Political parties of the Empire of Japan public assembly, the press and on political discussion. The Meiji government had come to power by an elite of "samurai" from certain clans ("hanbatsu") and the "genrō" felt threatened by anything looking ever remotely like republicanism or democracy. During this period, Itagaki Taisuke and Ōkuma Shigenobu were leading figures in the legitimization of political parties. Itagaki created Japan's first political party, the Aikoku Kōtō, in 1873 in Tokyo to petition for an elected assembly, and a similar regional party based in Osaka, the Aikokusha. These groups were the basis of the Jiyutō (Liberal Party), founded in 1881 as Japan’s first
Japan Farmers Party (1926–28) Japan Farmers Party (1926–28) The Japan Farmers Party (, "Nihon Nōmintō") was a political party in Japan between 1926 and 1928. It represented a rightist tendency amongst the proletarian parties in the country at the time. The party had a nationalist orientation. The party emerged from a split in the Labour-Farmer Party in 1926. An older generation of leaders of the Japan Peasant Union, such as Okabe Kansuke and Hirano Rikizo, were uncomforatble with the influence of the younger, radical generation in the Japan Peasant Union (who were keen on including leftwing elements in the Labour-Farmer Party), such as Oyama