suspected of being the informer of the Communist Party in the cabinet. This rumour was spread by the former Paris police prefect, who had been dismissed by him. The suspicions were dismissed by subsequent investigations. The UDSR joined the Republican Front, a centre-left coalition, which won the 1956 legislative election. As Justice Minister (1956–1957), François Mitterrand allowed the expansion of martial law in the Algerian conflict. Unlike other ministers (including Mendès-France), who criticised the repressive policy in Algeria, he remained in Guy Mollet's cabinet until its end. As Minister of Justice, he had a role in 45 executions of the Algerian natives, recommending President René Coty to reject clemency in 80% of the cases, an action he later came to regret. François Mitterrand's role in confirming the death sentences of FLN rebels convicted by French courts of terrorism and later in abolishing the death penalty in 1981 led the British writer Anthony Daniels (writing under his pseudonym of Theodore Dalrymple) to accuse François Mitterrand of being an unprincipled opportunist, a cynical politician who proudly confirmed death sentences of FLN terrorists in the 1950s when it was popular and who only came to champion abolishing the death penalty when this was popular with the French people. As Minister of Justice he was an official representative of France during the wedding of Rainier III, Prince of Monaco, and actress Grace Kelly. Under the Fourth Republic, he was representative of a generation of young ambitious politicians. He appeared as a possible future Prime Minister. Opposition during the Fifth Republic Crossing the desert: 1958–64 In 1958, François Mitterrand was one of the few to object to the nomination of Charles de Gaulle as head of government, and to de Gaulle's plan for a Fifth Republic. He justified his opposition by the circumstances of de Gaulle's comeback: the 13 May 1958 quasi-putsch and military pressure. In September 1958, determinedly opposed to Charles de Gaulle, François Mitterrand made an appeal to vote "no" in the referendum over the Constitution, which was nevertheless adopted on 4 October 1958. This defeated coalition of the "No" was composed of the PCF and some left-wing republican politicians (such as Pierre Mendès-France and François Mitterrand). This attitude may have been a factor in François Mitterrand's losing his seat in the 1958 elections, beginning a long "crossing of the desert" (this term is usually applied to de Gaulle's decline in influence for