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Two-stage presidential elections were held in Finland in 1931. On 15 and 16 January the public elected presidential electors to an electoral college. [1] They in turn elected the President.The result was a victory for Pehr Evind Svinhufvud, who won on the third ballot by just two votes. [2] The turnout for the popular vote was 47.3%. [3]
This presidential election was held during an ideologically, politically, socially and economically tense time. The Great Depression was impoverishing many Finnish farmers and workers. The far-right Lapua Movement had not settled for the ban of the Communist Party and its affiliated organizations in the autumn of 1930. It wanted to help elect a President who would also strongly oppose the Social Democrats and moderate bourgeois parties, such as the Progressives. Although Svinhufvud disapproved of the Lapua Movement's violent kidnappings of left-wing politicians and other illegal acts, he was their preferred presidential candidate. Former President K.J. Ståhlberg, a champion of democracy, parliamentarism and the rule of law, had been briefly kidnapped by some activists of the Lapua Movement with his wife in October 1930. He was chosen as the Progressive presidential candidate. Speaker of the Finnish Parliament, Kyösti Kallio, held ideals similar to those of Ståhlberg, and he became the Agrarian presidential candidate. The outgoing President, Lauri Kristian Relander, had lost the Agrarian presidential candidacy to Kallio, because he did not condemn the Lapua Movement as strongly as Kallio did, and a sufficient number of Agrarians believed that Kallio could control the Lapua Movement's extremists more effectively than Relander. Right-wing Finns and some centrists, such as a prominent Agrarian parliamentarian, Juho Niukkanen, were concerned that Ståhlberg's re-election (after a six-year break) as the Finnish President would escalate political tensions in Finland. The Commander-in-Chief of the Civil Guards (a bourgeois voluntary defence organization), Major General Lauri Malmberg, announced in the Finnish Parliament that he would not guarantee order among the Civil Guards, if Ståhlberg was elected president. Svinhufvud's razor-thin victory required Niukkanen's arm-twisting tactics, whereby he pressured all the Agrarian presidential electors to support Svinhufvud. This 69-year-old and slightly ailing conservative politician was considered by his supporters as a sufficiently bold, solid and patriotic man to re-unite the ideologically divided Finns. His pro-democracy supporters hoped that he could keep both right-wing extremists and left-wing extremists in check. [4] [5] [6]
| Party | Votes | % | Seats | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Social Democratic Party | 252,550 | 30.18 | 90 | |
| National Coalition Party | 180,378 | 21.56 | 64 | |
| Agrarian League | 167,574 | 20.03 | 69 | |
| National Progressive Party | 148,430 | 17.74 | 50 | |
| Swedish People's Party | 75,382 | 9.01 | 25 | |
| Small Farmers' Party | 11,772 | 1.41 | 2 | |
| Others | 672 | 0.08 | 0 | |
| Total | 836,758 | 100.00 | 300 | |
| Valid votes | 836,758 | 99.67 | ||
| Invalid/blank votes | 2,763 | 0.33 | ||
| Total votes | 839,521 | 100.00 | ||
| Registered voters/turnout | 1,775,982 | 47.27 | ||
| Source: Nohlen & Stöver | ||||
| Candidate | Party | First round | Second round | Third round | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Votes | % | Votes | % | Votes | % | |||
| Väinö Tanner | Social Democratic Party | 90 | 30.00 | 0 | 0.00 | |||
| Pehr Evind Svinhufvud | National Coalition Party | 88 | 29.33 | 98 | 32.67 | 151 | 50.33 | |
| Kyösti Kallio | Agrarian League | 64 | 21.33 | 53 | 17.67 | |||
| Kaarlo Juho Ståhlberg | National Progressive Party | 58 | 19.33 | 149 | 49.67 | 149 | 49.67 | |
| Total | 300 | 100.00 | 300 | 100.00 | 300 | 100.00 | ||
| Source: Nohlen & Stöver | ||||||||
Kyösti Kallio was a Finnish politician who served as the fourth president of Finland from 1937 to 1940. His presidency included leading the country through the Winter War; while he relinquished the post of commander-in-chief to Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim, he played a role as a spiritual leader. After the war, he became both the first President of Finland to resign and the only one to die in office, dying of a heart attack while returning home after submitting his resignation.
Lauri Kristian Relander was the second president of Finland (1925–1931). A prominent member of the Agrarian League, he served as a member of Parliament, and as Speaker, before his election as President.
Kaarlo Juho Ståhlberg was a Finnish jurist and academic who was one of the most important pioneers of republicanism in the country. He was the first president of Finland (1919–1925) and a liberal nationalist.
Pehr Evind Svinhufvud af Qvalstad was the third president of Finland from 1931 to 1937. Serving as a lawyer, judge, and politician in the Grand Duchy of Finland, which was at that time an autonomous state under the Russian Empire’s rule, Svinhufvud played a major role in the movement for Finnish independence. He was the one who presented the Declaration of Independence to the Parliament.
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Parliamentary elections were held in Finland on 1 and 2 July 1929. The result was a victory for the Agrarian League, which won 60 of the 200 seats in Parliament. Voter turnout was 55.6%.
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Parliamentary elections were held in Finland between 1 and 3 July 1933. The Social Democratic Party remained the largest party in Parliament with 78 of the 200 seats. However, Prime Minister Toivo Mikael Kivimäki of the National Progressive Party continued in office after the elections, supported by Pehr Evind Svinhufvud and quietly by most Agrarians and Social Democrats. They considered Kivimäki's right-wing government a lesser evil than political instability or an attempt by the radical right to gain power. Voter turnout was 62.2%.
Parliamentary elections were held in Finland on 1 and 2 July 1936. Following the election Prime Minister Toivo Mikael Kivimäki of the National Progressive Party was defeated in a confidence vote in September 1936 and resigned in October. Kyösti Kallio of the Agrarian League formed a centrist minority government after Pehr Evind Svinhufvud refused to allow the Social Democrats to join the government. After Svinhufvud's defeat in the February 1937 presidential election, Kallio took office as the new President in March 1937, and he allowed the Social Democrats, Agrarians and Progressives to form the first centre-left or "red soil" Finnish government. Aimo Cajander (Progressive) became Prime Minister, although the real strong men of the government were Finance Minister Väinö Tanner and Defence Minister Juho Niukkanen (Agrarian).
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| Parliamentary elections | |
|---|---|
| Municipal elections | |
| County elections | |
| Presidential elections | |
| European elections | |
| Sámi elections | |
| Referendums | |
Elections in brackets were not public elections | |
