Editing Kaarlo Juho Ståhlberg (section)

===Post-presidential life===
{{see also|Ståhlberg kidnapping}}
[[File:Ståhlbergs' at the railwaystation.jpg|thumb|upright|President Ståhlberg and his wife at the [[Helsinki Central Station]] after kidnapping. In the middle of picture his daughter Elli Ståhlberg stands behind them.]]
Ståhlberg did not seek re-election in 1925, finding his difficult term of office a great strain. He also believed that the right-wing and the monarchists would become more reconciled to the republic if he stepped down. According to the longtime late Agrarian and Centrist politician Johannes Virolainen, he believed that the incumbent president was too much favoured over the other candidates while standing for re-election.<ref>see Virolainen, "The Last Electoral Term" / Viimeinen vaalikausi, published in Finland in 1991</ref>

Ståhlberg did not appreciate his presidential successor, [[Lauri Kristian Relander]], at all, because Relander was the almost complete opposite of Ståhlberg. He would have preferred to have seen [[Risto Ryti]] as his successor; but when Relander was elected, he muttered: {{quote|May those take care of him who have hired him for it.<ref>Olavi Jouslehto & Jaakko Okker: ''Tamminiemestä Mäntyniemeen'', p. 33. Porvoo-Helsinki: WSOY, 2000. (in Finnish)</ref>}}

He was offered the post of Chancellor of the University of Helsinki, but declined it, instead becoming a member of the government's Law Drafting Committee. He also served as a National Progressive member of Parliament again, as a member for the Uusimaa constituency from 1930 to 1933.

In 1930, activists from the right-wing [[Lapua Movement]] kidnapped him and his wife, attempting to send them to the [[Soviet Union]], but the incident merely hastened the Lapua Movement's demise.

Ståhlberg was a National Progressive Party candidate in the 1931 Presidential election, eventually losing to [[Pehr Evind Svinhufvud]] by only two votes in the third ballot. He was also a candidate in the 1937 election, eventually finishing third.

[[File:Ståhlberg -85 v (1865-01-28) 1950 (JOKAUAS2 466-1).tif |thumb|Finnish ex-president Kaarlo Juho Ståhlberg's birthday reception in 1950. The President-in-office [[J.K. Paasikivi]] congratulates him.]]

In 1946, Ståhlberg retired and became the legal adviser of President [[J. K. Paasikivi]].  Paasikivi often consulted Ståhlberg; for example, under the [[1950 Finnish presidential election|1950 presidential election]] an emergency plan was planned to extend Paasikivi's term in parliament as president, which Ståhlberg condemned angrily in his letter to Paasikivi:{{blockquote|"If the Finnish people cannot and do not bother to elect a head of state once every six years, it will not really deserve an independent democratic state."<ref>Jouslehto & Okker, p. 88–90. (in Finnish)</ref>}}Their last discussion occurred less than two weeks before Ståhlberg died.<ref>see, for example, "J.K. Paasikivi's
Diaries I-II" / J.K. Paasikiven päiväkirjat I-II, edited and published in Finland around 1985–86</ref> He died on 22 September, 1952, and was buried in Helsinki's [[Hietaniemi cemetery]] with full honours.

Among Finnish Presidents, Ståhlberg has retained a remarkably impeccable reputation. He is generally regarded as a moral and
principled defender of democracy and of the rule of law, and as the father of the Finnish Constitution. His decision to voluntarily
give up the presidency is also generally speaking admired as a sign that he was not a power-hungry career politician.<ref>see, for example, "The Republic's Presidents 1919–1931" / Tasavallan presidentit 1919–1931, published in Finland in 1993–94</ref>