ISSN:
0026-749X
Source:
Cambridge Journals Digital Archives
Topics:
Ethnic Sciences
,
History
,
Political Science
,
Economics
Notes:
When universal manhood suffrage was promulgated, with much eclat, on 5 May 1925, its friends and its enemies both agreed that this act was a new high-water mark in the thirty-five year history of Japanese parliamentarianism. Of a national population of nearly 40 million in 1890, the first electorate had been carefully confined to 400,000 adult males who met a stiff property test. By the early 1920s inflation, population growth, and eased voting requirements had gradually spread the franchise to some 3 million persons, still a mere fraction of the populace. Then, at a stroke, the universal suffrage law of 1925 gave the vote to males aged twenty-five and older, swelling the pool of electors four-fold to more than 13 million.
Type of Medium:
Electronic Resource
URL:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0026749X0000055X
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