1956 Icelandic parliamentary election

1956 Icelandic parliamentary election
Iceland
← 1953 24 June 1956 June 1959 →

All 35 seats in the Lower House
and 17 seats in the Upper House of Althing
Turnout92.07%
Party Leader Vote % Seats +/–
Upper House
Independence Ólafur Thors 42.37 6 −1
People's Alliance Hannibal Valdimarsson 19.18 3 New
Social Democratic Haraldur Guðmundsson 18.33 2 0
Progressive Hermann Jónasson 15.63 6 0
Lower House
Independence Ólafur Thors 42.37 13 −1
People's Alliance Hannibal Valdimarsson 19.18 5 New
Social Democratic Haraldur Guðmundsson 18.33 6 +2
Progressive Hermann Jónasson 15.63 11 +1
This lists parties that won seats. See the complete results below.
Prime Minister before Prime Minister after
Ólafur Thors
Independence
Hermann Jónasson
Progressive

Parliamentary elections were held in Iceland on 24 June 1956.[1] The Independence Party remained the largest party in the Lower House of the Althing, winning 13 of the 35 seats.[2]

Electoral system

[edit]

The elections were conducted under rural–urban proportional representation. Twenty-one members were elected in single-member constituencies via first-past-the-post voting, while the remainder were elected using D'Hondt method proportional representation: twelve members in two-member constituencies, eight members in Reykjavík, and eleven from a single national compensatory list. To earn national list seats, a party had to win at least one constituency seat. In constituencies electing two or more members, within the party list, voters had the option to re-rank the candidates and could also strike a candidate out. Allocation of seats to candidates was done using a system based on the Borda count.[3]

Results

[edit]
PartyVotes%Seats
Lower
House
+/–Upper
House
+/–
Independence Party35,02742.3713–16–1
People's Alliance15,85919.18503+1
Social Democratic Party15,15318.336+220
Progressive Party12,92515.6311+160
National Preservation Party3,7064.480–200
Independents80.010New0New
Total82,678100.00350170
Valid votes82,67898.01
Invalid/blank votes1,6771.99
Total votes84,355100.00
Registered voters/turnout91,61892.07
Source: Nohlen & Stöver

References

[edit]
  1. ^ Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) Elections in Europe: A data handbook, p961 ISBN 978-3-8329-5609-7
  2. ^ Nohlen & Stöver, p976
  3. ^ Renwick, Alan (2010). Helgason, Þorkell; Hermundardóttir, Friðný Ósk; Simonarson, Baldur (eds.). "Electoral System Change in Europe since 1945: Iceland" (PDF). Electoral system change since 1945. Archived (PDF) from the original on 4 October 2021. Retrieved 4 October 2021.