Valdez daily prospector., 1913-10-02
THURSDAY, OCTOBER ,, 1913
FINLAND SUFFRAGE LEADER BORN IN ALASKA.

of the ElnnlSh parllament Ol Miss Anna Furuhjclm because she was born in Alaska, c0un- try which now has equal suffrage but which was under Russian rule at the time of her birth. She is the daughter of Russian ad- miral who died a few years ago. Her father was next to the last governor of Alaska before it was acquired by the United States. He belonged to the Swedish mo- bility in Finland, where his tal- ented daughter is now a power in politics.
 Little did her father dream when he was governor of Alaska that some day that country would have political equality of the sex es and that his own country of Finland would elect his daueh- ter, born in Alaska, to it's high est legislative body.
 Miss Furuhjelm is second vice. president of the International Woman Suffrage alliance and at tended the recent meeting of that body at Budapest, but she left the congress before it had adjourn ed to return to Finland and look after her candidacy for the par lament. She was one of 2i WO- men elected to that body last month.
 Ida Hustled Harper, an Indiana woman, who has been travelling in Europe and writing about the progress of the political equality movement, describes Miss Furuh- jelm as an aristocrat by birth. but thoroughly democratic fin her sympathies. She speaks scv- en languages fluently and has for many years been leader of women in Finland. She had been a candidate for parliament before but was defeated brralrs" she was a member of the Swedish, or mi norily, party. Recently there has been a coalition of he Swedish and Finnish clements of the WO- men of Finland, and that prob ably accounts iuN her success. Her election is attributed to the votes of women. Society women who never went to the polls be- fore helped elect Miss Furuh- jclm, and besides she received the votes of women clerks and dO- mestic servants because she stsOd for measures for the bet termenI of their condition.
 Thirteen of the twcnty-onc women recently elected to the Finnish parliament are members of the social democratic party. the aims of which seem to be generally about the same as the aims of Miss Furuhjelm and Oth- CT women that were success full at the. polls.
 The women of Finland were 'enfranchisrd in 1906. In 1907 t9 women we're elected to parlia- ment; in 1908, 25; in 1909, 2l; in a9Io, r.; in. 1911 li,; .ald, 1913, .2l. '." <
 The condilion ill Finland is re- markable because of the frequent dissoultion of the diet, or par lament, by the czar of Russia, of which Finland is a part. Arms have been taken away from the people and S0,OOO Russian troops are on hand to see that the rule of the cZar is enforced. Even at that, there a deal of independ- ence among the people. They go right ahead electing members of the diet committed to democrat ic principles, and in time they may wear out the. opposition of the czar. ....
 Despite the autocratic domina- tiOn of Russia, the Finnish par liament has enacted much legis- latiOn of a reformative character similar to measures that have been popular in legislatures of the United States ill the last four or five years.
 Curiously enough, the women of Finland got the right to vote from the members of the diet and to hold office in the highest leg islative body, but were not en-