+
Causes of The
French Revolution
+
Historical interpretations of class conflict
leading to
the French Revolution
Traditional view:

Bourgeoisie was united by
economic position and class
interest and frustrated by
feudal laws

Eventually, rose up to lead the
Third Estate in the Revolution
which resulted in abolition of
feudal privileges and
established a capitalist order
based on individualism and a
market economy.
Modern:

Revisionist historians have
questioned the existence of a
growing social conflict
between the bourgeoisie and
feudal nobility.

Both groups formed two
parallel social ladders,
increasingly linked at the top
by wealth, marriage, and
Enlightenment culture.
+
Long-Term Causes – 1. Breakdown of the
old order—ancien regime

The French Revolution was
partly influenced by the
American Revolution

Middle class resented gov’t
interference in their economic
activities.

Increased criticism of the
French gov’t was spurred by
rising expectations of the
Enlightenment.

Criticism mounted of gov’t
inefficiency, corruption, and
privileges of the aristocracy.

The legal system was chaotic,
with no uniform or codified
laws.

The Three Estates did not
reflect the realities of wealth
and ability in French society.
+
The Old Regime (Ancien Regime)
 Old
Regime – socio-political system which
existed in most of Europe during the 18th
century
 Countries
were ruled by absolutism – the
monarch had absolute control over the
government
 Classes
of people – privileged and
unprivileged
Unprivileged people – paid taxes and treated badly
 Privileged people – did not pay taxes and treated
well

+
Welcome Back!

Bell Ringer… What Revolution
help bring about the French
Revolution?

Agenda and Objectives:
Through notes and discussion
study will identify the short
term causes of the French
Revolution.
The
Three
Estates
+
Estate
First
Population
Privileges
Exemptions
•Collected the tithe
•Censorship of the press
•Control of education
•Kept records of births, deaths,
marriages, etc.
•Catholic faith held honored
position of being the state religion
(practiced by monarch and
nobility)
•Owned 20% of the land
•Paid no taxes
•Subject to Church
law rather than civil
law
•Moral obligation (rather than legal
obligation) to assist the poor and
needy
•Support the monarchy and Old
Regime
•Paid no taxes
•Support the monarchy and Old
Regime
•Nobles
•Collected taxes in the form of
feudal dues
•Monopolized military and state
appointments
•Owned 20% of the land
•Circa 25,000,000
•None
•None
•Paid all taxes
•Tithe (Church tax)
•Octrot (tax on goods brought into
cities)
•Corvée (forced road work)
•Capitation (poll tax)
•Vingtiéme (income tax)
•Gabelle (salt tax)
•Taille (land tax)
•Feudal dues for use of local manor’s
winepress, oven, etc.
•Circa 130,000
•High-ranking
clergy
Second
Third
•Circa 110,000
•Everyone else:
artisans,
bourgeoisie, city
workers,
merchants,
peasants, etc.,
along with many
parish priests
Burdens
What does this contemporary political cartoon say about conditions
in France under the Old Regime?
+
Government under the Old Regime:
2. The Divine Right of Kings

Monarch ruled by divine right

God put the world in motion

God put some people in positions of power

Power is given by God

No one can question God

No one can question someone put in power by God

Questioning the monarchy was blasphemy because it meant
questioning God
+
Examples of Absolutism…
Appointed the
Intendants, the “petty
tyrants” who governed
France’s 30 districts
Appointed the people
who would collect his
taxes and carry out his
laws
Controlled justice by
appointing judges
Controlled the military
Could imprison anyone
at any time for any
reason (blank warrants
of arrest were called
lettres de cachet)
Levied all taxes and
decided how to spend
the money
Made all laws
Made decisions
regarding war and
peace
+
3. Economic Conditions under the
Old Regime
 France’s
economy was based primarily on
agriculture
 Peasant
taxation
farmers of France bore the burden of
 Poor
harvests meant that peasants had trouble
paying their regular taxes
 Certainly
could not afford to have their taxes raised
 Bourgeoisie
 But
not
often managed to gather wealth
were upset that they paid taxes while nobles did
+
France Is Bankrupt
 The
king (Louis XVI) lavished money on
himself and residences like Versailles
 Queen Marie Antoinette was seen as a wasteful
spender
 Government found its funds depleted as a
result of wars

Including the funding of the American Revolution
 Deficit
spending – a government spending
more money than it takes in from tax revenues
 Privileged classes would not submit to being
taxed
+
Long-term Causes of the French
Revolution
Everything previously
discussed
Also
• Absolutism
• Unjust socio-political
system (Old Regime)
• Poor harvests which left
peasant farmers with
little money for taxes
• Influence of
Enlightenment
philosophes
• System of mercantilism
which restricted trade
• Influence of other
successful revolutions
• England’s Glorious
Revolution (16881689)
• American Revolution
(1775-1783)
+
Short-term Causes of the French
Revolution
Bankruptcy
• Caused by deficit
spending
• Financial ministers
(Turgot, Necker,
Calonne) proposed
changes
• But these were
rejected
• Assembly of
Notables voted
down taxation for
the nobility in 1787
Great Fear
Estates-General
• Worst famine in
memory
• Hungry,
impoverished
peasants feared that
nobles at EstatesGeneral were
seeking greater
privileges
• Attacks on nobles
occurred throughout
the country in 1789
• Louis XVI had no
choice but to call for
a meeting of the
Estates-General to
find a solution to the
bankruptcy problem
• All three estates
• Had not met since
1614
• Set in motion a
series of events
which resulted in the
abolition of the
monarchy and a
completely new
socio-political
system for France
+
Welcome Back!

Bell Ringer…Read Primary
documents and answer the
question “What were the
causes of the French
Revolution?

Agenda and Objectives:
Through notes and article
discussion students will
identify the first stage and
outcomes of the French
Revolution
+
Estates General-- May, 1789

Feudal assembly that
represented the Three Estates

Common agreement among the
Three Estates:

Had only met twice: 1302 (its
inception) & 1614.

France should have a
constitutional monarchy

Individual liberties must be
guaranteed by law.

Position of parish clergy had to
be improved

Abolition of internal trade
barriers

The main issue dividing the
three estates was how the
Estates General should vote


1788-89 excitement swept
over France on the eve of its
very first election.
“Cahiers de doléances”: Each
estate was instructed to
compile a list of suggestions
and grievances and present
them to the king.
+

Abbé Sieyès was the most
influential writer in the 3rd
Estate: wrote, “What is the
Third Estate?”

Claimed the Third Estate
should have the power in
France.

nobility should be abolished.

Believed the Third Estate
represented the vast majority
of French society

Brought the ideas of
Rousseau’s Social Contract to
the forefront.
+
The French Revolution and the “Age
of Montesquieu”



May 5, 1789: the Estates
General met and the Third
Estate was furious that the
voting method was by Estate
and not per capita.

June 20th, the Third Estate
declared itself the true National
Assembly of France.

When locked out of their
meeting place by Louis XVI they
met instead in an indoor tennis
court.

Tennis Court Oath: The Third
Estate swore to remain together
until it had given France a
constitution.

Third Estate thus assumed
sovereign power on behalf of
the nation.
Each estate was ordered to
meet and vote separately.
The Third Estate refused and
insisted that the entire Estates
General vote together.
+
Storming of the Bastille – July 14, 1789


“Parisian” revolution began in
response to food shortages,
soaring bread prices, 25%
unemployment, and fear of
military repression.

Citizens appointed Marquis
de Lafayette commander of
the city’s armed forces.

Paris was lost to the king.
On July 14, an angry mob
stormed the Bastille in search
of gunpowder and weapons.

The storming of the Bastille
inadvertently saved the
National Assembly.
+
The “Great Fear” of 1789

Spirit of rebellion spread to
the French countryside,
sparking a wave of violence.

Peasants attacked manor
houses in an effort to destroy
the legal records of their
feudal obligations.
+
Results…


August 4, 1789 National
Assembly voted to abolish
feudalism in France and
declared equality of taxation
to all classes.
Constituted one of the two
great social changes of the
Revolution (the other was the
abolition of guilds)

Amounted to a peaceful social
revolution

Ended serfdom (where it
existed), exclusive hunting
rights for nobles, fees for
justice, village monopolies, the
corvée, and other dues.
The Tennis Court Oath by Jacques Louis David
The Fall of the Bastille
+
Declaration of the Rights of Man and
Citizen August 26, 1789

Became the constitutional
blueprint for France.

Law is expression of the
“General Will” (Rousseau)

Enlightenment philosophy:
classical liberalism

“Citizen” applied to all French
people, regardless of class.

“Men are born and remain
free and equal in rights.”

Natural rights are “liberty,
property, security, and
resistance to oppression.”
(Locke)
+
Rights of Women


Women gained increased
rights to divorce, to inherit
property, and to get child
support from the fathers of
their illegitimate children.
Drawback of Declaration of
Rights: Women did not share in
equal rights.

Olympe de Gouges: The
Rights of Woman, 1791

Mary Wollstonecraft in
England published Vindication
of the Rights of Woman in 1792.
+
Welcome Back!

Bell Ringer:

1. List three outcomes of the
constitution of 1789.

2. List two characteristics from
the “Declaration of the Rights
of Man and Citizen.”

3. What were three “rights”
women gained during the
Revolution?

Agenda and Objective:
Through notes and discussion,
students will be able to
identify the three stages of the
French Revolution.

Friday: French Revolution
Thesis Paper DUE!
+
Women’s march to Versailles
(Oct. 1789)

Women pushed the revolution
forward in October when
shortages of bread persisted.

Incited by Jean-Paul Marat,
7,000 women marched 12
miles from Paris to Versailles


Demanded to see "the Baker,"
"the Baker's wife," and "the
Baker's boy".
The King met with some of the
women and agreed to
distribute all the bread in
Versailles to the crowd.

King and Queen forced to
move to Paris to live at the
Tuleries, the royal residence in
Paris

It was the last time the King
saw Versailles.

King’s power reduced to
temporary veto in lawmaking
process.
Women's march to Versailles
+
The Civil Constitution of the Clergy
(1790)

In essence, secularized religion

Created a national church with
83 bishops and dioceses.




Clergy forced to take a loyalty
oath to the new gov’t (since the
pope had condemned the
Revolution).
Convents and monasteries
abolished.

All clergymen would be paid by
the state and elected by all
citizens.
Half of French priests refused
to accept it—“refactory
clergy”

Result: deeply divided France
over the issue of religion.
Protestants, Jews, and agnostics
could legally take part in the
elections based on citizenship
and property qualifications.
+
Welcome Back!

Bell Ringer: What was the Civil
Constitution of the Clergy?

Document packet due
WEDNESDAY!

Objective: Through notes and
discussion, students will be
able to identify the three
stages of the French
Revolution.
+
1791: France became a constitutional monarchy
with
a unicameral Legislative Assembly

Half of males over 25 years
eligible to vote

Nobility was abolished

The National Assembly
divided France into 83
departments governed by
elected officials.

Economic reform—favored the
middle rather than the lowest
classes.

Le Chapelier Law (1791)
outlawed strikes, workers
coalitions and assemblies

Monopolies also were
prohibited

Assignats became new paper
currency. Church land sold to
pay off national debt-Much of it
purchased by peasants.
Medallion commemorating the Night of August 4,
the end of feudalism in France
+
French Government Restructure

Divided into 83 districts – local elections – identical
laws

Trade unions abolished to spur competition
(Chapelier Law)

Assignats issued – government bonds backed by confiscated
church lands
+
Reaction to France

Many aristocrats leave - plan counter-revolution

Leopold II and Frederick the Great issue “Declaration of Pillnitz” –
“If royal family harmed, Austria, Prussia, Britain
& Russia will intervene”

Leaders reject as dangerous & exportable
+
The Flight to Varennes
 Although
the King reluctantly accepted the
new constitution, he could not accept all the
reforms (e.g., the Civil Constitution of the
Clergy) and decided to leave the country.
 On
June 20, 1791, the King and his family set
out for the border in a carriage.
The apprehension of Louis XVI at Varennes
+
The Paris Mob

The news of the King's flight destroyed the last of the King's
popularity with the people of Paris.

The popular press portrayed the royal family as pigs and
public opinion plummeted.

Increasingly there were demands for an end to the monarchy
and the creation of a new kind of government, a republic.
+
International Reaction

Edmund Burke (1729-1797):
Reflections on the Revolution in
France (1790)


Thomas Paine: Rights of Man
(1791)
One of the great intellectual
defenses of European
conservatism.

Defending Enlightenment
principles and France’s
revolution.

Defended inherited privileges,
especially those of English
monarchy and aristocracy.

Saw triumph of liberty over
despotism.

Predicted anarchy and
dictatorship in France.


Advised England to go slow in
adapting its own liberties.
Kings and nobles of Europe,
some of which initially
welcomed the Revolution,
began to feel threatened.
+
Legislative Assembly, 1791-1792

A completely new group of
legislators replaced the
National Assembly in the new
government.

Jacobins, named after their
political club, came to
dominate the Legislative
Assembly

New gov’t reflected
emergence of political factions

The Girondins, a group of
Jacobins, became he left or
advanced party of the
Revolution in the Legislative
Assembly and led the country
into war.

Passionately committed to
liberal revolution.
+
Bell Ringer Review!!!!
 Compare
document packet
with your neighbor
 Agenda
and Objective:
Through notes and
discussion, students
will identify important
events and outcomes
of the 2nd and 3rd
stages of the French
Revolution.
+
War


Declaration of Pillnitz issued
by Prussia and Austria in
August, 1791.
Émigrés, French nobles who
fled France beginning in 1789,
influenced Prussia and Austria
to declare the restoration of
the French monarchy as their
goal.

Legislative Assembly declared
war on Austria in April 1792

Girondins became the party of
international revolution.

Claimed the Revolution could
never be secure in France until
it spread throughout the world
+
War of the First Coalition

French revolutionary forces
were soundly defeated by the
Austrian military.

Jacobins blamed their defeat
on Louis XVI, believing him to
be part of a conspiracy with
Prussia and Austria.

July 25, 1792: Brunswick
Manifesto issued by Prussia
and Austria and threatened to
destroy Paris if the royal family
was harmed.

Revolutionary sentiment was
stoked by Robespierre,
Danton, and the journalist,
Marat

August 10, 1792: Tuleries (the
King’s palace in Paris) was
stormed and the King was
taken prisoner, after fleeing to
the Legislative Assembly
August 10, 1792, attack on the Tuileries
Mob placing the red cap of liberty on the King's head at the Tuileries
Marked the beginning of the “Second Revolution”
+
2nd Phase (radical) The end of
Monarchy and the rise
of The Commune 1792

Revolutionary municipal gov’t
set up in Paris, which
effectively usurped the power
of the Legislative Assembly.

Led by Georges-Jacques
Danton

At the urging of radicals, the
Legislative Assembly
suspended the Constitution of
1791.

Ordered new elections based
on universal male suffrage to
summon a new national
convention to give France a
republican form of gov’t.
+
September Massacres

led by Paris CommuneRumors spread that
imprisoned
counterrevolutionary
aristocrats and priests were
plotting with foreign invaders

Prussia invades eastern
France

In response, mobs slaughtered
over a thousand priests,
bourgeoisie, and aristocrats
who opposed their program;
many were in prison.
+
The “Age of Rousseau”: 1792-1799

The National Convention,
1792-1795

Two factions emerged among
the Jacobins:

France was proclaimed a
republic on Sept. 21, 1792


Based on the ideas of Equality,
Liberty, Fraternity
The Mountain: radical
republicans; urban class
(Danton and Robespierre)

Girondins: more moderate
than the Mountain and
predominantly rural
+
Welcome Back

Bell Ringer….Any questions
regarding your test tomorrow?

Agenda and Objective:
Review and article read on
Napoleon.
"When the tocsin sounds, it will not be a
signal of alarm, but the signal to charge
against the enemies of our country. . . To
defeat them, gentlemen, we need boldness,
and again boldness, and always boldness;
and France will then be saved."
Georges-Jacques Danton: "Boldness and
again boldness, and always boldness"
+
The San-Culottes

Predominantly from the working-class; extremely radical.

Were a separate faction from those of the National Convention and had an
economic agenda.

Their violence and influence kept the revolution moving forward

Responsible for storming Bastille, marching to Versailles, driving the king
from Tuleries, and the September Massacres.

They feared the National Convention might be too moderate.

Favored direct democracy in their neighborhood clubs and assemblies,
together with a mass rising if necessary against the Convention itself.
The sans culottes
The bourgeoisie
+
Revolutionary army victories

After Holding back the
Prussians in a series of
victories. France was able
occupy of the entire Austrian
Netherlands by November
1792.

In February 1793, National
Convention declared war on
Britain, Holland and Spain, in
addition to its war with
Austria and Prussia—First
Coalition
The French Flag
 The
Marquis de Lafayette,
commander of the new
National Guard,
combined the colors of
the King (white) and the
colors of Paris (blue and
red) for his guardsmen's
uniforms and from this
came the Tricolor, the
new French flag.
+
The Execution of Louis XVI

The constitutional monarchy put in place by moderate
revolutionaries gave way to a radical republic.

On January 23, 1793 Louis Capet went to the guillotine in the Place
de la Concorde, where a statue of his predecessor, Louis XV, once
stood.
 At the scaffold he said "I forgive those who are guilty of my
death."
The execution of Louis XVI
+
The Rise of the Jacobins
 When
the constitutional monarchy fell and
he King was put on trial for treason in
December, the Girondins argued against
his execution.
 The
Jacobins thought he needed to die to
ensure the safety of the revolution.
 The
Jacobins in the National Convention
had 22 Girondin leaders arrested and
executed. The Jacobins had won.
+
May 1793 rise of the Enragés

The “Mountain”
(“Jacobins”) supported by
the sans-culottes ousted the
Girondins

believed the Girondins would
ally with conservatives and
royalists to retain power.

Enragés—radical working
class leaders of Paris—
seized & arrested 31 Girondist
members of National
Convention and left the
Mountain in control.

Even more radical than the
sans-culottes

Many Girondins fled Paris and
worked against the Revolution.

Marat was stabbed by
Charlotte Corday, a
supporter of the Girondist
faction, in 1793.
The Death of Marat by Jacques-Louis David
+
Committee of Public Safety
(1793-94)


By the summer of 1793, the
Committee of Public Safety
became an emergency gov’t
to deal with internal and
external challenges to the
revolution.
Led by Maximilien
Robespierre

Committee closely
collaborated with sansculottes.

Law of Maximum: a planned
economy to respond to food
shortages and related
economic problems.

In effect, it was an early
version of socialism.

Slavery abolished in the
French colonies

New calendar
+
With the Military…


Lévee en masse: the entire
nation conscripted into
service as war was defined as
a national mission.
Size of army grew to 1 million
men; unprecedented in history
of European warfare.

The planned economy made
mobilization effective.

Nationalism became a strong
force uniting French people.
+
The Reign of Terror (1793-1794)


Law of Suspects: Alleged
enemies of the revolution were
brought before Revolutionary
Tribunals that were created to
hear cases of treason
About 40,000 people
throughout France executed or
died in prison; many by the
guillotine.

The terror became a political
weapon; not directed at any
class in particular.

Most deaths occurred in
places in open revolt against
the Convention.
+
Maximilien Robespierre

"If the spring of popular
government in time of peace is
virtue, the springs of popular
government in revolution are at
once virtue and terror: virtue,
without which terror is fatal;
terror, without which virtue is
powerless. Terror is nothing
other than justice, prompt,
severe, inflexible.”
+
“Republic of Virtue”

Eventually, no one could feel
safe from Robespierre’s reign
of terror as leading Jacobins
who opposed Robespierre
were eventually executed

Cult of the Supreme Being
introduced in June, 1794

Deistic natural religion, in
which the Republic was
declared to recognize the
existence of God and the
immortality of the soul.

Notre Dame Cathedral was
converted into the “Temple of
Reason”
+


End of the Terror
Opposition to Robespierre
mounted in July, 1794.
was denounced in the
Convention, arrested, and
executed the next day, along
with his close associates.

Led to the Thermidorian
Reaction (1794)- 3rd Stage

Constituted a significant swing
to the right (conservatism).

Those who had led liberal
Revolution of 1789 reasserted
their authority.

Reduced powers of the
Committee of Public Safety
and closed the Jacobin club.

Girondins readmitted.
+
The Directory (1795-1799)

New constitution written in 1795 which set up a republican
form of gov’t.

A new assembly chose a five-member executive to govern
France: the Directory

Bicameral legislature

Almost all adult males were able to vote but they only voted
for “electors.”

Office holding reserved to property owners.
+
Challenges of The Directory
(1795-1799)

The Directory suffered from
corruption and poor
administration.

Despite, or perhaps because
of, these struggles, the French
developed a strong feeling of
nationalism – they were
proud of their country and
devoted to it. (fueled by
military victories)

Conspiracy of Equals led by
“Gracchus” Babeuf formed to
overthrow the Directory and
replace it with a dictatorial
“democratic” gov’t which would
abolish private property and
enforce equality

guillotined

It would be a military leader –
Napoleon Bonaparte, coming
to power through a coup d’état –
who would end the ten-year
period (1789-1799) known as
the French Revolution.
+
Change Resulting from the French
Revolution

By 1799, the French Revolution
had dramatically changed
France. It had dislodged the
old social order, overthrown
the monarchy, and brought the
Church under state control.
Many changes occurred in
everyday life:

New symbols, such as the
tricolor, emerged.

Titles were eliminated.

Elaborate fashions were
replaced by practical clothes.

People developed a strong
sense of national identity.

Nationalism, a strong feeling
of pride and devotion to one’s
country, spread throughout
France.
+
The Age of Voltaire: Napoleon and
Enlightened Despotism
+
Rise of Napoleon and end of the
Directory


A conspiracy emerged to save
the Revolution and prevent a
royalist return to power.
Abbé Sieyès, the leader of the
conspiracy, invited Napoleon
to join conspirators and
overthrow the Directory; he
did so upon returning from
Egypt with his forces.

Coup d’Ètat Brumaire,
November, 1799

Upon returning from Egypt
with his forces, Napoleon
drove legislators from the
Legislative Assembly.

A new constitution established
beginning the Consulate Era.

A plebiscite (general
referendum)overwhelmingly
approved: 3,011,007 to 1,562.
+
Napoleon…

born in Corsica, attends military school, then joins army,

appointed commander of armies by Directory,

wins stunning victories in Italy, gaining popularity; news of
his defeats in Egypt is suppressed

in 1795, Napoleon defeats royalist rebels attacking National
Convention,

In 1799, carries out coup d’état (seizure of power),
overthrows Directory.
+
+
France Under Napoleon
Napoleon consolidated his power by strengthening the
central government.
Order, security, and efficiency replaced liberty, equality,
and fraternity as the slogans of the new regime.
To fix economy, he sets up national banking system,
efficient tax collection; establishes lycées – government run
public schools to train officials; signs concordat—
agreement—with pope restoring Catholicism in France
Napoleon developed a new law code, the Napoleonic
Code:
Equality for all citizens
Religious toleration
Advancement based on merit