HTAV Annual Conference
29 July 2011
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
1
‘Change’ and the French
Revolution
‘The only thing that one really knows about human nature
is that it changes. Change is the one quality we can
predicate of it. The systems that fail are those that rely on
the permanency of human nature, and not on its growth
and development. The error of Louis XIV was that he
thought human nature would always be the same. The
result of his error was the French Revolution. It was an
admirable result.’ Oscar Wilde. This session will examine the
notion of 'change' within the French revolution as well as
some of the changes in the way it has been viewed and
interpreted by historians.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
2
‘Change’
•
•
•
•
In teaching approach
In resources
In multi-media
In the pre-revolutionary, revolutionary and
post-revolutionary period
• Short term change and long term change
• Change with Revolutions and VCAA
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
3
‘Change’ in the teaching of Revolutions
• Limited textbooks ‘pitched’ to secondary
students in Australia (Victoria) . . . Now . . .
• Audio and video material
• Images
• Digital resources
• Opportunities for dialogue in and out of class
(blogs, tumbler, podcasts etc).
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
4
‘Change’ as a feature of the Revolution
• The revolutionary calendar:
• Was introduced by decree of the Convention on 5
October 1793.
• An attempt to de-Christianise France (contemporary
parallels worth highlighting to students).
• Place names were purged of all Christian references.
• Names given to children, tended now to be drawn from
nature, heroes of antiquity or great ‘men’ of the
Enlightenment.
• Christian Feast Days were abolished.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
5
‘Change’ as a feature of the Revolution
• During this time there was vandalism to churches and
ancient site in the name of the Republic – a description
of such destruction:
• “ . . . The second group arrived in Auxerre . . . Along the
way they indulged themselves in all frenzied excesses
possible against religious property: they broke down
chapel doors, overthrew altars, threw down saints’
statues and images . . . [when] a copper crucifix [was]
carried upside down, on a cart, offering for passers by
to spit on it. When a citizen refused, one of the soldiers
waved his saber under his nose and cut a bit off . . . “
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
6
SOURCE: Mark Fielding – The Spirit of Change
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
7
A Massive Change?
• There is no doubt that the French Revolution changed
France enormously in the short term. But the extent to
which it changed France in the long term, versus the
extent to which the revolution simply interrupted long
term developments which really produced modern
France, is hotly contested. It is fairly easy to conclude that
the revolution produced in France an identity and
ideology which was not only new, but self consciously so,
deliberately drawing nothing from the history which
preceded the events of 1789 – 95. The monarchy was
removed from power, the king and queen executed, and
new forms of government tried in an attempt to find
stability.
•
•
Source: The Consequences of the French Revolution on France and EuropeBy Robert Wilde
http://europeanhistory.about.com/od/thefrenchrevolution/a/The-Consequences-Of-The-FrenchRevolution-On-France-And-Europe.htm
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
8
• There was also, at various stages in the revolution, a
deliberate attempt to build a new France, with a
complete wiping away of seigniorial dues, aristocratic
titles, a mass of taxation and tithes and a whole host of
other hangovers from the supposedly ‘feudal’
government of old regime France. The idea of three
‘estates’ was abolished, as were noble and church
privileges; nobility was completely ended, and church
lands were nationalized and sold, causing a full tenth of
all land in France to change hands, a massive
redistribution. The clergy became salaried officials of
the state. Most of these changes took place in only two
years, a tiny timescale for such sweeping reform.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
9
Was all ‘change’ revolutionary?
• Historians question the impact of these changes. For
every example like the ‘departments’, the new system
of administration which literally rewrote the map of
France, you have a case like the seigniorial dues, which
by 1789 had been well on the way to being replaced
with rents, a situation ardent supporters of the
revolution like to claim as being the result of events
after 1789. For every standardisation of weights and
measures across all of France you had the overstated
claim that military and government careers were open
to talent, not purchase, a situation which was already
evolving under the ancien regime.
•
•
Source: The Consequences of the French Revolution on France and EuropeBy Robert Wilde
http://europeanhistory.about.com/od/thefrenchrevolution/a/The-Consequences-Of-The-FrenchRevolution-On-France-And-Europe.htm
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
10
Change reflected in primary sources to
use with students . . . .
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
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Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
12
Leonard Cowie, The French Revolution:
Documents and Debates
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
13
Digital resources . . .
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
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‘Change’ in the teaching of Revolutions
• ‘Change’ in resources:
• You Tube
• Google Scholar
• I Tunes U – French Revolution for i-Books (Open
University – England).
• Podcasts
• Vodcasts
• Blogs
• Apps – i pad, i pod
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
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BBC Class Clips - http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningzone/clips/french.revolution/all/all/all/page1?format=grid&pagesize=12
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
16
The Social Contract – Melvyn Bragg
• Synopsis: Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss
the Social Contract and ask a foundational
question of political philosophy – by what
authority does a government govern?“ Man
was born free and he is everywhere in
chains”. So begins Jean Jacques Rousseau’s
great work on the Social Contract. Rousseau
was trying to understand why a man would
give up his natural freedoms and bind
himself to the rule of a prince or a
government . . . With Melissa Lane, Senior
University Lecturer in History at Cambridge
University; Susan James, Professor of
Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of
London; Karen O’Brien, Professor of English
Literature at the University of Warwick.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
17
The Encyclopedie
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the French
encyclopédie, the European Enlightenment
in book form. One of its editors,
D’Alembert, described its mission as giving
an overview of knowledge, as if gazing
down on a vast labyrinth of all the branches
of human ideas . . .
• observing where they separate or unite and even catching sight of
the secret routes between them. It was a project that attracted
some of the greatest thinkers of the Enlightenment - Voltaire,
Rousseau and Diderot - striving to bring together all that was known
of the world in one comprehensive encyclopaedia. No subject was
too great or too small, so while Voltaire wrote of “fantasie” and
“elegance”, Diderot rolled up his sleeves and got to grips with jammaking. The resulting Encyclopédie was a bestseller - running to 28
volumes over more than 20 years, amidst censorship, bans,
betrayals and reprieves . . . And what was its legacy – did it really
fuel the French Revolution?
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
18
Historiography
• Select Resources.
• History in Quotations
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
19
Change as a result of the
‘enlightenment’ . . .
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
20
The King’s Authority
• The elements that made up
the power of the King:
– Concept of absolute monarchy
During the reign of Louis XIV his
bishop Jacques Bossuet stated: “In
the exercise of lawful authority
the king is, and ought to be,
absolute; that is so far absolute
that there is no legal authority
which can delay or resist him”.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
21
The King’s Authority
• The elements that made up the power of the
King:
– Theory of rule by divine right
Bossuet also stated: “the King in his palace is the
image of God in his heaven, who sets the whole of
nature in motion” – as Adcock highlights, this meant
that to criticise the King was to criticise God.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
22
The King’s Authority
• The King exercised complete control
of the executive functions of
government.
• He ruled through a cabinet of
Ministers called the Council of State.
• The King could appoint and dismiss all
ministers.
• The King’s personal authority was
carried into the Provinces by royal
governors (intendants), chosen and
appointed by him.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
23
The King’s Authority
• The King was not a despot.
• According to Adcock the King “still had to respect
the nation’s traditions and laws. In reality, he
ruled beside provincial assemblies and other
special groups enjoying their own traditional
powers”.
• William Doyle underlines that “while none of
these groups actually challenged royal power
between 1614 and 1789, they certainly placed
some constraints on royal power”.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
24
A ‘challenge’ to Royal Authority.
• The highest courts of appeal were called the
‘parlements’.
• There were 13 supreme law courts to check
and register royal laws.
• The courts were given the power to make a
remonstrance – a private memo informing the
King that registration had been delayed
because they had identified some technical
problem in the law.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
25
A ‘challenge’ to Royal Authority.
• Under Louis XV, many of the judges decided that
they should try to moderate the power of the
King and used the remonstrance as a means to
politically oppose the monarchy.
• In 1750s and 1760s the parlements had the
power to stop Louis XV tax increases.
• By 1770 the King was prepared to fight back and
ordered that the courts be stripped of many of
their powers, to dismiss half of the judges and to
create new law courts.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
26
A ‘challenge’ to Royal Authority.
• Relations between the King and the parlement
largely settled from 1771-1774.
• In 1774, Louis XVI, as new King, made the
mistake of trying to win the parlements over
by giving them back their old powers.
• The judges were cautious in the use of their
power initially.
• The parlements would cause further problems
at the time of the monarchy’s greatest crisis.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
27
‘Change’ as a feature of prerevolutionary France
•
•
•
•
•
•
. . . . But not enough
Financial controllers and policies . . .
Turgot
Calonne
Necker
Brienne
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
28
Many big changes took place in France
during the Revolution.
• The French Revolution was aimed to be more than just a
revolution in government. It was meant to become a
revolution in all areas of life. In the midst of the
Enlightenment, those behind the Revolution thought that
they could have the power to enact the changes they
thought needed to be made in society at large.
• Old ideas should be removed, and new ideas should be put
into place through the force of law. They had the power
and the drive to make whatever changes they wanted, and
changes they would make.
• Christianity was to be replaced with a new religion,
founded on the Goddess of Reason rather than the archaic
Judeo-Christian God.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
29
• A new, better designed calendar would replace
the Gregorian calendar that had been used since
the Dark Ages. A new system of measurement
would be designed to replace the antiquated and
difficult to use systems of measurement that had
developed over the centuries.
• Of these things, the most lasting change came
from the French Revolution's changes to the
system of measurement.
• It was during the French Revolution that the
metric system was first developed and put into
place, and it has grown over the last two
centuries to become the most widely used
system of measurement in the world.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
30
• On the 8th of May, 1790, Charles Maurice de
Talleyrand, a Bishop who had sided with the
Revolutionists, proposed before the National
Assembly a change to the measurement system.
It would be a completely new system, one that
was both more scientifically accurate as well as
easier to use. The National Assembly accepted
this proposal, and set to work creating a new
system of measurement. Talleyrand, the man
who had set this change in motion, would later
seek refuge in England during the Reign of Terror.
• The National Assembly decided to create what is
known as a decimal system. This means that each
unit of measurement would be divisible by ten.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
31
• This would not only include measurements of length,
but also other measurements as well, such as volume,
mass and temperature. Its name comes from the basic
measurement of length, however, the meter, named
after the Greek word metron meaning "a measure."
• In order for this system to work, however, there had to
be a base measurement, on which everything else
could be based. The metre had to have a definition. It
wasn't easy to find a definition that everyone could
agree with.
• The first proposal was for the meter to be defined by
the length that a pendulum swings in one second. After
some time though, it was thought that this would not
be accurate enough. It was not a completely steady
distance, and so a new definition was proposed.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
32
• The Academy of Science recommended that the
new definition for a meter be equal to 1 10
millionth (1/10,000,000) of the distance between
the North Pole and the Equator, and this was
accepted by the National Assembly in 1791.
• This would provide a scientifically accurate and
constant measurement for the meter and the
basis of their new system. But after all of this
work, the National Assembly failed to put their
new system into place.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
33
• In 1791 a Constitution was put into place, making
France a Constitutional monarchy.
• This meant that there was a governing
Constitution which even the King must follow, as
well as a legislative body, called the Legislative
Assembly.
• France began a war with Austria in 1792, which
would lead to a series of wars across Europe.
• In October of 1792, the monarchy was abolished
and a Republic of France created. This would
become Year 1 of the new French calendar, which
was developed the next year.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
34
• The Legislative Assembly was removed, and a
new National Convention became the primary
governing body of France. It would be the
National Convention who would first make the
metric system law, 5 years after its first proposal
by Talleyrand.
• While the people of France were not required to
use the metric system, it became the official
system of measurement of the Republic of
France. The move to make the use of the metric
system required by all would not come until many
years later, when many other changes had come
to France.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
35
• Simon Schama is able to conclude his examination of the
revolution by asking the question: how much would a
standard village have been affected by it? There would no
longer be a class of aristocrats at the top level, but this
doesn’t mean the leading landholders would necessarily
have been ejected, executed or humbled: in many regions,
there was simply a social transformation from nobility to
citizen, and the chance to acquire even more land in the
church sales . . . They had more access to better courts,
and might have been able to pay off debts if they played
the economy well and benefited from a reduction in taxes.
Schama argues that little of any profundity
changed.(Schama, Citizens, 854 – 55), while – in contrast –
Jones argues that “Those who managed to survive the
dearths of the Revolution…experienced a real improvement
in purchasing power; the first such improvement in several
generations.”
•
•
•
Source: The Consequences of the French Revolution on France and EuropeBy Robert Wilde
http://europeanhistory.about.com/od/thefrenchrevolution/a/The-Consequences-Of-The-French-Revolution-OnFrance-And-Europe.htm
Simon Schame, Citzens – A Chronicle of the French Revolution
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
36
Sources of Discontent
• By 1780 in France the source of discontent was
not only the King and the ‘old regime’.
• The ‘old regime’ was a series of overlapping
systems, many of them competing with each
other.
• Administratively, according to Adcock, “the old
regime as a chaotic jumble of administration,
justice, local taxes and religious institutions. No
single subject in 18th century France could expect
to have the same treatment as everybody else . . .
It depended entirely upon where a person lived
and which set of systems was in force there.”
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
37
War, debt, unhappy tax payers . . .
• According to William Doyle, “Ever since the disasters of
the Seven Years War Frenchmen had longed to see
British arrogance humbled . . . . By the time Louis XVI
ascended the throne that process seemed well under
way.”
• Throughout 1776 the King was persuaded to intervene
in America to help humiliate the English.
• As Doyle explains – “In April secret supplies began to
be sent to the Americans, and the first steps were
taken to mobilize French naval strength. Thus began a
deterioration in French relations with the British which
culminated in February 1778 in a treaty alliance
between France and the United States, followed by five
years of all-out warfare. When it ended, the British
empire did indeed Nick
appear
to have been shattered.”
Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
38
BUT
• The French involvement in the War of
Independence brought the French to
the brink of what William Doyle terms
“financial exhaustion”.
• The French financial advisers of the
time (Turgot) had warned the King that
involvement could be disastrous
financially when he assumed office in
1774.
• In the words of Turgot, otherwise, “the
first gunshot will drive the State to
bankruptcy”.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
39
Finances – Turgot - Necker
• In 1776, Turgot’s fellow Ministers had lost faith in
both his policies and his judgement.
• In October 1776 Necker was appointed Director
of the Treasury.
• According to William Doyle – “Necker was not
plucked from obscurity. He has carefully
established himself as a man of influence and
ability who offered alternatives to Turgot’s
austere policies, and his appointment aroused
high expectations”.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
40
Necker
• Necker financed French
involvement in the American
war entirely by loans.
• No new taxation was imposed
while he was in power.
• Interest incurred on the loans
was charged to ordinary
expenditure, and Necker
claimed to have found the extra
money for this from economies
and ‘ameliorations’.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
41
Necker
• Necker managed to raise 52 livres in loans
between 1777 and his resignation in May
1781.
• In February 1781, beset by a campaign of
criticism and whisperings about his potentially
poor financial management, he performed
what Doyle has termed an “unprecedented
gesture” – the Compte rendu . . .
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
42
Compte Rendu au roi
• This was a balance sheet of the French
monarchy’s finances.
• It showed ordinary revenues to be exceeding
expenditure by over 10 million livres, after 3
years of war and no increases in taxation.
• The public, which bought thousands of copies,
was convinced.
• BUT it was in ‘extraordinary revenues’ where
the real cost of war was recorded.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
43
Compte Rendu au roi
• In 1781 the compte rendu prepared Necker’s
downfall. William Doyle explains that – “Bouyed
up by the public adulation it brought him, he
sought to force the King to admit him to the
innermost council, from which he was excluded
by his religion. The King . . . Refused, and Necker
resigned.” (19 May 1781)
• Necker’s resignation was a SIGNIFICANT blow to
the State because he personally was s associated
with the ‘improved’ economic situation.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
44
…and then there was Joly de Fleury
• On 25 May 1781 Joly de Fleury was appointed
Minister of Finance.
• de Fleury felt obliged at last to increase
taxation, with predictable objections from
several of the parlements – but the taxes were
still put in place.
• Between May 1781 and the end 1782 almost
252 million livres were raised.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
45
More Taxes, a new ComptrollerGeneral
• The raising of funds under further taxes saw the
King raise a THIRD addition tax for the period
1783-1786.
• During 1783 (3 November) Calonne is appointed
Controller-General (Minister of Finances).
• Calonne’s appointment at Versailles was popular
because (unlike Turgot and Necker) he made no
efforts to impose economies at court.
• Calonne believed that spending on ‘useful
splendour’ was good for the country’s credit.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
46
Calonne’s approach . . .
• From 1783-1787 Calonne kept
borrowing money (over 653
million) but doubts started to
emerge for how long this could
continue . . .
• By 1786 things were getting
critical, and Calonne responded
by proposing what Mark Fielding
terms “a package of reforms to
the King. A direct tax was to be
imposed on all land owners
without exception.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
47
Calonne’s plan . . .
• Under these measures:
– The corvee and internal customs barriers and dues
were to be abolished.
– Stamp duties on business transactions were to be
increased.
– Government spending reduced
– The burden on the peasants was to be eased by
reducing the taille by one-tenth.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
48
Opposition to Calonne’s Plan
• The nobility strongly opposed these reforms.
• Louis referred them to an old advisory body
called the Assembly of Notables (a group of royal
nominees, hand-picked).
• The 144 members met at the assembly at
Versailles in February 1787.
• Calonne’s plans were rejected.
• Calonne was dismissed and succeeded by
Lomenie de Brienne (he actually supported many
of Calonne’s reforms).
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
49
Ongoing opposition to tax reform . . .
• The notables continued to refuse the reforms under
Brienne.
• Louis XVI was forced to turn to the parlements to
endorse the reforms.
• The parlements refused to register royal edicts.
• The parlements agreed with the Notables that only the
Nation (as represented by the Estates General) had the
right to determine such matters.
• The Estates General had not met since 1614 – the
public began to support the parlements regarding the
recalling of the Estates General.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
50
Support for the Estates General
• Violence broke out across the country.
• Partly in support of the call for reforms and the
calling of the Estates General.
• Support also existed in the face of high priced
food caused by failed harvests and grain
shortages.
• Facing growing rebellion and the prospect of
national bankruptcy the king accepted defeat and
Brienne announced on 5 July 1788 that the
Estates General would be summoned to Versailles
in May the following year (1789).
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
51
Me
again . . .
And then . . .
Brienne resigned –
Necker comes
back!,
reappointed as
finance minister.
Nick Frigo - Santa Maria/Education
Consultant
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