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.

The likewise fascist Tōhōkai broke away from the Taisei Yokusankai and turned against prime minister Tojo.

[2][3] The Tojo Cabinet marked those independent congressmen elected who were not Taisei Yokusankai members as "not endorsed" in the official result.

Although Japan nominally became a one-party state as a result of the election, the group of Yokusankai-endorsed candidates soon split into numerous factions, some of which became critical of the government as the war dragged on.