The French Revolution
Section 9.41: Background of the French Revolution
July 14, 1789
Crane Brinton & The Anatomy of
Revolution
• Radical Period • Thermidorian
• Moderate
Period
Period
• Major Change
• Reactionary
• Republic
• Limited
stage
– Strong
Change
central
• Oligarchy
• Constitutional
government
– Moderates in
Monarchy
– Radicals in
control
– Liberal
moderates
in control
• Limited
enfranchisement
control
– Bourgeoisie
government
• Total
enfranchise• Idealized
ment
visions of Rev
forgotten
• Terror
• Free Market
• Command
economy
economy
– High Inflation
• Utopian/
idealized vision • Reliance on
Strong Man
• Restoration
Period
• Monarchy
restored
The French Revolution
Assembly
of Notables
call for
Estates
General
1787
1789
Civil
Constitution
of Clergy
-Flight to
Varennes
-Declaration
of Pilnitz
1790
1791
-Estates General
-Tennis Court Oath
-National Assembly
-Bastille stormed
-Great Fear
-Declaration of the Rights of M
&C
-March on Versailles
1792
-Louis XVI
executed
-Comm of
Public Safety
begins Terror
-Marie A.
executed
-Cult of
Reason
1793
-September
Massacres
-Year One of
First Republic
Proclaimed
-Directory
eliminates
radicals
1794
1795
Robespierre
executed on
9th of
Thermidor
Napoleon
crowns
himself
Emperor of
France
1799
1804
8th of
Brumaire
Napoleon
leads
coup
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
The Setting
Estates System
Old Regime (Ancien
Regime) was aristocratic
and feudal
France
Population of 25 million
Estates system was
medieval system rigid legal
orders
– But no longer an
economic or social
reality
First estate = the clergy
Second estate = the nobility
Third estate = everyone else
– wealthy business class
to poorest peasants
Was the Estates System cause the
Revolution?: Class Tensions
• Traditionally Marxist historians
– believed that Revolution caused by class
tensions
– Bourgeoisie of Third Estate v Nobles of the
Second
– Third grew sick of baring economic burden &
privilege of 2nd
– Bourgeoisie led 3rd Estate against others
• Modern Scholarship dismisses this
– Nobles and Bourgeoisie had lots in common
• Land, capitalism
• Noble class was open to rich
• Both groups generally supported Parlements
– Peasants of France had it much better than
Russian serfs
– Third Estate really only represented interests
of the bourgeoisie
The Setting
Estates System
•
Estates general had not be
called since 1614
No longer corresponded with
the distribution of wealth
nobility was open to those who
could afford it
66% of nobility had acceded
since 1600
•
•
•
–
•
50, 000 new nobles were created
since 1700
talent of nobility was from 3rd
Estate
First Estate: The Church
•
•
100 thousand members
collected tithe
– 10% of income
•
Owned 10 percent of the
•
land (greatest single
landowner)
Paid “voluntary gift”
every 5 years
played political role
•
– but so did English
Church
Second Estate: The Nobility
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
About 400 thousand members
Owned >20% of land
Retained Medieval Manorial Rights
–
Banalities
•
Exclusive rights to hunt, fish, monopoly on bread
baking, pressing grapes, etc.
–
Eminent property
•
fees paid to the noble for lands held by peasants
(transfer fees, when land changed owners by sale or
death)
Retained Medieval Honorific Rights
–
Right to carry a sword
Monopolized higher offices in the military, government, and
church
Exempt from direct tax (taille),
–
bourgeoisie greatly resented this (even thou they got out
of paying also)
Divided into:
–
Nobles of the Sword (noblesse d’epee) more distinguished
ancient
–
Nobles of the Robe (noblesse de robe) purchased the title
of administrative of judicial (robe)
The Third Estate
•
•
•
•
•
•
Everyone else
97% of population
Paid 100% of tax
– Taille (land tax)
Doctors, lawyers, merchants,
peasants, laborers, artisans,…
Peasants
– 80% of Population
– Owned 40% of land
Upper class bourgeois
• 2.3 million
• 8% of population
• Owned 20% of land
Cause 2: Political Culture and Public Opinion
•
The Enlightenment
–
writers created a culture that encouraged
political and social criticism
•
Natural rights
•
Historical progress
•
A language to communicate dissatisfactions
–
philosophes did not cause the revolution but
they gave it a conceptual context and a
theoretical language to describe dissatisfactions
•
book production reached peak in 1788
•
many newspapers and periodicals
•
parlements-courts of record used periodicals
to voice their opinions against ministers of
the monarchy
•
theories of Locke, Rousseau, Montesquieu,
Voltaire circulated
– Voltaire resented privilege
– Locke favored private property
– Mont- 3 branches would favor parlements
Critical Spirit
• Developed in salons, coffeehouses and
spread to the public sphere of political
debate
• Pamphleteers
– Stripped away the “sacred”
image of the nobility and the
church
– The Necklace Affair
• Public airing of courtroom
activity
– Corrupt noble against
oppressed peasant became
recurrent theme
• Campaigns to influence public opinion
became a force in the French
Revolution
– Reason, justice, rights