Portrait of Pieter RinkCartoon of Pieter Rink with Vermeer's Milkmaid, 1907.
Pieter Rink (13 August 1851, in Tiel – 6 August 1941, in The Hague), was a Dutch politician.
Pieter Rink was a successful lawyerinTiel. He was a member of the Liberal Union(Liberale Unie) and served in the city council of his city of birth (1883–1905) and was a member of the States-ProvincialofGelderland (1903–1905). In 1891 he was elected in the House of Representatives (Dutchlower houseofparliament) and remained a member till 1922 (except in the period 1905-1908 when he was Minister of the Interior). From July 1918 till April 1921 he was the president of the parliamentary group of the Liberal Union and from April 1921 till July 1922 he served as the first president of the Freedom League parliamentary party. In 1923 he was elected to the Senate (upper house), remaining a member till 1933. In the years prior to the introduction of universal suffrage (introduced in 1917) he was an ardent advocate of suffrage extension and was considered a "Takkiaan". This fact was underlined in the party brochure he co-authored, Het kiesrechtvraagstuk ("The Suffrage Question") which was published in 1903 and called for the introduction of universal suffrage, female suffrage and a reform of the electoral system.
Pieter Rinck joined the de Meestercabinet in 1905 as Minister of the Interior. This cabinet was very weak and incapable of introducing important reforms and it resigned in December 1907 (an earlier resignation in December 1906 was refused by Queen Wilhelmina).
After the merger of the Liberal Union and the League of Free Liberals(Bond van Vrije Liberalen) in 1921 he joined the new conservative liberal party Freedom League(Vrijheidsbond).
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