1956 Japanese House of Councillors election information
1956 Japanese House of Councillors election
← 1953
8 July 1956
1959 →
127 of the 250 seats in the House of Councillors 126 seats needed for a majority
First party
Second party
Leader
Ichirō Hatoyama
Mosaburō Suzuki
Party
Liberal Democratic
Socialist
Seats after
122
80
Seat change
12
14
Popular vote
11,356,874
8,549,940
Percentage
36.7%
29.9%
Swing
N/A
N/A
Third party
Fourth party
Leader
Sanzō Nosaka
Party
Ryokufūkai
Communist
Seats after
31
2
Seat change
3
2
Popular vote
2,877,102
599,254
Percentage
10.1%
2.1%
Swing
2.1pp
1.0pp
President of the House of Councillors before election
Yūzō Shigemune
Liberal Democratic
President of the House of Councillors-designate
Yutaka Terao
Liberal Democratic
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House of Councillors elections were held in Japan on 8 July 1956,[1] electing half the seats in the House plus two vacant seats in the other half. The Liberal Democratic Party won the most seats, but failed to win a majority. It was the first national election under the 1955 System, approximately a two party system of Ichirō Hatoyama's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) that was created in the "conservative merger" of 1955 and Suzuki Mosaburō's reunified Japan Socialist Party (JSP). The later dominant LDP failed to win a majority.
A key campaign issue was Prime Minister Ichirō Hatoyama's plan to revise Article 9 of the constitution – any change of the constitution requires a two-thirds majority in both chambers of the Diet. The left parties aimed to win at least a third of seats to prevent any constitutional change. Another issue was the government's plan to replace the elected prefectural boards of education with appointed ones, a plan fiercely opposed by the left: In June 1956, on the LDP's request the police intervened in the "deliberations" in the Diet when Socialist Councillors resorted to violence.
^Table 13: Persons Elected and Votes Polled by Political Parties - Ordinary Elections for the House of Councillors (1947–2004) Archived 2011-03-23 at the Wayback Machine Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications
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