French presidential election, 1974
Encyclopedia
Presidential elections were held in :France in 1974, following the death of President Georges Pompidou
Georges Pompidou
Georges Jean Raymond Pompidou was a French politician. He was Prime Minister of France from 1962 to 1968, holding the longest tenure in this position, and later President of the French Republic from 1969 until his death in 1974.-Biography:...

. They went to a second round, and were won by Valéry Giscard d'Estaing
Valéry Giscard d'Estaing
Valéry Marie René Georges Giscard d'Estaing is a French centre-right politician who was President of the French Republic from 1974 until 1981...

 by a margin of 1.6%. It is to date the closest presidential election in French history.

Campaign

In 1969
French presidential election, 1969
The 1969 French presidential election took place on 1 June and 15 June 1969. It occurred due to the resignation of President Charles de Gaulle on 28 April 1969. Indeed, De Gaulle had decided to consult the voters by referendum about regionalisation and the reform of the Senate, and he had announced...

, Georges Pompidou
Georges Pompidou
Georges Jean Raymond Pompidou was a French politician. He was Prime Minister of France from 1962 to 1968, holding the longest tenure in this position, and later President of the French Republic from 1969 until his death in 1974.-Biography:...

, formerly Prime Minister under the presidency of Charles de Gaulle
Charles de Gaulle
Charles André Joseph Marie de Gaulle was a French general and statesman who led the Free French Forces during World War II. He later founded the French Fifth Republic in 1958 and served as its first President from 1959 to 1969....

, was elected President of France for a seven year term. However, he died in office on 2 April 1974, and the French voters were called to elect his successor. The political classes were caught unawares by Pompidou's death.

On the Left, the Socialist Party
Socialist Party (France)
The Socialist Party is a social-democratic political party in France and the largest party of the French centre-left. It is one of the two major contemporary political parties in France, along with the center-right Union for a Popular Movement...

 (PS), the French Communist Party
French Communist Party
The French Communist Party is a political party in France which advocates the principles of communism.Although its electoral support has declined in recent decades, the PCF retains a large membership, behind only that of the Union for a Popular Movement , and considerable influence in French...

 (PCF), and the Movement of Left Radicals
Left Radical Party
The Radical Party of the Left is a minor social-liberal, and in opposition to its common understanding of its name, a moderate centre-left political party in France advocating radicalism, secularism to its french extend known as laïcité, progressivism, pro-Europeanism, individual freedom and...

 (MRG) campaigned for the Common Program that they agreed in 1972. Whilst the PCF was the main force of this coalition (at least in terms of popular support), they united behind the candidacy of the PS leader François Mitterrand
François Mitterrand
François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand was the 21st President of the French Republic and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra, serving from 1981 until 1995. He is the longest-serving President of France and, as leader of the Socialist Party, the only figure from the left so far elected President...

. Indeed, they thought the "Union of Left" could not win if it was led by a Communist in the presidential race. The fear of communism was often an argument used by the French Right to win elections. Furthermore, Mitterrand had succeeded in forcing an unexpected second ballot when he was candidate in 1965
French presidential election, 1965
The 1965 French presidential election was the first presidential election by direct universal suffrage of the Fifth Republic. It was also the first presidential election by direct universal suffrage since the Second Republic in 1848. It was won by incumbent president Charles de Gaulle who resigned...

 against General De Gaulle. Only two smaller Trotskyist parties refused to support Mitterrand and the Common Program, as well as the Social Democratic Party founded by a split of Socialist elects who disapproved the alliance with the PCF. For the first time since the beginning of the Fifth Republic
French Fifth Republic
The Fifth Republic is the fifth and current republican constitution of France, introduced on 4 October 1958. The Fifth Republic emerged from the collapse of the French Fourth Republic, replacing the prior parliamentary government with a semi-presidential system...

 in 1958, the Left had a serious chance of victory.

The situation in the "Presidential Majority" was very confused: no "natural candidate" had appeared. Prime Minister Pierre Messmer
Pierre Messmer
Pierre Joseph Auguste Messmer was a French Gaullist politician. He served as Minister of Armies under Charles de Gaulle from 1960 to 1969 – the longest serving since Étienne François, duc de Choiseul under Louis XV – and then as Prime Minister under Georges Pompidou from 1972 to 1974...

 had announced he would run if he was the only candidate of the majority. This condition being not satisfied, he withdrew. Four men declared their will to run: former Gaullist Prime Minister Jacques Chaban-Delmas
Jacques Chaban-Delmas
Jacques Chaban-Delmas was a French Gaullist politician. He served as Prime Minister under Georges Pompidou from 1969 to 1972. In addition, for almost half a century, he was Mayor of Bordeaux and a deputy for the Gironde département....

, the Chairman of the National Assembly
French National Assembly
The French National Assembly is the lower house of the bicameral Parliament of France under the Fifth Republic. The upper house is the Senate ....

 Edgar Faure
Edgar Faure
Edgar Faure was a French politician, essayist, historian, and memoirist.-Career:Faure was born in Béziers, Languedoc-Roussillon. He trained as a lawyer in Paris and became a member of the Bar at 27, the youngest lawyer in France to do so at the time...

, the former Craftsmen and Shopkeepers Minister representing the ultra-conservative wing of the Gaullist Party
Gaullist Party
In France, the Gaullist Party is usually used to refer to the largest party professing to be Gaullist. Gaullism claimed to transcend the left/right rift...

 Jean Royer
Jean Royer
Jean Royer was a French catholic and conservative politician, former Minister, and former Mayor of Tours.-Mayor of Tours:...

, and finally the Economy Minister and leader of the Independent Republicans
Independent Republicans
The Independent Republicans were a French liberal-conservative political group founded in 1962, which became a political party in 1966 . The leader was Valéry Giscard d'Estaing....

 Valéry Giscard d'Estaing
Valéry Giscard d'Estaing
Valéry Marie René Georges Giscard d'Estaing is a French centre-right politician who was President of the French Republic from 1974 until 1981...

.
Quickly, Faure withdrew and the real competition on the Right was between Chaban-Delmas and Giscard d'Estaing.

Chaban-Delmas conveyed an image of being a reformist Gaullist and invoked his proposals for a "New Society", which he had tried to apply when he led the cabinet (from 1969 to 1972), but he was supported by the "Barons of Gaullism" who held the bulk of ministerial offices for 16 years. His challengers denounced the continuation of the UDR-state, that is to say the appropriation of the state by the Gaullist Party.

Giscard d'Estaing portrayed himself as "the change in the continuity", a "modern turn" for the French politics, in the incumbent majority and more reassuring for moderate voters than the Common Program which was characterised as a collectivist project. He benefited from the divisions in the UDR. Indeed, 43 Gaullist personalities close to Pompidou and led by the young Interior Minister Jacques Chirac
Jacques Chirac
Jacques René Chirac is a French politician who served as President of France from 1995 to 2007. He previously served as Prime Minister of France from 1974 to 1976 and from 1986 to 1988 , and as Mayor of Paris from 1977 to 1995.After completing his studies of the DEA's degree at the...

 published an appeal insinuating that Giscard d'Estaing was more likely than Chaban-Delmas to defeat Mitterrand. As a result, the left-wing candidate faced the leader of the Independent Republicans in a very competitive run-off.

For the first time in the history of the French presidential elections, a Radio-TV-debate between the two finalists was organized. Mitterrand presented his competitor as the representing of the elites who pursued unfair policies, while Giscard d'Estaing criticized his opponent to be "a man of the past". The turnout reached a record and Giscard d'Estaing was elected with a margin of only 424 599 votes. He nominated Chirac as Prime Minister.

First round

Candidate Party Votes Percent
  François Mitterrand
François Mitterrand
François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand was the 21st President of the French Republic and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra, serving from 1981 until 1995. He is the longest-serving President of France and, as leader of the Socialist Party, the only figure from the left so far elected President...

Socialist Party
Socialist Party (France)
The Socialist Party is a social-democratic political party in France and the largest party of the French centre-left. It is one of the two major contemporary political parties in France, along with the center-right Union for a Popular Movement...

 (PS and PCF)
11,044,373 43.25%
  Valéry Giscard d'Estaing
Valéry Giscard d'Estaing
Valéry Marie René Georges Giscard d'Estaing is a French centre-right politician who was President of the French Republic from 1974 until 1981...

Independent Republicans
Independent Republicans
The Independent Republicans were a French liberal-conservative political group founded in 1962, which became a political party in 1966 . The leader was Valéry Giscard d'Estaing....

 (RI)
8,326,774 32.60%
  Jacques Chaban-Delmas
Jacques Chaban-Delmas
Jacques Chaban-Delmas was a French Gaullist politician. He served as Prime Minister under Georges Pompidou from 1969 to 1972. In addition, for almost half a century, he was Mayor of Bordeaux and a deputy for the Gironde département....

Union of Democrats for the Republic (UDR) 3,857,728 15.11%
  Jean Royer
Jean Royer
Jean Royer was a French catholic and conservative politician, former Minister, and former Mayor of Tours.-Mayor of Tours:...

Conservative UDR 810,540 3.17%
  Arlette Laguiller
Arlette Laguiller
Arlette Yvonne Laguiller is a French Trotskyist politician. Since 1973, she has been the spokeswoman and the best known leader and perennial candidate of the Lutte Ouvrière political party...

Workers' Struggle 595,247 2.33%
  René Dumont
René Dumont
René Dumont was a French engineer in agronomy, a sociologist, and an environmental politician.He was born in Cambrai, Nord, in the north of France. His father was a professor in agriculture and his grandfather was a farmer. He graduated from the INA P-G, as an engineer in agronomy...

Environmentalist
Environmentalism
Environmentalism is a broad philosophy, ideology and social movement regarding concerns for environmental conservation and improvement of the health of the environment, particularly as the measure for this health seeks to incorporate the concerns of non-human elements...

337,800 1.32%
  Jean-Marie Le Pen
Jean-Marie Le Pen
Jean-Marie Le Pen is a French far right-wing and nationalist politician who is founder and former president of the Front National party. Le Pen has run for the French presidency five times, most notably in 2002, when in a surprise upset he came second, polling more votes in the first round than...

National Front (FN) 190,921 0.75%
  Émile Muller
Émile Muller
Émile Muller was a French politician from Alsace. He was the candidate of the Democratic Socialist Movement of France in the French presidential election, 1974, where he won only 0.69% of the vote....

Social Democratic Party 176,279 0.69%
  Alain Krivine
Alain Krivine
Alain Krivine is a leader of the Trotskyist movement in France. He is a member of the Ligue Communiste Révolutionnaire , which is the French section of the reunified Fourth International. He was a member of the LCR's political bureau until March 2006, when he resigned from that committee...

Revolutionary Communist League
Revolutionary Communist League (France)
See Revolutionary Communist League for the other Ligue communiste révolutionnaire.The Revolutionary Communist League was a French democratic revolutionary socialist political party. It was the French section of the Fourth International...

 (LCR)
93,990 0.37%
  Bertrand Renouvin
Bertrand Renouvin
Bertrand Renouvin, born in Paris, is the founder and president of French political movement Nouvelle Action Royaliste, a monarchist group which aims at restoring constitutional monarchy in France. One may say his orientation is now close to the original Gaullism which originated from the...

Nouvelle Action Royaliste
Nouvelle Action Royaliste
The Nouvelle Action Royaliste , is a monarchist political movement marked by a will to found a constitutional monarchy in France.-History:...

43,722 0.17%
  Jean-Claude Sebag European Federalist Movement (MFE) 42,007 0.16%
  Guy Héraud
Guy Héraud
Guy Héraud was a French politician and lawyer. He was the candidate of the European Federalist Party in the French presidential election, 1974, where he won only 0.07% of the vote and last place...

European Federalist Party
Federalist Party (France)
The Federalist Party is a French European federalist political party, founded in 1995 by Jean-Philippe Allenbach and whose main leader is currently Yves Gernigon....

19,255 0.08%
Total 25,538,636 100%

Second round

Candidate Party Votes Percent
  Valéry Giscard d'Estaing
Valéry Giscard d'Estaing
Valéry Marie René Georges Giscard d'Estaing is a French centre-right politician who was President of the French Republic from 1974 until 1981...

Independent Republicans
Independent Republicans
The Independent Republicans were a French liberal-conservative political group founded in 1962, which became a political party in 1966 . The leader was Valéry Giscard d'Estaing....

 (RI)
13,396,203 50.81%
  François Mitterrand
François Mitterrand
François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand was the 21st President of the French Republic and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra, serving from 1981 until 1995. He is the longest-serving President of France and, as leader of the Socialist Party, the only figure from the left so far elected President...

Socialist Party
Socialist Party (France)
The Socialist Party is a social-democratic political party in France and the largest party of the French centre-left. It is one of the two major contemporary political parties in France, along with the center-right Union for a Popular Movement...

(PS)
12,971,604 49.19%
Total 26,367,807 100%

External links

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