Significance of the 1963 Korean Elections

Abstract

How should we evaluate the 1963 Korean presidential and National Assembly elections and the new institutional framework of the Third Korean Republic? The presidential elections were held on October 15, 1963. Election returns from 7,392 polling booths awarded victory by a narrow margin to General Pak, head of the military junta since its successful coup in May 1961 and the presidential nominee of the Democratic-Republican party. Pak's chief opponent was Yun Po-sun of the Civil Rule party, former president of the Second Republic. Pak polled 4,702,642 votes (47%) and Yun 4,546,614 votes (45%) out of the 10,081,198 total valid votes cast; 954,977 votes were declared invalid and 1,948,840 voters (16% of the 12,985,015 total registration) did not participate in the election. (See Table 1.) If General Pak hoped to use this election to obtain a popular mandate for continued military rule in Korea, he failed to obtain it, as the votes cast for his opponents amounted to 5,378,558, or 675,916 votes more than the votes cast for Pak. Clearly, Pak would not have won the election without the organizational support of the Democratic-Republican party.J This party was organized as the junta's government party by Kim Chong-p'iJ, a young dynamic organizer, the prime mover of the aforementioned successful coup and formerly the head of Korea's powerful Central Intelligence Agency. In his capacity as Chief of the CIA, Kim laid down a blueprint for the new party and its monopoly of the decision-making apparatus of a new republican government.2 The junta's popularity had steadily declined, primarily because of the failure of the financial reform program, its inability to cope with the worsening economic situation, and the termination of a short-lived honeymoon between the military and the intellectuals.3 Kim's scheme was to popularize a party which embraced within its leadership as many civilian