1937 Constantinopolitan general election (Queen of Cities)

General elections were held on December 5, 1937 to determine the composition of the fourth Parliament of the Sovereign City of Constantinople. This election was held following the April Crisis of 1935, which resulted in the adoption of a a new electoral law that changed the electoral system to first-past-the-post and gave a massive advantage to the ruling Citizens' Front and the resignation of all members of the Directory that were not affiliated with the Front. As a result, the ruling party won in a landslide, gaining a supermajority in the Chamber of Deputies.

On December 13, the Parliament re-elected the first single-party Directory in the country's history, firmly marking the beginning of the Citizens' Front's one-party rule over Constantinople.

Electoral system
The 1937 election was the first one that was held under the new d'Andria Law that provoked a political crisis that brought down Constantinople's multi-party democracy. Under this law, the Chamber of Deputies would be elected via first-past-the-post, giving a large advantage to multi-ethnic parties such as the Citiens' Front. In addition, subsequent legislation gerrymandered the electoral map in favor of the incumbent party, effectively guaranteeing a victory for the Front. The Chamber of Nations retained its old electoral system, leading to a weaker Frontist majority in the upper chamber.

Context
The 1937 election was held two and a half years since the Citizens' Front's seizure of power in the events of the April Crisis. Disillusioned with the lack of any social or economic reforms and the increasing political gridlock, the members of the Citizens' Front began to envision a possible electoral reform that would gear the country's political system towards a strong majority rule. The Crisis itself was caused by the Front's attempt to pass electoral reform (d'Andria Law) that would significantly increase its chances of getting a majority while simultaneously compromising the representation of the interests of ethnic communities in the Chamber of Deputies. This law did not find any support among the non-Frontist deputies and was thus supposedly doomed to fail in a fair vote in Parliament.

However, the reformist cause of the Citizens' Front gained popularity among the Constantinopolitan military, leading it to threaten a military intervention against Parliament. As a result of this intimidation, both chambers of Parliament approved the legislation by a large margin. The threat of a military coup scandalized numerous politicians and magistrates, thus leading to the resignation of many high-ranking officials (including members of the Directory) that were opposed to such methods. These resignations ultimately backfired as the intimidated Parliament subsequently voted in a one-party Directory for the first time in the country's history, securing the Front's chokehold on Constantinopolitan politics.

The period of quasi-one-party rule by the Citizens' Front was marked by the beginning of what would be known as the Great Reforms, a series of various programs that sought to modernize Constantinopolitan society and economy. Between 1935 and 1937, the government launched preparations for education, military, language, and administrative reforms. Meanwhile, the still ongoing economic crisis led the government to implement the country's first welfare programs that included the implementation of a minimum wage (1935), the prohibition of child labor (1936) and the creation of an unemployment benefit system (1937). For its 1937 campaign, the Citizens' Front prioritized the creation of a health insurance system for the city-state's poorest citizens.