How many thousands of years does it take for a woman to have power in government?
That’s an unfortunate question to have to ask and it’s only recently been answered. In this installment of This Week in History, we’ll be venturing to the not-so-Scandanavian country of Finland for a groundbreaking advancement of women’s rights.
To preface: I’m ecstatic that of all the history unfolding every week, women are the focus for this iteration of the column. The next time you look through history records, take note of how women are usually silent. It’s not that they didn’t have a voice; it’s that it was taken away for any number of reasons.
As a consequence, it can often be an uphill battle to give women a voice when they’re so blatantly rejected. But, this week, it is of course Women’s History Month. Let’s change that shameful pattern.
Like most moments of change, our story begins in the quiet rumblings of dissidents holding out underground.
Looming over Finland for much of its history was the mighty and indomitable Russian Empire. Sprawling from Vladivostok — on the precipice of China — to the urban expanse of St. Petersburg in the Baltic Sea, the Finns were counted among the constituents of an Empire they never asked for.
The rumblings of socialists, conservatives and liberals alike began in earnest in 1905. The Russian Tsar Nicholas II had long lost the plot. He began to see Russians as the sole proprietor of this vast empire, and who were the Finns to have their own culture, to deserve their own voice?
But as 1905 rolled into 1906, the pressure from Moscow finally began to splinter. Voices for reform were usually put down by the Tsar’s rifles, but what if the men holding those rifles were the most vocal reformists?
Soon, a revolution broke out in the streets as moderates protested the Russian aristocracy for the freedom to assemble and hold a representative government. The result was a compromise: the creation of the Russian Duma, the first representative body in the Russian Empire.
In Finland, the situation was a little less cut and dry. While undercurrents for reform were mounting in the capital, Helsinki, what was it really the capital of? And what good is reform for a region within an empire? The Finns had nothing of their own to reform.
In the meantime, the assassinations started piling up. In 1904, Governor-General Nikolai Bobrikov was the first to be taken down by the Finns. Soon after, Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich, a relative of Tsar Alexander II of Russia, was shot in Moscow.
The Russians had no choice but to ease off the pressure, and as a result, two important manifestos were propagated throughout Finland. The first was a socialist decree to establish a governing body of Finns, the second was a conservative reconstruction set to replace the ailing Senate of Finland, and the third was a class system, effectively granting Finland a modern legislative assembly.
By 1906, the Grand Duchy of Finland was gearing up for its first parliamentary election with its newfound legislative body, the Parliament of Finland.
The reform movement had been led by several parties and leaders, many of whom were gearing up for their own political campaigns. A major force in this new political landscape was the Finnish party.
This party was a collective of Finnish nationalists, but it fragmented early on. By 1907, the Young Finnish party emerged as a reform centered movement, while the Finnish Party remained a conservative, Finnish-language-centered sect.
Regardless, battling both these parties at the polls was Edvard Valpas-Hänninen’s Social Democratic Party. This left-leaning party had been at the heart of the reform movement that captivated the Finns as Russia’s influence waned.
This week in history, these three factions battled at the ballot on March 15 and 16 of 1907.
Stop right there. That isn’t our headline. Among the many revolutionary actions taken by Finns to secure their nation and culture’s future, the decision to uphold universal suffrage for all Finns, women included, was the greatest.
The reasons this came about are many, including the outspoken advocacy of Hedwig Gerhard, among other members of parliament (MP) that arose post-election. However, chief among them was the realization that politics and elections aren’t to be taken lightly.
A fair election can very much mean the survival of a culture and people, and for the Finnish leaders, excluding women from that process meant excluding an inherent part of Finland itself behind.
“Sisters,” begins Gerhard’s address leading up to the election, “The time for the elections is drawing near.”
“The Finnish woman is the first in Europe to whom suffrage has been granted. Let us perform with honour the duty that this entails,” Gerhard declared.
The actual political views of women at the time were mixed on issues, but many turned out to the election fighting for the State Church of Finland, improving the moral decency of the Finnish population, advancing prohibition and improving the status of women.
The election conducted this upcoming weekend in history was monumental for the improvement of women’s status in world politics. Although countries like New Zealand and Australia had granted women the right to vote before Finland, both had restrictions on women running for parliament.
For the first time in recorded history, a parliament openly allowed female candidates to run for office. The result? A respectable turnout was followed by an influx of women on the political scene.
62 female candidates campaigned in the election, and of those, 19 won seats. The majority of those elected sided with the Social Democratic Party.
These are the women that made history by being elected: Evelina Ala-Kulju, Hedvig Gebhard, Alexandra Gripenberg, Lucina Hagman, Anni Huotari, Mimmi Kanervo, Liisa Kivioja, Hilda Käkikoski, Maria Laine, Sandra (Aleksandra) Lehtinen, Alli Nissinen, Dagmar Neovius, Jenny Nuotio (later Upari), Maria Paaso-Laine, Hilja Pärssinen, Maria Raunio, Hilma Räsänen, Miina Sillanpää and Iida Vemmelpuu.
I encourage you to Google some of them; see if they have a Wikipedia article, at the very least. If not, why do you think that’s the case?
This parliament would carry out some ambitious reforms while in power, including increased support for women’s groups and Finnish workers, in addition to work hour adjustments and the prohibition of alcohol (although that wouldn’t be enforced for another decade).
Today, women make up a little over 45% of the Finnish parliament. Their impact on the country has certainly been felt, but their work is just beginning. This history is only a few generations old; given back the years of power that were stripped away from them, women will finally start to see the tremendous value they bring to this world materialize.
Let Gerhard’s statement reverberate today:
“Sisters! Let us ensure that not one of us is absent when the composition of Finland’s first truly democratic Parliament is being determined. A heavy burden of responsibility will lie on the shoulders of the woman who stays away from the election without due cause.”