A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
“Along the Paris streets, the death-carts rumble, hollow and
harsh. Six tumbrils carry the day’s wine to La Guillotine ”
.
Tumbrils - carts that carried condemned persons to the guillotine
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pO2DnAMzos
Learning Goals:
Summarize the events that occurred during
the radical phase of the French Revolution?
Understand how and why radicals
abolished the monarchy.
Explain why the Committee of Public
Safety was created and why the Reign
of Terror resulted.
Summarize how the excesses of the
Convention led to the formation of the
Directory.
MARIE ANTOINETTE TRANSPORTED BY CART TO THE GUILLOTINE
Analyze how the French people were
affected by the changes brought about
by the revolution.
A LIMITED MONARCHY
 August 1789, the National Assembly issued a Declaration of the Rights of
Man,
 Enlightenment philosophy: classical liberalism
 “Men are born and remain free and equal in rights.”
 The National Assembly created a constitutional monarchy with the reluctant
consent of King Louis XVI.
 new constitution went into effect in 1791.
 Became the constitutional blueprint for France.
 Influenced by American constitutional ideas
 Guaranteed due process of law; a citizen was innocent until proven guilty.
 Sovereignty of the people.
 Natural rights are “liberty, property, security, and resistance to
oppression.” (Locke)
 Law is expression of the “General Will” (Rousseau)
 Freedom of expression and religion.
 Liberty defined as freedom to do anything not injurious to others, as
determined only by law.
 Taxes could be raised only with common consent.
 All public servants accountable for conduct in office.
 Separation of powers through separate branches.
 Confiscation of property from private persons had to be done with fair
compensation.
 “Citizen” applied to all French people, regardless of class.
WORLD WAR AND REPUBLICAN FRANCE, 17911799
 Foreign Reactions and the Beginning of War
 Edmund Burke published the classic critique of the
French Revolution,
 Reflections on the Revolution in France, in 1790.
 Mary Wollstonecraft published her rebuttal,
 A Vindication of the Rights of Man in the same
year.
 Wollstonecraft and the Frenchwoman Olympe de
Gouges argued that women should be included in
the liberal ideal of equality.
 In the summer and fall of 1791 the Revolution was
radicalized by several events.
 Louis XVI’s attempt to escape France
 Austria and Prussia’s declaration of readiness to
intervene in France under certain conditions
 The election of a new Legislative Assembly under a
new constitution
 By the summer of 1792 France was at war with
Austria and Prussia and the Legislative Assembly had
removed Louis XVI from the throne.
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.
 Women could not vote or hold office
 Olympe de Gouges: The Rights of Woman, 1791
• Following official Declaration in each of its 17
articles, she applied them to women explicitly in
each case.
 Mary Wollstonecraft in England published
Vindication of the Rights of Woman in 1792.
• Ideas similar to de Gouges
• Madame de Stael
• Ran a salon and wrote widely read books.
• Deplored subordination of women to men that the
Revolution had done so little to change.
The Second Revolution
 Members of the newly elected National Convention declared France a Republic in
September 1792.
 Revolutionaries tried to create a new revolutionary French culture.
 The Convention tried and executed Louis XVI on charges of treason.
 The sans culottes, or working people of Paris, exercised a strong influence on the
Convention.
TOTAL WAR AND THE TERROR
 Military defeats prompted the revolutionary government, led by the
Committee of Public Safety,
 primitive sort of centrally controlled economy,
 fixed prices for bread,
 rationing,
 tight control of munitions industry
 The Terror aimed to crush all opponents of the Revolution.
 About 40,000 French were executed in the Terror
 300,000 suspects were arrested.
 France mobilized a huge number (800,000) of motivated soldiers by
instituting a draft and encouraging patriotic sentiment.
 Outnumbering their opponents by perhaps 4 to 1, France won great
battlefield victories.
THE THERMIDORIAN REACTION AND THE
DIRECTORY, 1794-1799
 The Convention, fearing the expansion of the Terror,
 executed Maximilien Robespierre in July 1794.
 A new executive, the five-man directory, ruled France
from 1795-1799, essentially as dictators.
 The end of economic controls hit the poor in Paris
hard, and resulted in riots that were suppressed by
force.
 In rural France villagers, especially women, restored a
normal, structured lifestyle, based in part on the
Catholic Church.
THE NAPOLEONIC ERA, 1799-1815
 Napoleon’s Rule of France
 Napoleon confirmed the gains of the peasantry and reassured the middle class by defending
property.
 He strengthened the central bureaucracy of France.
 By the Concordat of 1801 he simultaneously reinstated freedom of worship for Catholics and
maintained tight control of the Church.
 Napoleon’s new law code reduced women’s legal and property rights.
 Napoleon established a police state and strict censorship to silence political dissent.
 Napoleon’s Wars and Foreign Policy
 The Treaty of Amiens with Great Britain (1802) gave France Holland, the Austrian
Netherlands, the west bank of the Rhine, and most of the Italian peninsula.
 In May 1803 Napoleon renewed war with Britain, but his plans to invade the island were
shattered by the naval battle of Trafalgar (1805).
 Austria, Russia, and Sweden joined Britain in the Third Coalition against Napoleon (1805).
Napoleon defeated the Coalition’s continental partners.
 In 1806 Napoleon crushed Prussia.
 French occupation of much of Europe eventually produced nationalist reactions, as the
conquered areas attempted to throw off French rule.
 In June 1812 Napoleon invaded Russia. He was defeated.
 Joined by Austria and Prussia, Russia and Great Britain defeated Napoleon in 1814.
 The victorious allies set up a constitutional monarchy in France under Louis XVIII.
RADICAL DAYS OF THE REVOLUTION
THE MONARCHY IS ABOLISHED
The Radical Phase of the Revolution -1793,
• one of the bloodiest governments in French history as leaders sought to
extend and preserve the revolution.
Tensions Lead to Violence
French Army in trouble
(the region we see today as
• Prussian forces were cutting down raw French recruits
Germany and Poland)
• royalist officers were deserting the French army, joining others hoping to restore
the king’s power.
• Battle disasters
• Angry revolutionaries who thought the king was in league with the enemies.
August 10, 1792
• a crowd of Parisians stormed the royal palace of the Tuileries and slaughtered
the king’s guards.
• The royal family fled to the Legislative Assembly, escaping before the mob
arrived.
“September massacres.”
• citizens attacked prisons that held nobles and priests accused of political
offenses.
• About 1,200 prisoners were killed; among them were many ordinary criminals.
RADICALS TAKE CONTROL AND EXECUTE THE KING
September 1792
• Radicals called for the election of a new legislative body called the National
Convention.
• Suffrage, the right to vote
• all male citizens, not just to property owners.
• abolished the monarchy and establish a republic—the French Republic.
• a new constitution
Jacobins were mostly middle• The Jacobins plan
class lawyers or intellectuals.
• remove all traces of the old order
• seized lands of nobles
• Abolished titles of nobility
• Put Louis XVI on trial as a traitor to France.
• The king was convicted and sentenced to death.
• January 1793,
“Frenchmen, I die innocent. I pardon the authors of my death. I pray God that the
blood about to be spilt will never fall upon the head of France. . . .”
• October, Marie Antoinette was also executed.
TERROR AND DANGER GRIP FRANCE
Early 1793
• The country was at war with much of Europe,
• Britain,
• the Netherlands,
• Spain,
• Prussia.
• Vendée (vahn DAY) region of France, royalists, priests
peasants rebelled against the new government.
• Paris, the sans-culottes demanded help with food
shortages and inflation.
• The Convention was bitterly divided between Jacobins
and the Girondins.
THE CONVENTION CREATES A NEW COMMITTEE
The Committee of Public Safety
• To deal with the threats to France.
• 12-member committee
• almost absolute power as it battled to save the revolution.
• prepared France for all-out war,
• issuing a levée en masse,
• or mass tax that required all citizens to contribute to the war effort.
• in charge of trials and executions.
ROBESPIERRE “THE INCORRUPTIBLE”
Maximilien Robespierre (ROHBZ pyehr).
• a shrewd lawyer and politician, Jacobin
• rose to the leadership of the Committee of Public Safety.
• his selfless dedication to the revolution earned him the nickname “the
incorruptible.”
• The enemies of called him a tyrant.
Embraced Rousseau’s idea of the general will as the source of all
legitimate law.
• He promoted religious toleration
• Wanted to abolish slavery.
• “republic of virtue” only through the use of terror,
• “prompt, severe, inflexible justice.”
• “Liberty cannot be secured, unless criminals lose their heads.”
THE GUILLOTINE DEFINES THE REIGN OF TERROR
Reign of Terror, - from September 1793 to July 1794.
Spectators greeted
death sentences with
cries of “Hail the
Republic!” or “Death
to the traitors!”
• Revolutionary courts conducted hasty trials.
• Suspect were those who resisted the revolution.
• About 300,000 were arrested.
• Seventeen thousand were executed.
• the guillotine quickly became a symbol of horror.
• Many were victims of mistaken identity or were falsely accused by their neighbors.
• Many were packed into hideous prisons, where deaths from disease were common.
• Weary of bloodshed and fearing for their own lives, members of the Convention turned
on the Committee of Public Safety.
• July 27, 1794, Robespierre was arrested. The next day he was executed.
LIBERTY – EQUALITY - FRATERNITY OR DEATH
• February 5, 1794, Robespierre explained why the terror was necessary to achieve the
goals of the revolution:
“It is necessary to stifle the domestic and
foreign enemies of the Republic or perish
with them. . . . The first maxim of our politics
ought to be to lead the people by means of
reason and the enemies of the people by
terror. . . . If the basis of popular government
in time of peace is virtue, the basis of
popular government in time of revolution is
both virtue and terror.”
—Maximilien Robespierre, quoted in Pageant
of Europe (Stearns
THE REVOLUTION ENTERS ITS THIRD STAGE
The Constitution of 1795
• Moving away from the excesses of the Convention,
• moderates produced the third constitution since 1789.
• The middle class and professional people of the bourgeoisie were the principal force
• set up a five man Directory
• two-house legislature
• elected by male citizens of property.
• Directory held power from 1795 to 1799.
• Weak
• dictatorial,
• The Directory faced growing discontent.
• Peace was made with Prussia and Spain,
• war with Austria and Great Britain continued.
• Corrupt leaders lined their pockets
• failed to solve problems.
• rising bread prices caused riots,
• the Directory quickly suppressed them.
• the renewal of royalist feeling.
• émigrés were returning
• devout Catholics, who resented measures that had been taken against the Church
In the election of 1797,
 supporters of a constitutional monarchy won the majority of seats in the legislature.
 As chaos threatened, politicians turned to Napoleon Bonaparte
 a popular military hero
REVOLUTION BRINGS CHANGE
1799 – 10 years of Revolution
• It had removed the old social order,
• overthrown the monarchy,
• brought the Church under state control.
New symbols
• red “liberty caps”
• tricolor
• the liberty and equality of all male citizens.
• new title “citizen”
• people of all social classes.
• All other titles were eliminated.
• Elaborate fashions and powdered wigs gave way to the practical
clothes and simple haircuts of the sans-culottes.
NATIONALISM SPREADS
Nationalism, a strong feeling of pride in and devotion to one’s country
• Revolution and war gave the French people a strong sense of national identity
• civic festivals that celebrated the nation and the revolution.
• A variety of dances and songs on themes of the revolution
• By 1793, France was a nation at war.
• From the port city of Marseilles troops marched to a rousing new song.
• It urged the “children of the fatherland” to march against the “bloody banner
of tyranny.”
• This song, “La Marseillaise” would later become the French national anthem.
REVOLUTIONARIES PUSH FOR SOCIAL REFORM
Social Reform and Religious Toleration.
• state schools
• replace religious ones
• organized systems to help the poor, old soldiers, and war widows.
• abolished slavery in France’s Caribbean colonies.
• major slave revolt raging in the colony of St. Domingue (Haiti)
• The 1st successful slave revolt
ART OF REVOLUTION
Napoleon Crossing Mont Saint Bernard,
Jacques-Louis David, 1801
Imprisoned after moderates turned against the
Reign of Terror, David barely escaped with his life.
When Napoleon rose to power, David deftly
switched his political allegiance to the new
Emperor of France and became one of
Bonaparte’s chief portraitists. Notice the names
carved into the rocks. David included these names
of great past rulers to show Napoleon’s level of
greatness. David’s depictions of Napoleon helped
cement him as a strong and heroic leader.
THE THIRD OF MAY, 1808, FRANCISCO JOSÉ DE GOYA Y
LUCIENTES, 1814
One of the consequences of the French Revolution and Napoleon’s
rise was that France soon found itself at war with the rest of Europe.
Francisco Goya saw first hand the impact of these wars. Born in
northern Spain, he rose to become the official painter of the
Spanish court. When Napoleon invaded Spain and deposed its king,
Goya chronicled the horrors of the resulting guerrilla warfare.
People never knew if friends or family might appear on a list of
guillotine victims. There is some debate on the humaneness of
death by guillotine. Some authorities claim that even after the
head has been severed, the victim could remain conscious for
up to 30 seconds.
Georges Danton, a
Revolutionary leader,
challenged the Terror
and was guillotined.
This engraving depicts Robespierre’s
Execution by guillotine. His was not the
last. “Twenty minutes later, [those condemned for the day] were
in front of the scaffold…. Pale, tense, shivering… several of
them lowered their heads or shut their eyes…. The third [victim]
was…the Princess of Monaco…. On the platform, her youthful
beauty shone in the dazzling July light.” The executioners then
tossed the bodies and heads into large baskets near the
scaffold.
VIDEOS
http://www.biography.com/people/louis-xvi-9386943
http://www.history.com/topics/marie-antoinette/videos (guillotine)
http://www.history.com/topics/marie-antoinette/videos/robespierre-and-the-reign-ofterror?m=528e394da93ae&s=undefined&f=1&free=false
http://www.biography.com/people/marie-antoinette-9398996