REPEAL OF AN OPPOSITION PARTY: PROGRESSIVE REPUBLICAN PARTY

Democracy is indispensible in the states having a republican regime. Correspondingly, there must be a mechanism that controls the power so as to be operative in real sense. If there is no such a mechanism within the system ,the the name of the management system is Republic but it remains invalid in terms of content. Nowadays, the foundations which confer functionality to the control mechanisms can be classified as government agencies, civil society organizations and political parties. However, it is impossible to mention that such institutions of the Republic existed in Turkey in the 1920s. Because settling the process of reforms in the society is a process that still continues. Surely, In this process, there will be a section that shows dissenting voices to the new implementations. One of these is the Progressive Republican Party (Terakkiperver Cumhuriyet Fırkası) which was founded by the people within the parliament of that period. This article will focus on the short lifespan -the seven months- of the first opposition party in the history of the Turkish and how that opposing voices was silenced by the law called Takrir-i Sükûn.