The French Revolution

Reform and Political Crisis

1789: The French Revolution

The Reconstruction of France

The Second Revolution

Most monarchs still claimed to hold their authority

directly from God

Each estate (order of citizens) had its particular

rights, privileges, and obligations

A financial or political crisis that could normally be

managed by the monarchy threatened to snowball in

this new environment

The French Revolution constituted the pivotal event

of European history in the late eighteenth century

The Revolution transformed the nature of sovereignty and

law in France

The French Revolution’s innovations defined the foundations of a liberal

society and polity

Reform and Political Crisis

Strong monarchs with reputations for being

“enlightened”reigned in Prussia, Austria, Spain, and

even Russia

In Britain energetic movements for political

reform ran into determined opposition

Britain’s 13 colonies in North America

were driven to rebellion and a revolutionary war for

independence

Enlightened Absolutism in Central and Eastern

Europe

Many believed that the Enlightened ruler was the

future of kingdoms

Frederick II of Prussia symbolized the enlightened phase of absolutism with his

comment that the ruler is the “first servant of the

state”

Any notion that Enlightenment thinking

caused monarchs to abandon these efforts is

misleading

Catherine the Great (r. 1762-96—Russia) played this game to its limit—an

experiment in representative government

Formation of a Legislative

Commission to present grievances,

propose reforms, and then debate the

proposals

Little came of the commission except

some good publicity

Conceptions of Enlightened Rule in Germany

Eighteenth-century German writers depicted the state as a machine and the ruler as its mainspring

Monarchs, who were expected to dedicate

themselves to the welfare of their subjects in return

for their subjects’ obedience

Joseph II and the Limits of Absolutism

From the Habsburg Empire, Joseph proved to be the most

innovative of the century’s major rulers as well as one of

its most autocratic personalities

Implemented several reforms long advocated by

Enlightenment thinkers: freedom of expression,

religious toleration, state control of Church, legal reform

Agrarian Reform

Agrarian reform was generally the weak side of

enlightened absolutism

Joseph set out to eradicate serfdom and to convert Habsburg peasants into

free individuals in command of their persons

and of the land they cultivated

He sought to limit the financial

obligations of peasant tenants to their lords and to

the state

He provoked fierce opposition among

the landowning nobles

Upheavals in the British Empire

George III tried to control through patronage and

influence

The Whig aristocrats saw this operation as a

threat to their own traditional power

“Wilkes and Liberty”

John Wilkes, a member of Parliament and a journalist,

became the center of this rising conflict

The government arrested him for seditious libel on a

general warrant

He fled to France

He eventually elected to the House of Commons

Rebellion in America

George III and his prime minister attempted to force

the colonies to pay the costs, past and present, of their

own defense through increased taxes and

imposing a centralized authority

America resisted, fundamentally different from

European movements

They appealed to traditional rights supposedly enjoyed

by all British subjects

propelled by the concepts of “popular sovereignty” and

“natural rights” advanced by John Locke

The American Declaration of Independence, penned by

Jefferson, Adams, and Franklin

The American Revolution created

the first state governments in the

modern era in which the exercise of power was grounded on the

participation and consent of male

citizens—not a royal sovereign

1789: The French Revolution

The rebellion in America inspired the discontent in

France

Its ultimate slogan—”Liberty, Equality,

Fraternity”, an expression of social and civic ideals that became the foundations of

modern Western civilization

It swept away seigneurialism, tax

privileges, guild monopolies, and an end to slave trade

Fraternity expressed that all citizens,

regardless of social class, or region, shared

a common fate in society and that the nation’s well-being could override the

interests of individual citizens

Origins of the Revolution

Those who made the Revolution believed they

were rising against despotic government, in

which citizens had no voice, and against

inequality

King Louis XVI (r. 1774-1792) and his queen,

Marie Antoinette

The Cultural Climate

Intellectual ferment preceded political revolt

—many of the new thinkers argued against

Monarchy

Many writers portrayed the French aristocracy as

decadent and the monarchy as a

ridiculous despotism

Class Conflict

Many believe the transition from the

aristocratic feudalism of the Middle Ages to the era of middle-class

capitalism

The middle classes led the Revolution in order to change the political and social systems in

their own interests

Others have argued that the leaders of the

Revolution in 1789 were lawyers, administrators, and liberal nobles, and

rarely merchants or industrialists

Regardless, the gap between the nobility and the middle classes was nothing compared with the gap of both from the

working class

Fiscal Crisis and Political DeadlockThe Failure of Reform

Jacques Turgot, a controller-general of finances under

Louis XVI, hoped to encourage a policy of

nonintervention (laissez-faire)

Allow individuals maximum freedom to

pursue their own economic interests

He sought to replace the obligation of peasants to work on the royal roads with a small new tax on

all landholders

Vested interests viewed Turgot as a dangerous

innovator

Turgot was removed, as was the last chance for

significant reform

Deficit Financing

The King turned to Jacques Necker, a

banker from Geneva who had a reputation for financial wizardry

Better public relations

Due to excessive borrowing, taxes were raised—an unpopular

prospect for many

Calonne and the Assembly of Notables

The new controller-general, Charles Calonne,

convinced the king to convene an Assembly of

Notables of 150 “notable” men

The assembly refused to endorse the proposed

reforms

The assembly denounced the king

and his lavish spending and

insisted on auditing the monarchy’s

finances

The aristocracy’s determined

opposition was putting an end to

absolutism in France

From the Estates General to the National

Assembly

The calling of the Estates General, a body

representing the clergy, nobility, and third-estate,

in 1789

Great excitement emerged and many “patriots”

swelled the movement against corruption and

spending

The Critique of Privilege

Nobles would still hold vastly disproportionate powers if the Estates General voted by order

The nobility, they claimed, monopolized all the lucrative

positions in society while doing little for its productive

workers

The enemy was no longer simply absolutism but

privilege as well

Cashiers and Elections

The king had invited all citizens to meet their local parishes to elect

delegates to draft “grievance

petitions” (cahiers)

The bulk of the complaints had to do

local problems and high taxes—NOT natural

rights

Deadlock and Revolution

The Third Estate formed a “National Assembly”

The king sought to lockout the Third Estate

To curb complaints, he promised equality in

taxation, and civil liberties

The king was eventually forced to recognize the

National Assembly—the

delegation began a nonviolent, “legal”

revolution

They claimed to be the sovereign

power in France

The Convergence of Revolutions

The winter and spring of 1788-1789 had brought

severe economic difficulties—crop failures and grain

shortage caused a doubling of the price of flour

Many feared an “aristocratic plot” against

the National Assembly and the Third-Estate

The Fall of the Bastille

The king set 20 thousands royal troops into the Paris

region

The movement prepared to resist and sieged the

Bastille, an old fortress once used as the as a prison and

stored gunpowder

The first major battle—the revolution turned violent

Peasants Revolts

These events did not pacify the anxious and hungry people of the

countryside

Seigneurial dues and church tithes weighed

heavily on many peasants

Suspicions were rampant that nobles were hoarding

grain

Peasants sacked houses of the nobles and burned

seigneurial records

“the Great Fear”

These prompted armed mobilizations in

hundreds of villages, and set off new attacks on

manor houses

Many declared the “abolition of feudalism”

The Reconstruction of France

The National Assembly set out not simply to enact reforms but to

reconstruct French institutions on entirely new principles

No aspect of France’s social or political system was immune to scrutiny, not even slavery in the

colonies

In 1792 war broke out, which led directly to the fall of the monarchy

and to a new, violent turn in the Revolution

The Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen

The Declaration was the death certificate of the old regime and

a rallying point for the future

The Declaration enumerated *natural rights such as freedom of expression and freedom of

religious conscience

The new regime would be based on the principles of

reason rather than tradition

The New Constitution

Representative Government

From 1789 to 1791, the National Assembly acted as a Constituent Assembly to produce a constitution for

France

In 1790 nobles lost their titles and became

indistinguishable from other citizens

Under the French Constitution of 1791, every adult male of

settled domicile who satisfied minimal

taxpaying requirements gained the right to vote

In the same frame of mind the Assembly excluded all women

from voting

Women in the Revolution

A brief but spirited drive for women’s suffrage advanced through pamphlets, petitions, and deputation to the Assembly

—Declaration of the Rights of Women

The majority of deputies believed women to be too emotional

Race and Slavery

Public opinion scorned Jews as an alien race

not entitled to citizenship

The Assembly rejected that argument and extended civil and political equality to

Jews

Planters argued that they could not maintain slavery

since it is based on race

Slave rebellions erupted, blacks turned violently on

their white masters and proclaimed the independence

of the colony—Haiti

In 1794 the French revolutionary government

abolished slavery in all French colonies

Unifying the NationThe Assembly divided the

nation’s territory into eighty-three departments of

roughly equal size

The new administrative map also created the boundaries

for a new judicial system

Criminal defendants for the first time gained the right to

counsel

Economic Individualism

Besides dismantling internal tariffs and chartered trading

monopolies, it abolished merchants’ and artisans’ guilds and proclaimed the

right of every citizen to enter any trade and

conduct it freely

The Revolution and the Church

Under revolutionary ideology, the French

Catholic Church could no longer exist as an

independent corporation

It made the state responsible for the

upkeep of the Church

Religious Schism

The Assembly intended to rid the Church of inequities that enriched the aristocratic

prelates of the old regime

*Civil Constitution of the Clergy reduced the number

of bishops from 130 to 83 and all bishops must make

an oath of loyalty to the constitution

Some refused, remaining loyal to the Pope and the church’s

independence

A schism tore through French Catholicism

The oath crisis polarized the nation

Counterrevolution, Radicalism, and War

The King’s Flight

Emigres formed an army that threatened to overthrow the

new regime at the first opportunity

The Assembly reaffirmed the king’s place in the new regime, but Louis’ treasonous flight to Varennes ensured that radical

agitation would continue

The Fall of the Monarchy

France went to war with a coalition of Austria, Prussia,

and the emigres

Rebellion continued. Louis XVI published a Manifesto

supporting the invaders

The Assembly declared Louis XVI’s reign suspended

Half the members fled Paris—ending its legitimacy