Graciela Quan Valenzuela (1911 – 22 January 1999) was a Guatemalan lawyer and activist. She campaigned for

women's suffrage Women's suffrage is the right of women to vote in elections. Beginning in the start of the 18th century, some people sought to change voting laws to allow women to vote. Liberal political parties would go on to grant women the right to vot ...

, writing a draft proposal for Guatemala's enfranchisement law. She was also a social worker, adviser to the President of Guatemala, delegate to the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmoniz ...

and the President of the

Inter-American Commission of Women The Inter-American Commission of Women ( es, Comisión Interamericana de Mujeres, pt, Comissão Interamericana de Mulheres, french: Commission interaméricaine des femmes), abbreviated CIM, is an organization that falls within the Organization of ...

Biography

Graciela Quan Valenzuela was born in 1911 in Guatemala and graduated from the

Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala The Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala (USAC, ''University of San Carlos of Guatemala'') is the largest and oldest university of Guatemala; it is also the fourth founded in the Americas. Established in the Kingdom of Guatemala during the Spani ...

in 1942 as the country's first female attorney. She was the last woman to graduate before women were granted civil rights. Her thesis, "Ciudadanía opcional para la mujer guatemalteca" ("Citizenship is optional for Guatemalan women") proposed a draft law for granting enfranchisement to women. In 1944, Quan founded with a group of women, including Angelina Acuña de Castañeda, Elisa Hall de Asturias, and Irene de Peyré, among others, the ''Unión Femenina Guatemalteca Pro-ciudadanía'' (Union of Guatemalan Women for Citizenship) favoring recognition of their civil rights, including suffrage for literate women. After the 1944 Guatemalan coup d'état the new Constitution, promulgated on 1 March 1945 granted the right to vote to all literate citizens, including women. She was one of the organizers of the

Primer Congreso Interamericano de Mujeres The Primer Congreso Interamericano de Mujeres (First Inter-American Congress of Women) was a feminist meeting held from 21 to 27 August 1947 in Guatemala City, Guatemala. It was called together by the Women's International League for Peace and Freed ...

(First Inter-American Congress of Women) held on 27 August 1947 in Guatemala City, which had as one of its main themes equality of men and women. That same year, she was one of the founders of the Altrusa Club Guatemala, an affiliate of the organization

Altrusa International, Inc Altrusa International, Inc (Altrusa) is an international non-profit organization focused on community service. It was founded in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1917 by Dr. Alfred Durham as a chain of national clubs for business and professional women. H ...

. The initial goal of the club was to provide impoverished girls with an education; it later expanded to assisting street children and founding the municipal children's library. Quan served as a delegate to the

in 1956-57 as well as an adviser to President Carlos Castillo Armas on social issues. Between 1957 and 1961 Quan served as Guatemala's representative to the

and the organization's president. In 1978, she was recommended as a regional adviser to the

Agency for International Development The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is an independent agency of the U.S. federal government that is primarily responsible for administering civilian foreign aid and development assistance. With a budget of over $27 ...

on women's issues in Latin America based upon her previous experience on the United Nation's Human Rights Commission and her pioneering social work in Guatemala.

Death

Quan died on 22 January 1999 in

Guatemala City Guatemala City ( es, Ciudad de Guatemala), known locally as Guatemala or Guate, is the capital and largest city of Guatemala, and the most populous urban area in Central America. The city is located in the south-central part of the country, ne ...

, Guatemala.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Quan, Graciela 1911 births 1999 deaths Date of birth missing Guatemalan feminists Guatemalan women lawyers Guatemalan suffragists Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala alumni 20th-century Guatemalan lawyers 20th-century women lawyers

Biography

Death

See also

References