- Kenseitō
nihongo|Kenseitō (Constitutional Party)|憲政党|Keiseitō was a
political party inMeiji period Japan .The Kenseitō was founded in June 1898, as a merger of the
Shimpotō headed byŌkuma Shigenobu and theJiyūtō led byItagaki Taisuke , with Ōkuma as party president. After the collapse of the Itō administration, Ōkuma becamePrime Minister of Japan , and in the following election, the Kenseitō won a majority of seats in the lower house of the Diet.However, members of the former Jiyūtō felt that Ōkuma did not distribute the cabinet seats in fair proportion to their party, and joined with
Yamagata Aritomo and other conservative elements in the Diet to criticizeMinister of Education Ozaki Yukio for a speech which they felt promotedrepublicanism . Following Ozaki’s resignation, the former Jiyūtō faction continued to attack the government until Ōkuma's cabinet disintegrated.The former Jiyūtō faction reorganized itself into the 'New Kenseitō' in November 1898 with Itagaki as its president. The ‘New Kenseitō” joined Itō Hirobumi’s
Rikken Seiyūkai in 1900.The remaining party members still loyal to Ōkuma reorganized themselves into the 'Kensei Hontō' (True Kenseitō) in November 1898. However, 34 party members defected in 1901 over Ōkuma’s support for the 4th Itō administration’s efforts to raise taxes to pay for expenses incurred in the
Boxer Rebellion .In 1903, the Kensei Hontō and Rikken Seiyūkai joined forces to oppose the first
Katsura Tarō administration. In 1907, Ōkuma resigned as president, and in the elections of 1909, the Kensei Hontō won only 65 seats in the Diet, as opposed to the Rikken Seiyūkai’s 204.The Kensei Hontō merged with smaller parties to form the
Rikken Kokumintō in March 1910.References
*Banno, Junji, "The Establishment of The Japanese Constitutional System". Routledge (1995) ISBN 0415134757
*Hall, John Whitney,
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