Transcript American and French Revolutions Lsn 5

American and French
Revolutions
Lsn 5
ID & SIG:
• American Revolution, ancient regime,
civilians in the American Revolution,
Cowpens, Enlightenment, French
Revolution, Greene, Howe, Quartering Act,
Trenton, Washington, Yorktown
The Enlightenment
• Enlightenment thinkers sought to discover
natural laws that governed human society in the
same way Newton’s laws regulated the universe
• Collectively, these thinkers were called the
philosophes (“philosophers”)
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Voltaire
Montesquieu
Locke
Roussseau
Francis-Marie Arouet (1694-1778)
(Voltaire)
• Was especially critical of the
Roman Catholic Church which he
held responsible for fanaticism,
intolerance, and incalculable
human suffering
• Wrote Candide in 1759 in which
he analyzes the problem of evil in
the world and depicts the woes
heaped upon the world in the
name of religion
• His battle cry against the Roman
Catholic Church was ecrasez
l’infame (“crush the damned
thing”)
Baron de Montesquieu (1689-1755)
• Sought to establish a
science of politics and
discover principles that
would foster political
liberty in a prosperous
and stable state
• Instrumental in
developing the idea of
separation of powers
(executive, legislative,
judicial)
John Locke (1632-1704)
• Studied the relationship
between the individual
and the state
• Wrote An Essay
Concerning Human
Understanding in 1689
• Largely anti-authoritarian
• There must be a
distinction between the
legitimate and illegitimate
functions of institutions
John Locke
• Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) had described a
social contract in which people in a state of
nature ceded their individual rights to a strong
sovereign in return for his protection
• Locke offered a new social contract theory in
which people contracted with one another for a
particular kind of government, and that they
could modify or even abolish the government
– Great influence on Thomas Jefferson and the
Declaration of Independence
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (17121778)
• Many Enlightenment thinkers
condemned the legal and
social privileges enjoyed by
aristocrats and called for a
society in which all individuals
were equal before the law
• In 1762, Rousseau wrote The
Social Contract arguing that
members of a society were
collectively the sovereign
– All individuals would
participate directly in the
formulation of policy and
the creation of laws
The American Revolution
American Revolution: New
Legislation
• In the mid-18th Century, British colonists in North
America seemed content with British rule, but in the mid1760s things started to change
• Trying to recover financial losses from the French and
Indian War (1754-1763) and the Seven Years’ War
(1756-1763), the British passed a series of new taxes on
the colonies
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Sugar Act (1764)
Stamp Act (1765)
Townsend Act (1767)
Tea Act (1773)
• Other offensive legislation included the Quartering Act of
1765
American Revolution: Colonial
Response
• The colonists responded
with demands of “no
taxation without
representation,”
boycotted British
products, attacked British
officials, and staged the
Boston Tea Party (1773)
– Consistent with Rousseau
• In 1774, they organized
the Continental Congress
which coordinated the
colonies’ resistance to
British policies
American Revolution: Declaration
of Independence
• On July 4, 1776,
the Continental
Congress
adopted “The
Unanimous
Declaration of the
thirteen united
States of
America” (The
Declaration of
Independence)
Revolutionary War
• Declaring yourself to be
“Free and Independent
States” and making it so
were two different things
• On April 18, 1775, British
troops and colonial militia
skirmished at Lexington
and the American
Revolutionary War had
begun
By the rude bridge that
arched the flood,
Their flag to April's breeze
unfurled,
Here once the embattled
farmers stood,
And fired the shot heard
round the world.
--Ralph Waldo Emerson
Colonial Troops: Aug 1776
• 28,000 soldiers
• Average soldier was 20 years old with less than
a year of service
• Muskets, bayonets, light field guns
• Two or three ranks of infantry supported by light
field guns
• Used simplified British tactics (experience from
Seven Years’ War)
• No Navy
• Great disparity in quality between militia and
Continental Army
• Many generals were imposed upon General
George Washington by Congress or state
governments
“Continental Soldier”
by Don Troiani
British Troops: Aug 1776
• 24,000 soldiers
• Average soldier was 30 years old with 10 years
service
• Muskets, bayonets, light field guns
• Two or three ranks of infantry supported by light field
guns
• Powerful Navy (30 warships, 400 transports)
• More experienced, better led, more thoroughly
disciplined and trained
• General William Howe knew generals from their
Seven Years’ War record
Objectives
• Colonists
– Gain independence
• British
– Maintain colonies within the British Empire
• Both sides understood from the beginning
that they were fighting for the allegiance of
a people and for the destruction or
preservation of one state and the creation
of another
Colonists’ Situation Regarding
Civilians
• Had to defeat the
British and control
the loyalists without
losing popular
support or
destroying the
republican
principles for which
they fought
In this 2000 movie, Mel Gibson
plays a reluctant patriot who joins
the colonists’ cause only after his
son is killed by the British
British Situation Regarding
Civilians
• Argued that they were protecting loyalists
from the tyranny of a few ambitious rebels
• Various strategies
– Intimidating the rebels with a show of force
– Combining force and persuasion to break the
rebellion without alienating a majority of the
colonists
– Enlisting the support of loyalists in a gradual
and cumulative restoration of royal
government
Trenton
• The British defeated the
colonists at Long Island in
Aug 1776 and followed up
their success with a series of
landings on Manhattan
Island
– Compelled Washington to
retreat, escaping finally
over the Delaware River
into Pennsylvania with
about 3,000 men.
– Howe then went into
winter quarters.
Trenton
• In December 1776, Washington
determined to make a surprise attack
on the British garrison in Trenton, a
1,400-man Hessian force
– Took advantage of British being in
winter quarters and in poorly
defended, dispersed locations
– Bad weather and limited visibility
– Christmas had reduced British
security
• Hoped that a striking victory would lift
the badly flagging American morale
• Reinforcements had raised
Washington's army to about 7,000
Typical winter quarters
Trenton
• On Christmas night (December 25-26) Washington ferried about 2,400
men of across the ice-choked Delaware River at McConkey’s Ferry
above Trenton and then proceeded by two columns on different routes,
converging at opposite ends of the main street in Trenton
Trenton
Trenton
• At 8:00 a.m. the colonists converged on Trenton
in two columns, achieving complete surprise.
• After only an hour and a half of fighting, the
Hessians surrendered.
– Some 400 of the garrison escaped southward
to Bordentown, NJ when two other American
columns failed to get across the Delaware in
time to intercept them.
– About 30 British were killed and 918 captured.
– American losses were only 4 dead and about
the same number wounded.
Cowpens
• Nathanael Greene was
commander in the
Carolinas and Georgia
– Only a little over 1,000
Continentals and
bands of ill-disciplined
militia against
Cornwallis’ 10,000 men
• Had to create
circumstances to achieve
success
Cowpens
• Greene divided his army into
two divisions which he posted
to the northwest and northeast
of Cornwallis’ camp at
Winnsboro
– Allowed him to better feed his
own men, sustain the militia, and
harass the British
– Tempted Cornwallis to divide his
main body, making it more
vulnerable
• Cornwallis did this in Jan 1781,
sending 1,100 men (commanded
by Tarleton) to attack Greene’s
western division (commanded by
Daniel Morgan)
Cowpens
• Americans suffered 6.2%
losses (12 killed and 60
wounded)
• British suffered 90%
losses
• Cornwallis became
obsessed with Morgan
and turned to pursue him
– Morgan retreated into
Virginia
– In a month Cornwallis had
marched 225 miles without
achieving decisive battle
Daniel Morgan
Yorktown
• From Aug 21 to Sept 26,
1781 Washington and
Rochambeau (French)
marched their armies
from New York to Virginia
• Simultaneously, De
Grasse (French) sealed
off the Chesapeake with
the Navy
• Objective was to trap and
defeat Cornwallis’ army
on the York Peninsula
Yorktown
• Battle would begin with
two parallel siege lines
followed by an assault
• Allies had an
overwhelming
advantage in numbers
(16,000 to fewer than
8,000)
• On Oct 19, the British
surrendered and in Sept
1783 they formally
recognized American
independence
The French Revolution
French Revolution: Ancien Regime
• The early understanding of freedom, equality,
and popular sovereignty in America would have
broad implications throughout the world
– Remember Emerson’s “shot heard round the world”
• The Americans sought independence from
British imperial rule, but they kept British law and
much of the British social and cultural heritage
• On the other hand, French revolutionaries
sought to replace the ancien regime (“the old
order”) with new political, social, and cultural
structures
French Revolution: Estates
General
• In May 1789, in an
effort to raise taxes,
King Louis XVI
convened the Estates
General, an assembly
representing the
entire French
population through
three groups known
as estates
King Louis XVI
French Revolution: Estates
General
• The first estate was about
100,000 Roman Catholic
clergy
• The second estate was
about 400,000 nobles
• The third estate was
about 24 million others
(serfs, free peasants,
laborers)
– In spite of these
numerical
discrepancies, each
estate had one vote
ancien regime
French Revolution: Estates
General
• The third estate
demanded sweeping
political and social
reform, but the other
two estates resisted
• On June 20, 1789,
the third estate
seceded from the
Estates General and
declared itself the
National Assembly
Marie Antoinette
French Revolution: National
Assembly
• The National Assembly
vowed not to disband until
France had a written
constitution
• This assertion of popular
sovereignty spread to Paris
and on July 14 a crowd
stormed the Bastille to seize
weapons and ammunition
• The garrison surrendered in
the wake of great bloodshed
– The attackers severed the
commander’s head and
paraded it through the streets
on a pike
• Insurrections spread
throughout France
Storming of the Bastille
French Revolution: Declaration
• In Aug 1789, the National Assembly issued
the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the
Citizen
– Obviously influenced by the American Revolution
and the Declaration of Independence
• Proclaimed the equality of all men, declared
that sovereignty resided in the people, and
asserted individual rights to liberty, prosperity,
and security
Reforms of the National Assembly
• Reconfigured French society
– Ended the fees and labor services
the peasants owed their landlords
– Seized church lands
– Abolished the first estate and
defined clergy as civilians
– Required clergy to take an oath of
loyalty to the state
– Made the king the chief executive
but deprived him of legislative
authority (a constitutional
monarchy)
The motto of the National
Assembly was “Liberty,
– Men of property could vote for
equality, fraternity”
legislators
The Convention
• Alarmed by the disintegration of monarchial
authority, the rulers of Austria and Prussia
invaded France to support the king and restore
the ancien regime
• The revolutionaries responded by establishing
the Convention, a new legislative body elected
by universal male suffrage
• The Convention abolished the monarchy and
proclaimed France a republic
The Convention
• Drafted people and
resources for use in
the war through the
levee en masse
(universal
conscription)
– A move toward
total war
• Used the guillotine
to execute enemies
to include King
Louis XVI and
Queen Marie
Antoinette in 1793
for treason
Maximilian Robespierre (17581794)
• Robespierre led the
radical Jacobin party
which believed France
needed complete
restructuring and used
a campaign of terror to
promote their agenda
• Dominated the
Convention from 17931794
Robespierre and the Jacobins
• Sought to eliminate the
influence of Christianity
– Closed churches
– Forced priests to take wives
– Promoted a new “cult of
reason” as a secular alternative
– Devised a new calendar which
recognized no day of religious
observance
• Between the summers of
1793 and 1794, the Jacobins
executed 40,000 people and
imprisoned 300,000
“It is dreadful but necessary” (“C’est
affreux mais nécessaire”), from the
Journal d'Autre Monde, 1794.
The Directory
• Many of the victims of the reign of terror were fellow
radicals who had fallen out of favor with Robespierre and
the Jacobins
• In July 1794, the Convention arrested Robespierre and
his allies, convicted them of treason, and executed them
• A group of conservative men of property seized power
and ruled from 1795 to 1799 under a new institution
called the Directory
• The Directory sought a middle way between the ancien
regime and radical revolution but had little success
• In Nov 1799, Napoleon Bonaparte staged a coup d’etat
and seized power
Next
• Napoleonic Wars