An initial inquiry among patient of mental hospitals on their participation in the Land Parliament elections in Hesse in 1978 revealed an extremely low quota (7.5% only). Hence, before the Federal Parliament elections were held in 1980, the staff and patients of the mental hospitals in Hesse and Rhineland-Palatinate had been informed in detail on the patients' right to vote and on possible difficulties in translating this right into reality. A bare one-fifth of the patients did actually vote as a result of this information campaign. This is partly due to the fact that the mental patients themselves have rather hazy notions about their rights - and this applies equally to the staff and to the civic authorities, Several practical difficulties which stand in the way of the patients in exercising their civil rights, came to light on this occasion.