1965 French presidential election 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 to appease concerns about
Constitutional amendments under the French Fifth Republic matching the term of office of the President with the Deputies. Indeed, when the parliamentary majority did not support the President, he would be forced to appoint a hostile prime minister as a minister of his party and would be likely be reversed by the National Assembly. The Constitution includes in its preamble, since , an of 10 articles, at the request of President of the Republic Jacques Chirac. For the subsequent ratification of the Treaty of Lisbon, a revision of Title XV of the Constitution was passed by Congress on February 4, 2008, by 560 votes against 181. The