1976 Portuguese legislative election

1976 Portuguese legislative election

← 1975 25 April 1976 1979 →
263 seats to the Portuguese Assembly 132 seats needed for a majority
Registered	6,564,667 5.4%
Turnout	5,483,461 (83.5%) 8.2 pp
First party Second party Third party   Leader Mário Soares Francisco Sá Carneiro Diogo Freitas do Amaral Party PS PPD CDS Leader since 19 April 1973 6 May 1974 19 July 1974 Leader's seat Lisbon Porto Lisbon Last election 116 seats, 37.9% 81 seats, 26.4% 16 seats, 7.6% Seats won 107 73 42 Seat change 9 8 26 Popular vote 1,912,921 1,335,381 876,007 Percentage 34.9% 24.4% 15.9% Swing 3.0 pp 2.0 pp 8.4 pp   Fourth party Fifth party   Leader Álvaro Cunhal Acácio Barreiros Party PCP UDP Leader since 31 March 1961 1976 Leader's seat Lisbon Lisbon Last election 30 seats, 12.5% 1 seat, 0.8% Seats won 40 1 Seat change 10 0 Popular vote 788,830 91,690 Percentage 14.4% 1.7% Swing 1.9 pp 0.9 pp
Vote winner strength by district Results by constituency
Prime Minister before election Vasco de Almeida e Costa (interim) Independent Prime Minister after election Mário Soares PS

The 1976 Portuguese legislative election was held on Sunday 25 April, exactly one year after the previous election, and two years after the Carnation Revolution. With a new Constitution approved, the country's main aim was economic recovery and strengthening its democratic institutions. The election renewed all 263 members of the Assembly of the Republic.

The Socialist Party won a plurality of votes, almost 35 percent, and legislative seats, and its leader Mário Soares became the Prime Minister of the 1st Constitutional Government on 23 July 1976. The lack of a socialist majority forced his party to form an unexpected coalition with the Democratic and Social Center, a right-wing party. The nature of this coalition, between a socialist party and a conservative party that voted against the new constitution because of its socialist influences, surprised most Portuguese voters and marked the start of the Socialist Party's right-wing turn that would soon be attacked by all the left due to the new government's measures against left-wing reforms following the Carnation Revolution, mainly concerning agrarian reform, in what was called the PS putting "Socialism in the drawer".^[1]

The Social Democratic Party (then known as the Democratic People's Party, PPD) won the second most votes and seats, 24 percent of the votes, but polled 10 points below the PS. The Portuguese Communist Party (PCP) achieved considerable gains that reflected its growing influence, mainly in the south of the country, gaining 14 percent of the votes. The big surprise in the elections was the strong showing of the Democratic and Social Center (CDS), which polled ahead of PCP and gathered 16 percent of the votes. Only 19 years later, in 1995, would the CDS again surpass the PCP in number of votes.

Voter turnout fell to 83.5 percent, compared with the 91.7 percent just a year before.