class districts of the large cities rolled up huge majorities for the few liberal politicians who were allowed to run for election.
The peasantry had not yet awakened to politics, and the urban proletariat was hardly strong; but without doubt the city workers were on their way to becoming a force in Japanese society and politics. Their medium of expression was more the labor union than the political party. Japanese labor unions, which had grown rapidly during the prosperous war years, were strong enough by 1919 to exert considerable pressure through strikes, and strikes became a definite part of the Japanese scene in the 1920’s. By 1929, union membership had grown to well over 300,000 and promised to keep on growing. It seemed but a matter of time before the proletariat would join with city intellectuals and white collar workers to form a strong, possibly dominant political force in Japan.
Paralleling these political changes in Japan during the 1920’s were even more startling changes in Japanese society and culture. The rural areas and small towns were being modernized only very slowly, but a whole new social structure and life were beginning to appear in the cities. Tokyo naturally took the lead in cultural as well as political changes, for it was both the capital and the greatest city of Japan, with a population which reached about 7,000,000 in 1940. The great earthquake and fire of September 1, 1923, accelerated the speed of social change in the Tokyo area. This tremendous cataclysm, which in three days took close to 100,000 lives and completely destroyed about one-half of Tokyo and almost all of Yokohama, helped to sweep