Shogunal Regency (1623-1632)
In 1623, when Iemitsu was nineteen, Hidetada abdicated the post of shogun in his favor. Hidetada continued to rule as Ōgosho (retired Shogun), but Iemitsu nevertheless assumed a role as formal head of the bakufu bureaucracy.
In 1626, Shogun Iemitsu and retired Shogun Hidetada visited Emperor Go-Mizunoo, Empress Masako (Hidetada's daughter and Iemitsu's sister), and Imperial Princess Meisho in Kyoto. Shogun Iemitsu made lavish grants of gold and money to the court nobles and the court itself. Yet relations with Go-Mizunoo deteriorated after the Purple Clothes Incident (紫衣事件, shi-e jiken?), during which the Emperor was accused of having bestowed honorific purple garments to more than ten priests despite an edict which banned them for two years (probably in order to break the bond between the Emperor and religious circles). The shogunate intervened, making the bestowing of the garments invalid. When the wet nurse of Iemitsu and Masako broke a taboo by visiting the imperial court as a commoner, Go-Mizunoo abdicated, embarrassed, and Meisho became empress. The shogun was now the uncle of the sitting monarch.
In Kan'ei 9, on the 24th day of the 2nd month (1632), Ōgosho Hidetada died, and Iemitsu could assume real power. Worried that his brother Tokugawa Tadanaga might assassinate him, however, he ruled carefully until that brother's death by Seppuku in 1633.
Read more about this topic: Tokugawa Iemitsu