Marie Thérèse Casgrain, ., née Forget (10 July 1896 – 3 November 1981) was a French Canadian feminist, reformer, politician and senator. She was a leader in the fight for women's right to vote in the province of Quebec, as well as the first woman to lead a political party in Canada. In her later life she opposed nuclear weapons and was a consumer activist. A strong federalist, one of her last political actions, at age 83, was to intervene on the "No" side in the 1980 Quebec sovereignty referendum. Family and early life Born in Saint-Irénée-les-Bains, near Quebec City, Thérèse was raised in a wealthy family, the daughter of Blanche, Lady Forget (née MacDonald), and Sir Rodolphe Forget, a wealthy entrepreneur and Conservative Member of Parliament. In 1905, at eight years old, she became a boarder at the Dames du Sacré-Coeur, at Sault-au-Récollet, near Montreal. Upon graduation, she hoped to further her studies at university, but her father opposed the idea, not seeing any utility in further education for women. In his view, Thérèse should instead learn how to manage a household, a skill that would befit a future wife of her stature. Thérèse was engaged twice. Her first fiancé died falling out of a window while sleepwalking, when she was only seventeen years old. In 1916, aged twenty, she married Pierre-François Casgrain, a wealthy Liberal politician with whom she raised four children. Thérèse's father, Sir Rodolphe, had represented the Charlevoix riding since the general election of 1904, holding it as a Conservative. However, he was opposed to conscription and with the Conscription Crisis looming, he decided that he would not stand for re-election in the general election of 1917.<ref>[http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/forget_rodolphe_14E.html Jack Jedwab, Dictionary of Canadian Biography: "Forget, Sir Rodolphe".]</ref> Her husband, Pierre Casgrain, sought the nomination in the new Charlevoix—Montmorency riding for the Liberal Party as a Laurier Liberal, opposed to conscription. He was elected in the general election. Women's right to vote Thérèse Casgrain accompanied her husband to Ottawa, the national capital, for the opening of the parliamentary session in the spring of 1918. It was during her time in Ottawa that she became aware of the importance of the right to vote for women. Prior to the 1917 Canadian federal election, women did not have the right to vote in federal elections. In the lead-up to the election, the government of Prime Minister Borden had enacted the