Pressure mounted in postwar Turkey over the state's increasingly authoritarian rule. Responding to spreading dissension, Inönü yielded to his critics and authorized multiparty activity, permitting access to a democratic process. In 1946 four of the dissenters, Jelal Bayar, Adnan Menderes, Refik Koraltan, and Fuad Koprulu, founded the Democratic Party, which gained unexpected popularity in the general elections. Despite bribery, scare tactics, and even suspicious ballot handling, the Democratic Party won 61 out of 465 seats in the assembly, and consequently an official, if not modest, voice in the decision-making process. By the election of May 1950, the Democratic Party had attracted enough of the displaced minorities to win a sweeping majority, appealing to private business owners, Islamic reactionaries, and the struggling rural population. In a first-time stunning example of Turkish democracy at work, Inönü stepped down peacefully to lead the minority People's Party. Bayar was elected president, Menderes was chosen as prime minister, and a period of relative prosperity was inaugurated. Economic initiatives were taken to relax government controls and to encourage private enterprises, and Menderes' alliance with the United States resulted in the arrival of American aid, agricultural assistance, equipment, and countless John Deere tractors. In a move to appease their Islamic supporters, the Democratic Party approved the reinstatement of religious instruction as an optional educational program and reversed Atatürk's decree requiring Turkish as the language of the call to prayer.
Despite a brief period of progress in the early 1950s, Turkey's economy took a nosedive. To finance its poorly managed reforms, the government was forced to take out foreign loans, and Turks began seeking employment beyond their borders. Meanwhile, in a move to return to a one-party system, Menderes began undermining his opposition by banning political meetings, invoking censorship, and creating a special Democratic Party to "investigate political activity," a sufficiently vague mandate for random arrests. Although Menderes maintained a high degree of popularity, the military elite and the foreign-educated intelligentsia began to sow the seeds of rebellion. In response, Menderes imposed martial law. Within a week, students were demonstrating in the streets and cadets from the military academy were staging protests. Cemal Gürsel, a commander of the ground forces and one of the leaders of the movement, decided it was time to act, and in spite of a lack of a clear plan, set the military machine into motion. On May 27, 1960, in a nonviolent coup d'état, the armed forces arrested President Bayar, whose later sentence of death was changed to life in prison. Menderes was hanged on charges of treason, along with hundreds of members of the Democratic Party. The Committee of National Unity, composed of high-level military officials who had participated in the coup, dissolved the Democratic Party government and took over. The people, jubilant of the overthrow, were rewarded with a new constitution; Gürsel was elected president of the Assembly, and former President Inönü, 37 years after his first appointment as prime minister, assumed the position again, along with the task of constructing the Second Republic.
Four political parties offered candidates in the 1961 election, of which only four won seats: the Atatürk-influenced Justice Party, led by Süleyman Demirel; the social democrat RPP; the right-to-moderate Turkish Workers Party; and the communist Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions. Despite Inönü's popularity, the RPP lost ground, while the JP, plumped up by displaced members of the late DP, made gains. Nevertheless, neither was able to summon a majority and legislation was paralyzed. After a year and a half, the military handed over control of the state to civilian rule but maintained a watchful eye on the government in the ensuing years, even failing in two attempted coups later in the first half of the decade. In 1965 the JP was successful in acquiring a majority in the Grand National Assembly, sidelining the RPP for the first time since 1961 and providing Demirel with enough votes to end the coalition-style government in favor of a cabinet.
