1965 French presidential election allies of the Gaullists. 1965 French presidential election The 1965 French presidential election, held on 5 December and 19 December, was the first direct presidential election in the Fifth Republic and the first since the Second Republic in 1848. It had been widely expected that incumbent president Charles de Gaulle would be re-elected, but the election was notable for the unexpectedly strong performance of his left-wing challenger François Mitterrand. This was the second presidential election since the beginning of the Fifth Republic. Under the first draft of the 1958 constitution, the president was elected by an electoral college, in order
Article 49 of the French Constitution of the President of the Republic by direct suffrage. The circumstances of that vote are quite specific, it occurred at the end of the Algerian crisis, which affected the first years of the Fifth Republic, a kind of transitional phase in its history. The vote took place during the first legislature of the Fifth Republic, and put an ends to it. The parliamentary elections of 1958 had not resulted in a clear majority, but the president and the Debré government could work with the assembly without a secured majority, because the priority was to resolve the Algerian crisis. In the