by any but high functionaries, appointed Government Commissioners for matters within their several departments. In a word, there exists considerable friction in the popular assembly against this state of affairs, which reduces it to the position of a mere debating society.