1942 Japanese general election

1942 Japanese general election

← 1937 30 April 1942 1946 →

All 466 seats in the House of Representatives
234 seats needed for a majority
  First party
 
Leader Hideki Tojo
Party Taisei Yokusankai
Last election 421
Seats won 381


Prime Minister before election

Hideki Tojo
Taisei Yokusankai

Prime Minister after election

Hideki Tojo
Taisei Yokusankai

General elections were held in Japan on 30 April 1942 to elect members of the House of Representatives. They were the only elections held in Japan during World War II. By this time, the House of Representatives had lost much of its power to the military dictatorship, a process that had begun with the "Manchurian Incident" when the Imperial Army invaded Manchuria without approval from the (then still civilian) cabinet in 1931. Since 1932 when Admiral Viscount Saitō Makoto was appointed prime minister of the first so-called "national unity cabinet", fewer members of the political parties in the House of Representatives had held any significant role in government. Additionally, the military had by this point sought to transform Japan into a totalitarian one-party state.