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) vote for the party in the elections the same year. The party launched ten candidates in the 1928 Diet election, whom together mustered 36,491 votes. None of the candidates of the party were elected. In December 1928 the party merged with the Proletarian Masses Party, the Japan Labour-Farmer Party and four regional political parties, forming the Japan Masses Party. 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