Transcript The French Revolution

The French Revolution
How to Lose Your Head in More Ways than One
French Revolution – The Causes
• French Society under the “Old Regime”
• Three Estates = Clergy, Nobles, All Others
• Tax & Privilege Issues >> Internal Divisions
• Enlightenment Thought & America
• Financial Crisis due to ↑ Debt & Natural Disaster
• Failed Reforms
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Reputation of Monarchy = untrustworthy
Necker Report = misinformation of true condition
Calonne’s proposal = tax changes… rejected
Brienne’s proposal = land tax changes…rejected
• The Deadlock = Estates General called… agendas?
The Revolution Begins
• Estates General >> National Assembly
– Organization & Vote Debate
• Equal or population based?
• Vote by “head” or by “order”?
– Third Estate Acts…Clergy?
• Forms National Assembly
• Tennis Court Oath
– Standoff >> Lockout >> >>
Constitutional Assembly
• July 14, 1789…
– Troops called + Necker fired
– Bread Prices Up + Militia
– The Bastille attacked…
1st violence + “tri-color”
The Revolution Continues…
• Bastille violence >> mobs >> Great Fear
– Violence vs. Nobles & Clergy… peasant rights NOW!
– August 4, 1789
• Equality before the law
• Equal Opportunity
• Declaration of Rights of Man & the Citizen
– Male oriented
– “Free & equal”
– “Liberty, property, security & freedom from oppression”
• Marat… agitates & encourages violence via press
• Natural Disaster >> Women’s March on Versailles
– Poor harvests = Famine + Inflation =  anger ↑↑↑↑
– Bread + Recognition >> Violence + Royals to Paris
Reconstructing France
• Government by Constitutional Monarchy
– Legislative Assembly (laws) + King (delay veto)
– “Active Citizenry”
• Male taxpayer suffrage & elector privilege
• Olympia de Gouges >> Declaration of Rights of Woman
– Administrative “Departments” & Courts
• Economic Changes
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Chapelier Law = no unions
Metric System = science / math based, not monarch!
Confiscation of Church lands & resell to ↓ debt
“Assignats” = government bonds >> inflation
What was the basic cause of the French
Revolution?
A. A majority of the French people wanted to
replace the monarchy with a republic
B. France was a weak country in severe
economic decline
C. The past abuses of the Old Regime
D. The support of the nobles for the absolute rule
of Louis XVI
E. The invasion of France by foreign powers
Answer: C
Reconstructing the Catholic Church
in France
• Civil Constitution of the Clergy
– Dissolves nearly all religious orders in France
– Requires clerical oath of allegiance
• “Constitutional Priests”
– Creates strong opposition & condemnation by
Roman Catholic Church – Pope Pius VI
– Church < > State Separation
• Essentially kills French RC Church
Counter-Revolutionary
Movements
• Émigré
– Nobles who fled
– Planned to reinstate monarchy & Old Regime
• Flight to Varennes, June 1791
– Royal family flees, is captured & returned to
Paris under arrest as ‘enemy of the revolution’
• Declaration of Pillnitz (A), August 1791
– Austria & Prussia promise intervention if…
• Royal family harmed
The Second Revolution
Power Struggle – 1791>>
• Jacobins… political club
– “Republic of Civic Virtue”
– Representative Government, laissez-faire
• Girondists… moderate faction of Jacobins
– Émigré laws… return or ??...vetoed by King
– War declaration on Austria… why?
• Sans-Culottes… Working class
– Economic relief
– Direct Democracy
• Paris Commune >> September Massacres
– Execution of aristocrats & loyalists… 1792
The End of the Monarchy
• December 1792 Louis XVI put on trial
– Condemned for conspiracy
• January 1793 ‘Citizen Capet’ is guillotined
Europe vs. the Revolution
• Edmund Burke’s condemnation
– Revolution creates instability & violence
– Led to repression across Europe… fear!
• The Partitions of Poland
– 1772 Partition led to more reforms
– 1791 Polish Patriots reform government
along enlightened ideas
– 1793 Poland partitioned is Russian puppet
– 1795 final Polish partition, ceases to exist
The Reign of Terror
Defending the Revolution at home
• France v. First Coalition (A, P, GB, Sp, N)
– French export of revolutionary ideals
– Europe wants protection from radicalism
• Committee of Public Safety & Robespierre
– Accuses & executes “Enemies of the Revolution”
• Levée en Masse
– Mass conscription of all males & production
– Massive mobilization to protect revolution
Robespierre’s
“Republic of Virtue”
• Public good over private good
• Exclusion of women
– Followed Rousseau’s ‘separate spheres’
– Olympia de Gouges guillotined
• De-Christianization
– New Calendar, persecution
– Worship of Reason
• Tribunals v. enemies = death
– Marie Antoinette, aristocrats
– Jacques Danton, other republicans
– 25000+ citizens executed
End of the Terror
• Cult of the Supreme Being
– Deist Cult with Robespierre as Priest
• Overextension of Terror by Robespierre
– Danton & other leaders executed… ppl.
– Law of 22 Prairial …conviction w/o evidence 
– 9 Thermidor = Robespierre’s arrest & execution 
• Thermidorian Reaction
– New leadership + Less radical + White Terror
– Religious Revival + Conservatism + New Constitution
• Constitution of Year III…
– More conservative
– Council of Elders + Council of 500 + Directory (5)
– Property basis of suffrage & social status
– Economic & Political Instability… who gains / loses power?
• Royalists attempt to restore monarchy… NB = hero!
• In this chaotic time, who will people follow?
The French Revolution
Questions to ponder…
Which of the following best characterizes
eighteenth century France just prior to the
revolution of 1789?
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
The economic status of the peasants improved
dramatically
The aristocracy’s power had completely eroded
The clergy’s privileges were declining
The monarchy was experiencing a financial crisis
Participation by the bourgeoisie in political affairs was
increasing dramatically
Answer: D
The main purpose of the women’s march to
Versailles in October 1789 was to
A. Provide the National Assembly & king with a
declaration of support
B. Protest the seizure of Louis XVI & Marie
Antoinette by the National Guard
C. Present their concerns to the queen
D. Protest the lack of female representation in the
National Assembly
E. Ensure the king’s support for the Declaration of
the Rights of Man & lower bread prices
Answer: E
The French Reign of Terror is most closely
associated with the
A. Women’s march to Versailles
B. Establishment of the Committee of Public
Safety
C. Issuance of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy
D. Drafting of the Declaration of the Rights of Man
& Citizen
E. Reform of criminal & civil law
Answer: B
The calling of the Estates-General in France by
King Louis XVI in 1789 was the direct result of
A. An uprising of the sans-culottes in Paris
B. France’s defeats in the Seven Years War
C. The impact of the ideology advocated in the
American Revolution
D. The failure of the Assembly of Notables to
endorse the king’s program of tax reform
E. The recommendation by Jacques Necker,
France’s Director General of Finance
Answer: D
Which of the following best describes the French
Third Estate?
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
The palace at the Tuileries, which was the chief royal
residence after Versailles and the Louvre
The nobility of the robe, who acquired their rank by
purchase
The non-noble, non-clerical section of the EstatesGeneral
The revolutionary faction that launched the Reign of
Terror
Counterrevolutionary provinces that resisted the
National Assembly
Answer: C
At the start of the meeting of the Estates-General,
the Third Estate refused to have their credentials
officially recognized because
A. They resented that the three estates met &
voted separately, by order
B. They doubted the decisions would be made by
fully democratic means
C. The aristocracy also refused to show
credentials
D. They resented the idea of including peasants
in the Third Estate
E. The king refused to hold future meetings
Answer: A
What is the main point of the
political cartoon provided?
A. The uniqueness of French
innovation
B. The French people
support each other greatly
C. The appropriateness of
absolutism
D. The unfairness of French
society
E. The superiority of France
Answer: D