A PIECE OF SWISS HISTORY
THE SWISS WOMAN’S RÜTLI
On 5 March 1957, a step towards gender equality was made in Unterbäch. Against the will of the national government, the local council granted women a unique right to vote. Thus, the women of Unterbäch were the very first women in Switzerland to be allowed to vote – 14 years before the introduction of women’s suffrage. For this reason Unterbäch is also called the “Rütli of Swiss women”. This is in reference to the Rütli (Rütli-Meadow), the place where, according to legend, the alliance of the original Swiss cantons was made, the so-called Rütli-Oath.
It is 2 March 1957, a Saturday, shortly before six in the evening. Crime scene: Unterbäch, a village of 400 people in the Upper Valais. There is snow on the streets. A woman in a beige coat with a herringbone pattern is making her way. She has tied a scarf around her and her hair is knotted tightly back. A sign on the side of the road says “Bureau de vote féminin”. Men line the last steps to the ballot box. When they recognise a familiar face from the village, a deafening noise erupts – drums being beaten by strong male hands. The woman quickly climbs the stairs. As she slides her ballot paper into the slot of the ballot box, a flurry of flashbulbs from photo cameras captures this historic moment on celluloid. Stones from the male protesters hit the roof. The woman is Katharina Zenhäusern, wife of the mayor of Unterbäch. She had just become the first Swiss woman to make her political will known at the ballot box – illegally, against the will of the men and the authorities. (Source: blick.ch)
WHAT’S GOING ON IN UNTERBÄCH?
There is this lawyer and prefect, Peter von Roten, who sits in the Grand Council of the Canton of Valais for the Catholic Conservatives. This man has taken it into his head to introduce women’s suffrage in a subversive way and without amending the constitution, so to speak on his own authority. The Valais electoral law of 1938 provides the jurist with an opportunity to do so. Article 8 states that prisoners or paupers are excluded from exercising political rights – there is no mention of women. In Unterbäch, the situation is favourable in that the municipal council has already decided to register the 150 women of age in the village in the electoral register. And because a federal ballot on the extension of compulsory civil defence to women is scheduled for this weekend, Peter von Roten sees the big day for the historic act as having come – it is inconceivable to him that only men could decide on compulsory civil defence for women. He also convinces the village teacher and mayor Paul Zenhäusern of his plan, and he gets his council colleagues on board. And of course the village’s highest political representative also informs the Valais State Council about the plan, and it is hardly surprising that the message comes back from there that the Unterbächer plan is unlawful under constitutional law because it is unconstitutional. (Source: blick.ch)
A SEVEN-POINT MEMORANDUM
The mountain villagers react with a seven-point memorandum in which they inform the “High Council of State of the Canton of Valais” that the people of Unterbach “have in no way asked for a consent which, in our opinion, they did not need and whose refusal is therefore legally irrelavant”. The government down in Sion is then somewhat surprised by the crystal-clear legal rebuff, which can hardly have come from the pen of a village school teacher with no legal knowledge. In fact, the letters were written by Peter von Roten.
But what no one knows is that behind the two men is a woman – Iris von Roten, herself a doctor of law, the wife of Peter von Roten. He came out of the closet many years later: “Iris was the driving force behind my commitment to women’s suffrage and is therefore the real author of the referendum in Unterbäch. Certainly, I would have been in favour even without her influence, but I would hardly have fought so vehemently.” (Source: blick.ch)
AHEAD OF ITS TIME
In 1957, Unterbäch sent a political signal and was ahead of its time. The international press took note and reported on the story; even the *New York Times* covered the illegal goings-on in the small Swiss mountain community. Thirty-three out of 86 women from Unterbäch dared to make their way to the polling station; the proposal was rejected both there and at national level. Women in Valais had to wait until 1970 to be granted political rights, whilst Swiss women had to wait a further year.
In Switzerland, it took a further 13 years before Elisabeth Kopp (80) was finally elected to the country’s highest government in 1984. What began in Unterbäch – known as the ‘Rütli of Swiss women’ and a symbol of women’s political rights – reached its culmination with the election of the first woman to the Federal Council. The rebellious village of Unterbäch granted Federal Councillor Kopp honorary citizenship. (Source: blick.ch)
Tip
IN MEMORY OF THE RÜTLI OF SWISS WOMEN
Women’s Quotation Trail
Quotes from famous women from Valais punctuate this enjoyable 3.5 km walk from Brandalp to Unterbäch.
The Women’s Quotes Trail can be enjoyed as a walk in summer and as a snowshoe hike in winter.