Japan's Pseudo-Democracy by Peter J. Herzog

Author:Peter J. Herzog [Herzog, Peter J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781873410097
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Published: 1995-01-17T00:00:00+00:00

The 1976 Decision

The Supreme Court announced another decision on this issue on 14 April 1976. The suit concerned the December 1974 elections to the House of Representatives which voters from Chiba Prefecture wanted to have declared unconstitutional. In its ruling, the court stated that the Diet should have established a rational election system. 'Naturally, the equality of the ratio between the electors of the population of each election district and the allocated number of seats must be the most important and basic standard, but in addition, the prefectural division which forms the basis of the election district partition is an element that cannot be overlooked. In the further division of the prefectures, factors such as the results of earlier elections, the integrative power of the election district, cities, towns and villages and other administrative units, size (of the election district), density of population, type of inhabitants, transportation facilities, geographical conditions etc. are to be considered and the relation with the seats to be allocated is to be taken into account in making a concrete decision.

'Moreover, how the rapid changes in society, of which the urban conglomeration of the population is one phenomenon, should be taken into account and how it should be reflected in the division into election districts and the allocation of seats is one of the high policy factors to be considered in the Diet. Various elements, therefore, can be taken into consideration in the partition into election districts and the allocation of seats. Nevertheless, even if from this point of view allowance is made for all the elements which can be considered in the Diet, if the inequality in the concrete value of votes has reached such a degree that it cannot possibly be regarded as generally possessing rationality, it must be inferred that the limit of the Diet's rational discretion has been transcended and unless a special reason is shown justifying this inequality, it must be judged to constitute a violation of the constitution.'

The court pointed out that despite a revision of the Election Law which brought the inequality in the ratio of the value of one vote in the most under-represented districts to the most over-represented districts to 1: 2, the discrepancy from the national average of the number of votes necessary to elect one representative was 47.3 per cent for the most over-represented district and 162.87 per cent for the most under-represented constituency. The conclusion of the court was 'The inequality in the value of votes shown by this discrepancy was of such an extent that even if all factors mentioned above, particularly the necessity of coping with the rapid social changes, were included in a certain discretion in policy, it could not possibly be thought to generally possess rationality and was a condition contravening the equality of the right to vote required by the constitution.'

Since there had been no correction within the constitutionally required reasonable time, the determination of the election districts and the allocation of seats for the 10 December 1972 election to the House of Representatives violated the constitution.

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