Legislative elections were held in

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

on 1 July 1979.

Dieter Nohlen Dieter Nohlen (born 6 November 1939) is a German academic and political scientist. He currently holds the position of Emeritus Professor of Political Science in the Faculty of Economic and Social Sciences of the University of Heidelberg. An expe ...

(2005) ''Elections in the Americas: A data handbook, Volume I'', p453 The

Institutional Revolutionary Party The Institutional Revolutionary Party ( es, Partido Revolucionario Institucional, ; abbr. PRI) is a political party in Mexico that was founded in 1929 and held uninterrupted power in the country for 71 years, from 1929 to 2000, first as the Nati ...

(PRI) won 296 of the 400 seats in the Chamber of Deputies. Voter turnout was 49%.Nohlen, p460 They were the first national elections held after the approval of the political reform of 1977, which allowed the

Mexican Communist Party The Mexican Communist Party ( es, Partido Comunista Mexicano, PCM) was a communist party in Mexico. It was founded in 1917 as the Socialist Workers' Party (, PSO) by Manabendra Nath Roy, a left-wing Indian revolutionary. The PSO changed its name ...

Mexican Democratic Party The Mexican Democratic Party ( es, Partido Demócrata Mexicano, PDM) was an ultra-Catholic social conservative political party in Mexico that existed between 1979 and 1997. At its height in 1982, the party had over 500,000 active voters and 12 seat ...

and the Workers' Socialist Party to obtain legal registration and compete in elections for the first time, as well as increasing the size of the Chamber of Deputies from 237 seats to 400.

Background

The National Action Party, the only significant opposition to the PRI, did not nominate a presidential candidate in the 1976 general elections due to intense internal conflicts. Subsequently, a legitimacy crisis emerged that called into question the democratic model envisioned in the

constitution A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organisation or other type of Legal entity, entity and commonly determine how that entity is to be governed. When ...

Valentín Campa Valentín Campa Salazar (14 February 1904 – 25 November 1999) was a Mexican railway union leader and presidential candidate. Along with Demetrio Vallejo, he was considered one of the leaders of the 1958 railway strikes. Campa was also the ...

, a well-known union leader and figurehead of the outlawed

, ran as an unregistered candidate and received nearly a million votes that had to be annulled. The September 23 Communist League, the Party of the Poor and the were among the urban and rural subversive groups whose members were tortured and imprisoned during the 1970s dirty war. A year later, an amnesty law was pushed, fulfilling a leftist demand that this package of reforms lay the groundwork for the end of political clandestinity by creating democratic channels.

1977 electoral reforms

On 1 April 1977

Minister of the Interior An interior minister (sometimes called a minister of internal affairs or minister of home affairs) is a cabinet official position that is responsible for internal affairs, such as public security, civil registration and identification, emergency ...

made a speech in

Chilpancingo Chilpancingo de los Bravo (commonly shortened to Chilpancingo; ; Nahuatl: Chilpantsinko) is the capital and second-largest city of the state of Guerrero, Mexico. In 2010 it had a population of 187,251 people. The municipality has an area of in ...

in which he declared his intention to make significant modifications to the electoral system. The choice of this city for the announcement was intentional, as it was the seat of the organization from which the majority of armed and peasant movements against the government, including those led by Genaro Vázquez and

Lucio Cabañas Lucio Cabañas Barrientos (, 12 December 1938 – 2 December 1974) was a Mexican schoolteacher who became a revolutionary, albeit not a Marxist one. Cabañas regarded Emiliano Zapata as his role model and he never abandoned his Christian faith, a ...

, had emerged. Following the announcement of this commitment, the opposition and academic and intellectual community were invited to participate in discussions aimed at reaching consensus on the reform. The result was constitutional amendments and the approval of the Federal Law of Political Organizations and Electoral Procedures (LOPPE), which established the structure of the electoral college (a separate electoral body would not be established until Carlos Salinas de Gortari's six-year term in 1990); permitted coalitions; provided for official slots on radio and television for the promotion of various political forces; contained the new proportional representation formula (which distributed 100 seats among the parties based on the national share of votes received); and the number of deputies that made up the Lower House being increased from 186 to 400, which forced the construction of the San Lázaro Legislative Palace to accommodate them.

Results

References

{{Mexican elections

Legislative A legislature is an assembly with the authority to make laws for a political entity such as a country or city. They are often contrasted with the executive and judicial powers of government. Laws enacted by legislatures are usually known as p ...

Legislative elections in Mexico