The 1927 parliamentary election was a victory for the Labour Party which won 59 of the 150 seats and became the parliament's largest group. The Conservative Prime Minister Ivar Lykke resigned on 20January 1928. He recommended that the King ask the leader of the Centre Party, Johan Mellbye, to form a new cabinet. When Mellbye's attempt failed, the King called the Storting's president Carl Joachim Hambro and vice-president Hornsrud for consultation on 23January. During the meeting with the King, Hornsrud expressed his view that it would be constitutionally most correct to ask the Labour Party as the largest party to form a cabinet, though he did not know whether the Labour Party would be able to form a cabinet.