JAPANESE GENERAL ELECTIONS

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2422, 30 March 1915, Page 6

JAPANESE GENERAL ELECTIONS

OPPOSITION LANDSLIDE

(By Telegraph—Press Assn.—Copyright.)

(Rec. March 29, 7.20 p.m.)

Tokio, March 29. The Japanese elections have resulted in a Government majority ol : forty. The Opposition, tho Seiyukai I'artv, has lost 7a. seats, of which Baron Kato has gained 55. The electors endorse the Government's policy regarding China, believing that Germany has fostered Ohincso antagonism towards Japan.

The addition of two divisions to the Armv in Korea was the oruxj ostensibly, of the trouble which, on December 25, 1914, caused the dissolution of the Japanese Parliament. The same proposal caused the fall of the last Cabinet of Marquis Saionji and of tho third Katsura Cabinet. The Okuma Cabinet (which camo into office in April, 1914, as the result of tho Navy scandals which discredited the Ministry under Admiral Count Yamamoto, and the Seipukai Party), did not have the support of the House, even from its inception, which was regarded by tho nation as unconstitutional. It was really a Cabinet of the Chosliu clan, backed by a combination of the Dosliikai, the Chuseikai, and tlie Kokuminto, with the Seiyukai Opposition in an overwhelming majorityTo make matters worse, it turned out that the Cabinet had no other policy than an increase of army divisions and the destruction of the Seiyukai Party.' i The Okuma Ministry has since then made headway—it lias behind it the credit of tho successful issue of the operations at I'singtau. of the formulation of a definite and well-devised financial policy, and of other minor achievements—and therefore the prospect of a fifth complete change .of Ministry within little more than two years may be considered unlikely. ; But foreign interest in the present situation in Japan must lie in its general rather t'han its particular features in the overgrowing prominence of the role of the Diet, and in the approach toward* party politics and government. These are facts—that up to within a couple of years ago Japan's destinies were controlled by a single clan, entrenched behind tho Elder Statesmen, the Army, and, in the last resort, the Throne, while the Diet and the people played the part of the Greek chorus, praising or lamenting (for a few weeks only in the year) what the Ministers did, but never, or rarely ever, interfering in the action; and that within the last two years the chorus has jnounted'the stage, overthrowing one Ministry headed by the strongest bureaucrat of modern magnates and the, great military clan of Choshu, overthrowing the succeeding Ministry, and therewith humbling tho Kavy magnates and tlie great Navy clan of Satsuma, ca-sting into discredit and bending to its will the one-time omnipotent Genro, and establishing in the seat of power a group of men who proclaim the doctrines of advanced Liberalism and to-day are giving proof of their conviction that a Ministry should represent the views of the majority in Parliament and the electorate. .