Part 18: From Old Regime to Revolution
18.6
The Tennis Court Oath (June 20, 1789)
From the outset, the Estates-General was hampered by organizational disputes. After several weeks of
frustration, the Third Estate invited the clergy and nobility to join them in organizing a new legislative
body. Only a few of the lower clergy accepted, but the National Assembly was thus formed on June 17,
1789. Three days later they were accidentally locked out of their usual meeting place, and they marched
to a nearby tennis court, where they took an oath to draft a new constitution for France. This is one of
the most important documents of the revolution. The oath was taken orally and individually with but one
vote in dissension. The president of the National Assembly was barely able to save the dissenter from
bodily harm.
Source: “The Tennis Court Oath” is reprinted with permission of Macmillan Publishing Company from A
Documentary Survey of the French Revolution, edited by John Hall Stewart, p. 88. Copyright 1951 by
Macmillan Publishing Company, renewed 1979 by John Hall Stewart.
The National Assembly, considering that it has been summoned to establish the constitution of the kingdom, to effect the
regeneration of public order, and to maintain the true principles of monarchy; that nothing can prevent it from continuing
its deliberations in whatever place it may be forced to establish itself; and, finally, that wheresoever its members are
assembled, there is the National Assembly;
Decrees that all members of this Assembly shall immediately take a solemn oath not to separate, and to reassemble wherever circumstances require, until the constitution of the kingdom is established and consolidated upon firm foundations; and that, the said oath taken, all members and each one of them individually shall ratify this steadfast resolution
by signature.
Question:
1. Does The Tennis Court Oath call for radical action? Why is it considered to be one of the most
important documents of the French Revolution?
414