This year's extraordinary Diet session came to a close Monday, ending a sitting that has been wracked with problems and scandals since it started in early October.
During the course of the session two ministers resigned, a plan for reforming college English-language tests was withdrawn and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was accused of breaching election campaign laws in relation to a cherry-blossom viewing party hosted each year by the nation's political leader.
Those scandals encouraged opposition lawmakers to boycott a number of bills, including one that included measures said to make voting in referendums easier and would have been instrumental to delivering constitutional revision.