When the newspaper that Kōtoku and fellow socialist Sanshirō Ishikawa had worked for, Yorozu Chūhō, endorsed the war, they resigned in protest to form the group.

Multiple issues of the newspaper were banned by the Meiji government because they were deemed politically offensive, and editors were arrested, fined, and jailed.

[9] Two anarchist contributors to the initial newspaper, Uchiyama Gudō and Kōtoku Shusui, were later convicted and executed in the 1911 High Treason Incident.

In October 1914, the anarchists Ōsugi Sakae and Arahata Kanson attempted to revive Heimin Shinbun.

[10] After the Second World War, the Japanese Anarchist Federation revived the newspaper in June 1946, but the group collapsed in 1950.