While Washington was seized with congressional negotiations over the Wall Street bailout, Iraq's parliament on Wednesday took another major step toward political stabilization. By a unanimous vote, the national legislature approved a plan for local elections in 14 of 18 provinces by early next year - clearing the way for a new, more representative and more secular wave of politicians to take office.

The legislation eliminates the party slate system that allowed religious authorities to dominate Iraq's previous elections, and it provides for women to hold 25 percent of seats. Most important, it will allow Sunni leaders who boycotted the 2005 provincial elections - and who have since allied themselves with U.S. forces against al-Qaida in Iraq - to compete for political power in the provinces that were once the heartland of the insurgency.

As always in Iraq's halting journey toward a new order, the reform was not complete. Elections were put off in the province surrounding the volatile city of Kirkuk, where Kurds, Sunni Arabs and other groups compete for power, and in three Kurd-run provinces. Staging fair and peaceful elections will be another major challenge.

But the precipitous drop in violence in Iraq during the past year offers strong reason for hope that a good election can be held - and that the new Sunni and Shiite leaders who emerge will be well-positioned to jump-start reconstruction in the provinces and negotiate with each other.

More steps are needed - most important, agreement on a law distributing Iraqi oil revenue among provinces and allowing for new investment. But it's now clear that the political progress that the Bush administration hoped would follow the surge of U.S. forces in Iraq has finally begun.