THE FRENCH
REVOLUTION:
THE RADICAL PHASE
Strong reactions in neighboring countries
sparked the radical phase of the revolution
which resulted in the establishment of the
First French Republic.
• Most were satisfied with initial reforms but the Jacobin
party pushed for a republic, no king
• Girondists
• The Mountain
• June, 1791 Louis XVI attempts to flee France
• August, 1791 Declaration of Pillnitz
• Early 1792 Prussia and Austria invade France at the
request of Louis XVI and émigrés
• April, 1792 France declares war on Austria and
Prussia
• Legislative Assembly deposed Louis XVI and called
for an election of a National Convention to write a new
constitution
• Summer of 1792 the sans-culottes emerge as major
players in the Paris Commune and they wanted an
economic revolution to follow the political revolution
• September Massacres of 1972
• September, 1792 First French Republic proclaimed
• Abolished imprisonment for debt
• Abolished slavery
• Adopted the metric system
• Divorce initiated by women
• Planned a national educations system
• Prohibited primogeniture
• New calendar established
• Established the Cult of the Supreme Being
• Citizen Louis Capet, formerly Louis XVI, executed
January 21, 1793
• February, 1793 Britain, the Netherlands, and Spain get
involved in the war against revolutionary France
• April, 1793 Committee of Public Safety formed
• June, 1793 Law 22 Prairial
• August, 1793 Levee en Masse
• mobilization of the economy for the war
• military draft for all unmarried men
• military was 3 to 4 times the size of the enemies
• young men rose up the ranks based on abilities
instead blood (Napoleon)
• birth of modern nationalism
• citizen-soldiers fought enthusiastically not for their
province or city, feudal lord or king, but for their
country
• Reign of Terror (fall 1793 to summer 1794)
• 300,000 arrested and 40,000 executed
• Domestic opposition to the revolution was
crushed
• July, 1794 Thermidorian Reaction
• Eventually the public turned against the Terror
and its leaders and the moderates regained
controlled of the National Convention
• Constitution of Year III