Finnish labour leader who became the world’s first Social Democratic head of government and then joined the Red government
Born in Kannus in Central Ostrobothnia in 1873, he emigrated to America at 17, worked in the mines and joined the radical Western Federation of Miners. Back in Finland from 1900, he entered Parliament for the Social Democrats in 1907, chaired the Finnish Trade Union Federation in 1912–1917 and was Speaker in 1913. In 1917 he became vice-chairman of the Senate’s economic department, the world’s first social democratic prime minister. In the civil war he was commissar for supply in the People’s Delegation, signed the 1 March treaty with Soviet Russia and fled to Russia after the defeat. In 1919–1920 he advised the British-organised Murmansk Legion, for which the Communist Party of Finland sentenced him to death. From 1922 to 1949 he edited the social democratic paper Raivaaja in the United States, and the 1944 Lex Tokoi cleared him of the civil war charges.
Career timeline
- 1907–1918Social Democratic member of the Parliament of Finland
- 1912–1917Chairman of the Finnish Trade Union Federation
- 1913Speaker of the Parliament of Finland
- 1917Vice-chairman of the Senate’s economic department (head of government)
- 1918Commissar for supply, Finnish People’s Delegation
- 1919–1920Political adviser to the Murmansk Legion
- 1922–1949Editor of Raivaaja in the United States
Trade union leader who commanded the Finnish Red Guards from January to March 1918
Born in Kuopio in 1880, he joined the labour movement while studying law at Helsinki University. He was one of the leading Red Guard organisers in Helsinki during the 1905 general strike and in 1907 became the first chairman of the Finnish Trade Union Federation, losing the post in 1911 over his drinking. One of the most radical voices of 1917, openly calling for armed revolution, he was elected to the five-man committee of the Red Guards and in January 1918, without any military training, succeeded Ali Aaltonen as their commander-in-chief. Removed on 20 March after a series of defeats, he organised the defence of Viipuri with Edvard Gylling and escaped to Petrograd in May. He helped found the exiled Communist Party of Finland and worked in the Karelian Workers’ Commune, but was arrested in the Great Purge and shot in Petrozavodsk in 1937.
Career timeline
- 1907–1911First chairman of the Finnish Trade Union Federation (SAJ)
- 1917Commander of the Kymi Paper Mill Red Guard; member of the five-man Red Guard committee
- 1918Commander-in-chief of the Red Guards; member of the People’s Delegation
- 1920–1923Several posts in the Karelian Workers’ Commune
- 1931–1935Head of the revolution research department, Karelian Research Institute
Head of Finland's 1918 Red revolutionary government, who later led the exiled Communist Party and served the Comintern
In July 1917, as Manner cried 'To free Finland!', the Eduskunta passed the Supreme Power Act and the gallery answered with the Finnish national anthem.
Finnish socialist revolutionary who led Finland's 1918 Red government as chairman of the People's Delegation. After the civil war's defeat, he fled to Soviet Russia, co-founded the Finnish Communist Party, and led it for fourteen years while serving on the Comintern executive committee.
Career timeline
- 1900Graduated from Helsinki University; journalist at Porvoo newspaper
- 1906Joined SDP; founded and edited the workers' paper Työläinen
- 1910–1914Member of Parliament for Uusimaa
- 1917Member of Parliament for Uusimaa
- 1917Speaker of Parliament and chairman of the SDP
- 1918.01–04Chairman of the Finnish People's Delegation (head of the Red government); also Commander-in-Chief of the Red Guards from April
- 1918.08Co-founded the Finnish Communist Party (SKP) in Moscow
- 1920–1934Chairman of the SKP; member of the ECCI (elected 1920, 1928)
- 1934–1935Reassigned as Comintern rapporteur for Latin American affairs
- 1935–1939Arrested, sentenced to 10 years; died in the Ukhta-Pechora camp
Finnish socialist who was Red Finland’s commissar of finance and later headed the government of Soviet Karelia
Born in Kuopio in 1881, the statistician and economist took his doctorate in 1909 with a thesis on crofting and became the Social Democrats’ agrarian expert. He sat in the Diet for the party from 1908 to 1917, was its vice chairman, and in November 1917 co-wrote “We demand” with Kuusinen. In the civil war he was Commissar of Finance of the People’s Delegation, led the talks for the 1 March treaty with Soviet Russia and signed it, and organised the defence of Viipuri at the end. Escaping to Sweden, he headed the Stockholm bureau of the Communist Party of Finland and in 1920 reported to Lenin on Karelian autonomy. As chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars of Soviet Karelia in 1923–1935 he pursued Finnicisation, was condemned for “nationalist chauvinism” and removed, and was shot in Moscow in 1938.
Career timeline
- 1905Editor-in-chief of the Marxist journal Sosialistinen aikakausilehti
- 1908–1917Social Democratic member of the Diet; party vice chairman
- 1918Commissar of Finance, Finnish People’s Delegation
- 1918–1920Head of the Stockholm bureau of the Communist Party of Finland
- 1920–1923Leading the Karelian Workers’ Commune
- 1923–1935Chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars of the Karelian ASSR
The Social Democratic realist who faced Stalin as Finland's Winter War foreign minister, rising from the cooperative movement
At the final meeting on 9 November 1939, when Finland refused even the reduced demands, 'the eyes of our opposite numbers opened wide.' Stalin asked: 'You don't even offer Ino?'
The politician who rebuilt Finland's Social Democratic Party from the ashes of the 1918 civil war into a parliamentary-democratic force. He became prime minister of Finland's first leftist government in 1926, and during the Moscow negotiations on the eve of the Winter War he joined Paasikivi at the table, urging Helsinki to accept a territorial exchange. It was Tanner who later recorded that when Finland rejected even the reduced Soviet demands at the final meeting of 9 November 1939, Stalin's and Molotov's 'eyes opened wide.' After the war he served a five-and-a-half-year prison sentence under Soviet pressure, but returned to parliament and led the party into the early 1960s.
Career timeline
- 1907Member of Parliament, SDP
- 1917Senator for Finance
- 1926–1927Prime Minister
- 1927–1945President, International Co-operative Alliance
- 1937–1939Minister of Finance
- 1939–1940Minister of Foreign Affairs
- 1942–1944Minister of Finance
- 1957–1963Chairman, Social Democratic Party
Labour journalist and former Russian army officer who became the first commander-in-chief of the Finnish Red Guards
Born in 1884 to a poor land worker’s family in Jämsä, he joined the Russian Army in 1903, served as a lieutenant in the Russo-Japanese War, joined the socialists in the 1905 revolution, and was jailed in Moscow and expelled from the military. Back in Finland he worked for the labour press in Turku, Vyborg and Kotka and as a Social Democratic party official. In October 1917 he organised the Workers’ Order Guards in Helsinki and after the November general strike became their commander-in-chief. In January 1918, despite heavy drinking in Petrograd, he bought a large cargo of guns and ammunition from the Bolsheviks, but on 28 January he was replaced by Eero Haapalainen. He broke out of besieged Tampere on the battle’s last night, was captured near Lahti and was shot at the Hennala camp in May 1918.
Career timeline
- 1904–1905Lieutenant in the Russian Army in the Russo-Japanese War
- 1917Organiser of the Workers’ Order Guards in Helsinki
- 1917–1918First commander-in-chief of the Order Guards and Red Guards
- 1918Red Guard general staff; staff of the Häme Front
