Editing National Rally (section)

=== Early years ===
==== Foundation (1972–1973) ====
{{multiple image
 | width = 150
 | image1 = Movimento Sociale Italiano Logo.svg
 | alt1 = Logo of the Italian Social Movement
 | image2 = Old Front Nationale Logo.svg
 | alt2 = Logo of the National Front between 1972 and 2007
 | footer = '''Left:''' Logo of the Italian Social Movement<br />'''Right:''' Logo of the National Front between 1972 and 2007
}}

While ''Ordre Nouveau'' had competed in some local elections since 1970, at its second congress, in June 1972, it decided to establish a new political party to contest the [[1973 French legislative election|1973 legislative elections]].{{sfn|Shields|2007|pp=163–164}}{{sfn|DeClair|1999|pp=36 f}} The party was launched on 5 October 1972 under the name '''National Front for French Unity''' (''Front national pour l'unité française''), or '''Front National'''.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=169}} In order to create a broad movement, ON sought to model the new party on the more established [[Italian Social Movement]] (MSI), which at the time appeared to establish a broad coalition of the Italian hard right. The FN adopted a French version of the MSI tricolour flame as its logo.{{sfn|Shields|2007|pp=159, 169}}{{sfn|DeClair|1999|pp=31, 36–37}}{{sfn|Kitschelt|McGann|1997|p=94}} ON wanted to unite the various French far-right currents, and brought together "nationals" of Le Pen's group and [[Roger Holeindre]]'s Party of French Unity; "nationalists" from [[Pierre Bousquet]]'s ''Militant'' movement or [[François Brigneau]]'s and Alain Robert's [[Ordre Nouveau (1960s)|Ordre Nouveau]]; the [[anti-Gaullist]] [[Georges Bidault]]'s Justice and Liberty movement; as well as former [[Poujadists]], Algerian War veterans, and some monarchists, among others.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=169}}{{sfn|DeClair|1999|p=13}}<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.france-politique.fr/chronologie-fn.htm|title=Chronologie du Front National FN|last=De Boissieu|first=Laurent|website=France Politique|issn=1765-2898|access-date=31 August 2019|archive-date=31 August 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190831115618/https://www.france-politique.fr/chronologie-fn.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> Le Pen was chosen to be the first president of the party, as he was untainted with the militant public image of the ON and was a relatively moderate figure in the far-right.{{sfn|DeClair|1999|pp=38 f}}{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=170}}

The National Front fared poorly in the [[1973 French legislative election|1973 legislative elections]], receiving 0.5% of the national vote, although Le Pen won 5% in his Paris constituency.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=171}} In 1973, the party created a youth movement, the ''Front national de la jeunesse'' (National Front of Youth; FNJ). The rhetoric used in the campaign stressed old, far-right themes and was largely uninspiring to the electorate at the time.{{sfn|DeClair|1999|p=39}} Otherwise, its official program at this point was relatively moderate, differing little from the mainstream right's.{{sfn|Shields|2007|pp=173 f}} Le Pen sought the "total fusion" of the currents in the party, and warned against "crude activism."{{sfn|Shields|2007|pp=174 f}} The FNJ were banned from the party later that year.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=175}}{{sfn|DeClair|1999|p=39}} The move towards the mainstream cost it many leading members and much of its militant base.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=175}}

In the [[1974 French presidential election|1974 presidential election]], Le Pen failed to find a mobilising theme for his campaign,{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=176 f}} since many of its platform's major issues, such as [[anti-communism]], were shared by most of the mainstream right.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=183}} Other FN issues included calls for increased French birth rates, immigration reduction (although this was downplayed), establishment of a professional army, abrogation of the [[Évian Accords]], and generally the creation of a "French and European [[renaissance]]."{{sfn|Shields|2007|pp=177, 185}} Despite being the only nationalist candidate, he failed to gain the support of the whole of the far-right, as the various groups either rallied behind other candidates or called for voter abstention.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=177}} The campaign further lost ground when the [[Revolutionary Communist League (France)|Revolutionary Communist League]] made public a report of Le Pen's alleged involvement in torture during his time in Algeria.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=177}} In his first participation in a presidential election, Le Pen won only 0.8% of the national vote.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=177}}

==== FN–PFN rivalry (1973–1981) ====
Following the 1974 election, the FN was obscured by the appearance of the [[Party of New Forces]] (PFN), founded by FN dissidents (largely from the ON).{{sfn|DeClair|1999|p=41}}{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=178 f}} Their competition weakened both parties throughout the 1970s.{{sfn|DeClair|1999|p=41}} Along with the growing influence of [[François Duprat]] and his "[[Revolutionary Nationalist Groups|revolutionary nationalists]]", the FN gained several new groups of supporters in the late 1970s and early 1980s: [[Jean-Pierre Stirbois]] (1977) and his "[[Corporatism#Corporate solidarism|solidarists]]", [[Bruno Gollnisch]] (1983), [[Bernard Antony]] (1984) and his Catholic fundamentalists, as well as [[Jean-Yves Le Gallou]] (1985) and the [[Nouvelle Droite]].{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=180–184}}{{sfn|Camus|Lebourg|2017|p=121}} Following the death of Duprat in a bomb attack in 1978, the revolutionary nationalists left the party, while Stirbois became Le Pen's deputy as his solidarists effectively ousted the [[neo-fascism|neo-fascist]] tendency in the party leadership.{{sfn|Shields|2007|pp=181, 184}} A radical group split off in 1980 and founded the [[French Nationalist Party]], dismissing the FN as becoming "too [[Zionism|Zionist]]" with Le Pen being a "puppet of the Jews."{{Sfn|Camus|Lebourg|2017|p=106}} The far right was marginalised altogether in the [[1978 French legislative election|1978 legislative elections]], although the PFN came out better off.{{sfn|Shields|2007|pp=179–180, 185–187}}{{sfn|DeClair|1999|p=43}} In the first election for the [[1979 European Parliament election in France|European Parliament in 1979]], the PFN became part of an attempt to build a "Euro-Right" alliance of the continent's far-right parties, and was in the end the only one of the two that contested the election.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=181 f}} It fielded Jean-Louis Tixier-Vignancour as its primary candidate, while Le Pen called for voter abstention.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=182}}

For the [[1981 French presidential election|1981 presidential election]], both Le Pen and Pascal Gauchon of the PFN declared their intentions to run.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=182}} However, an increased requirement regarding obtaining signatures of support from elected officials had been introduced for the election, which left both Le Pen and Gauchon unable to participate.{{refn|group=nb|In France, parties have to secure support from a specific number of elected officials, from a specific number of departments, in order to be eligible to run for election. In 1976, the number of required elected officials was increased fivefold from the 1974 presidential cycle, and the number of departments threefold.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=182}}}}

The election was won by [[François Mitterrand]] of the [[Socialist Party (France)|Socialist Party]] (PS), a results that brought the [[political left]] to national power for the first time in the Fifth Republic; Mitterrand immediately dissolved the National Assembly and called a snap legislative election.{{sfn|Shields|2007|pp=182, 198}} With only three weeks to prepare its campaign, the FN fielded only a limited number of candidates and won only 0.2% of the national vote.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=183}} The PFN was even worse off, and the election marked the effective end of competition from the party.{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=183}} The Socialists attained their best ever result with an [[absolute majority]] in the [[1981 French legislative election|1981 legislative election]].{{sfn|Shields|2007|p=182 f}}

The "socialist takeover" led to a radicalisation in centre-right, anti-communist, and anti-socialist voters.<ref>{{cite book |last=White |first=John Kenneth |year=1998 |title=Political parties and the collapse of the old orders |publisher=SUNY |isbn=978-0-7914-4067-4 |url={{Google books|AdZBAAsucPcC|page=38|plainurl=y}} |page=38 }}</ref>