ABSTRACT
In the morning of May 10, 1981 Valery Giscard d'Estaing cast his ballot in an election he hoped would give him seven more years as president of the French republic. Giscard's antagonist Francois Mitterrand voted in another small country town, Chateau-Chinon in the high Morvan country of western Burgundy. The Socialist party candidate for the presidency had been mayor of the town for twenty-two years and was deputy for the local department, the Nièvre. Giscard had reasons for hope on election morning. Giscard knew that Georges Marchais' scarcely hidden aim in 1981 was to ensure Mitterrand's defeat in the second round. Washington and Bonn expected and welcomed Giscard's re-election. The candidates remained in the country to await the count; Giscard in his chateau, Mitterrand in the Hotel du Vieux Morvan, his local headquarters. The Mitterrand who ran for president in 1965 was very far from being the Socialist leader of 1981.
