6/25/2020 Details of 2001 (Gyo-Tsu) 82 | Judgments of the Supreme Court Provisions of the Public Offices Election Law after the Amendment). The outlines of the systems regarding the exercise of the right to vote of Japanese citizens residing abroad before and after the Amendment are as follows. (2) Outline of the system before the Amendment Article 42(1) and (2) of the Public Offices Election Law before the Amendment provided that persons not listed on the electoral register and those not eligible to be listed on the electoral register should not have the right to vote. It was further provided that persons eligible to be listed on the electoral register should be Japanese citizens aged 20 years or over having an address in an area of a given municipality in Japan who continued to be listed on the basic resident register of the municipality for three consecutive months or more since the day on which their resident cards for the municipality had been prepared (Article 21(1) of the said law, Article 15(1) of the Basic Resident Register Law). Japanese citizens residing abroad were excluded from the electoral register because they were not listed on the basic resident register of any municipality in Japan. For this reason, Japanese citizens residing abroad were unable to vote in any elections of HR members or elections of HC members. (3) Outline of the system after the Amendment By the Amendment, an overseas electoral register was newly established (see Chapter 4-2 of the Public Offices Election Law), and the principal sentence of Article 42(1) of the Public Offices Election Law before the Amendment was revised from "Persons not listed on the electoral register shall not have the right to vote" to "Persons not listed on the electoral register or overseas electoral register shall not have the right to vote." The overseas voting system shall be applicable to elections of HR members and elections of HC members. However, it is provided that, for the time being, the new system shall be applicable only to elections of HR members under the proportional representation system and elections of HC members under the proportional representation system; therefore, for the time being, it shall not be applicable to elections of HR members under the singleseat constituency system and elections of HC members under the constituency system (Article 8 of the Supplementary Provisions of the Public Offices Election Law after the Amendment). 3. In this case, the jokoku appellants indicated in the attached List of Parties 1, who are Japanese citizens residing abroad, alleging that depriving them of the opportunity to exercise the right to vote on the grounds that they reside abroad is in violation of Articles 14(1), 15(1) and (3), 43, and 44 of the Constitution and Article 25 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (Treaty No. 7 of 1979), seek against the jokoku appellee (i) declaration that the Public Offices Election Law before the Amendment is illegal (in violation of the articles of the Constitution and the Covenant mentioned above) for having precluded the jokoku appellants from exercising the right to vote in elections of HR members and elections of HC members, and (ii) declaration that the Public Offices Election Law after the Amendment is illegal (in violation of the articles of the Constitution and the Covenant mentioned above) for precluding the jokoku appellants from exercising the right to vote in elections of HR members under the single-seat constituency system and elections of HC members under the constituency system (as principal claims), as well as (iii) declaration that the jokoku appellants are eligible to exercise the right to vote in elections of HR members under the single-seat constituency system and elections of HC members under the constituency system (as a alternative claim). In addition to the above, the jokoku appellants indicated in the attached List of Parties 1 and the jokoku appellants indicated in the attached List of Parties 2 who were residing abroad as of October 20, 1996, and then returned to Japan seek damages of 50,000 yen per person and delay damages thereon from the jokoku appellee, alleging that they suffered from being unable to vote in the general election of members of the House of Representatives held on that day (hereinafter referred to as the "Election") due to the failure of the Diet, the legislative branch of government, to amend the Public Offices Election Law to enable Japanese citizens residing abroad to exercise the right to vote in national elections. https://www.courts.go.jp/app/hanrei_en/detail?id=1264 10/21