Housewife No. I

For 30 years, Chilean women had seen bills for women's suffrage introduced in Congress, had watched them languish and die. This time they meant business. Led by sleekly coiffured Rosa ("Mitty") Marckmann de Gonzalez Videla, 41, wife of the President, they determinedly celebrated Women's Suffrage Week, felt sure that a new bill before the Chamber of Deputies would both live and become law.

At a special session of Congress, the galleries were packed by smartly dressed members of the Chilean Federation of Women's Clubs (FECHIF). Congressmen outdid themselves with promises. But promises were not enough for Mitty Gonzalez, FECHIF's honorary president, or for her old friend Anita Figueroa, FECHIF's executive president. Warned Anita: "If the bill isn't passed soon, we'll have broken glass in the streets!"

As the nation's first housewife, Mitty Gonzalez is confidante and adviser to most of Chile's other housewives. In her office at La Moneda (Chile's White House) she puts in a seven-hour day answering the hundreds of letters they write, asking her for everything from recipes to help in finding a new house. One correspondent recently begged for the President's old brown suit so that her husband could go on a religious pilgrimage.

With her trim figure, blonde hair and syrup-colored eyes, fun-loving Mitty Gonzalez looks like a French fashion plate. She was the first in Santiago to wear the New Look. But unlike Eva Peron, another South American style-setter, she cares little for politics. Says she: "Women's suffrage will not necessarily mean that every woman must run for office."

Last week, satisfied that only a little more prodding by the President was necessary to get the suffrage bill passed, Mitty went back to her correspondence. "Luckily," says she, "I have never had to persuade my husband on the suffrage issue. Gabriel has always been convinced . . ."

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