By-Elections in the Ottoman Parliament, 1908-1912

Abstract

The 1908 Assembly of Deputies (Meclis-i Mebusan), which opened on December 17th 1908 after the proclamation of the second Constitutional Monarchy, witnessed a colorful parliamentary life. While the things happened in this assembly created the first examples in terms of the democracy adventure of Turkey, the applications to be performed or the ongoing ones later served as a model for the Turkish Republic. Particulary the things that happened in the assembly after 1910 have the characteristics of setting an example for the following periods. The Assembly of Deputies in the Ottoman State, which opened in 1908 after a long period of thirty years, had a solemn opening ceremony on December 17th. The opening ceremony was prepared days before by considering even the smallest details, and the ones who would attend the ceremony, the places where the invitees would stand and the marches to be sung were all determined. Many domestic and foreign viewers came to the opening ceremony to which Sultan Abdulhamid II also attended and due to the crowd, there were no vacancies left in the hotels and inns in Istanbul. Therefore, many mosques and schools were assigned to the visitors as places to stay. 230 deputies were present at the opening ceremony of the 1908 Assembly of Deputies, where 281 deputies were elected. 281 deputies were elected as members of the 1908-1912 Assembly of Deputies and about 324 different deputies took part in the Assembly during the four working periods. In this study, within the scope of the statistical information, we will lay emphasis on the 43 deputies that differed. Before proceeding to the by-elections, it would be beneficial to emphasize the election system in the Ottoman State and the working period of the Assembly of Deputies in this period in order to better understand the subject matter.