Word: mitterand
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1960-1969
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...loyalists of the French Communist Party), and the "Gauchistes" (further divided into a Trotskyist tendency and a Maoist tendency). This bitterly divided house held together until 1965 when the French Communist Party, scizing an opportunity to gain in the national parliament, supported the non-communist candidate for President, Francois Mitterand. The Trotskyists stomped out of the party Congress, denouncing the FCP as supporters of the status quo, and, holding their own Congress, declared the birth of the Jeunesse Communiste Revolutionaire (JCR). Six months later the Maoists also quit and hoisted their banner, the l'Union des Jeunesses Communistes marxistes-leninistes...
...first time since the popular front of 1936 France's leftist parties formed a limited, tactical alliance to help them gain seats in the Assembly. The two major groups -- the Federation of the Left under Francois Mitterand (the man who nearly defeated de Gaulle in the presidential elections of 1965) and the Communists -- agreed to present a single candidate in as many districts as possible so that the leftist vote would not be split...
...days after the first round Mitterand met with Waldeck-Rochet, the leader of the Communists, to decide which leftist candidates should step down. When the two groups originally planned the alliance they assumed that the leftist candidate with the most votes would continue into the final-round and all others would withdraw. In many districts, however, a Communist polled more votes than a moderate socialist yet still had no chance of winning even if the other leftists withdrew. The leaders of the left assumed that while most Communists would vote in the second round for a socialist, there were thousands...
Waldeck-Rochet and Mitterand reached a remarkable agreement during their negotiations after the first round. They decided that the strongest place candidate should proceed into the final round even if he had not received more votes than the other leftists in the first round. With unprecedented cooperative spirit the Communists agreed to sacrifice 15 of their own candidates who had polled in the first round more votes than the socialists they eventually supported...
...cooperation suggests, furthermore, that when de Gaulle steps down from the Presidency some time in the next few years, a leftist will stand an extraordinarily good chance of succeeding him. The candidate of the united left, certainly not a Communist, would likely be Mitterand or Guy Mollet -- a disliked but very skillful former leader of the fourth Republic. Another Fourth Republic figure, Pierre Menders-France who made his political comeback in Grenoble last week after unsuccessful attempts in 1958 and 1962, is one of the most intelligent and reform-conscious of all Socialist leaders. Mendes has a very large following...