Federal Council election 1984

The 1984 Federal Council election took place on October 2, 1984. It became necessary because Federal Councilor Rudolf Friedrich ( FDP ) had announced his resignation for health reasons after only one year in office.

The candidates

According to the magic formula, the FDP raised a claim to the seat. None of the other Bundesrat parties questioned the seat claim. The FDP nominated Elisabeth Kopp and Bruno Hunziker to succeed Friedrich. However, a media campaign was soon launched against Elisabeth Kopp in which her husband was accused of evading taxes and doing money laundering.

After a while, however, this mood turned because they didn't want to blame Kopp for her husband's mistakes.

The vote

The replacement election was scheduled for October 2 in the United Federal Assembly . After the SP had failed to achieve the goal of bringing Lilian Uchtenhagen to the Federal Council a year earlier, the SP now supported Kopp's candidacy.

Results

		1st ballot
ballot papers distributed		244
ballot papers received		244
empty / invalid		0/3
valid total		241
absolute more		121
	Elisabeth Kopp	124
	Bruno Hunziker (FDP)	95
various		22nd

Elisabeth Kopp was thus the first woman to be elected to the Federal Council in the first ballot.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ http://www.presserat.ch/5880.htma  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
2. ↑ http://www.tagesanzeiger.ch/wissen/geschichte/25-Jahren-Die-erste-Frau-im-Bundesrat/story/11554130
3. ↑ Official election results on admin.ch

Web links

• Directory of the members of the Federal Council