Kagan Reading Outline
Unit: The French Revolution
Kagan 547-550
1) What was the key issue facing the French royal government in the 1780s? What was its first step to address the
problem? (548)
2) What steps did Rene Maupeou take to address the debt and control the parlements? Why did his plan fail?
(548-49)
3) Describe three issues which diminished the reputation of the monarchy in France? (549)
4) What were the results of Necker’s financial report? Why did it anger the aristocrats? (549)
5) What were some of Calonne’s plans to rescue the French economy? How did the Assembly of Nobles react to
his plans, and how did they recommend changing the tax system of France? (549-550)
6) Why was Louis XVI forced to call the Estates General? (55)
Kagan 550-557
1) In what two ways did the Assembly of Notable and parlement of Paris limit the power of the Third Estate in the
Estates General? (550-552)
2) Describe the grievances that the French people had with their government, as listed in the cahiers de doleances
(lists of grievances). (552)
3) What was the National Assembly, and which two estates voted to join it? How did Louis XVI’s reaction further
accelerate the political revolution? (552)
4) Why were the people of Paris anxious during the summer of 1789? Describe the events at the Bastille on July
14th, 1789. What did the fall of the Bastille symbolize? (552-553)
5) What triggered the Great Fear? Why was August 4th, 1789 critical toward establishing equality in France?
6) Describe the tenets of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen. What was the document’s attitude
toward the freedoms of women? (555)
7) What did the women of Paris do about the high bread prices in October 1789? How did it affect the dynamics of
the French government? (557)
Kagan 557-567
1) Describe the new structure of government set in place by the National Assembly through the Constitution of
1791. Who could vote and who could not? (557, 559)
2) What rights did Olympe de Gouges call for in the Declaration of the Rights of Women? (559)
3) How was France politically restructured by the National Assembly? (559)
4) What action did the National Assembly take to attempt to finance the national debt? What affect did that have
on France? (563)
5) What was the purpose and provisions of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy? What was the reaction? (563)
6) Who were émigrés? What did the royal family try to do to escape the Revolution? What was the Declaration of
Pillnitz, who was involved, and what affect did it have on the leaders of the Revolution? (564)
7) Who were the Jacobins, and what were their goals? What subgroup of the Jacobins led the Assembly and what
measures did they take to counter counterrevolution? (p. 564)
8) What happened to King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette in August 1792? Why was the King executed some six
months later? (p. 564, 566)
9) Describe the role of the Paris Commune in the September Massacres and the Convention’s formation. (p. 565)
10) Who were the sans-culottes and what did they want? How did the leaders of the Jacobins (the Mountain) and
the sans-culottes come to work together? (p. 566)
11) How did Edmund Burke and Thomas Paine’s interpretations of the French Revolution differ? (p. 567)
Kagan 567-573
1) How were the foreign wars perceived by the French people? What were they really fighting for? (p. 569)
2) What was the purpose of the Committee of Public Safety? What was the purpose of its levee en masse? (p. 569)
3) How was Rousseau’s “republic of virtue” used to justify the government’s actions during the Reign of Terror?
What was Maximillian Robespierre’s definition of “terror?” (p. 571)
4) What happened to the role of women serving in the Revolution by the end of 1793? (p. 572)
5) What effect did efforts of De-Christianization have on popular support for the Revolution? (p. 572)
6) What was Robespierre’s Cult of the Supreme Being? (p. 573)
7) What was the final fate for Robespierre? Why did this happen? (p. 573)
Kagan 573-578
1) Describe the Thermidorian Reaction and explain how it took France in a completely different direction. (p. 573)
2) What was the “white terror?” What were the cultural and religious reactions at the end of the Reign of Terror?
(p. 574-575)
3) Describe the formation of the new Constitution of the Year III, including the Directory. (p. 575)
4) How were peasants affected by the course of the French Revolution? (p. 576)
5) What challenges of social unrest did the Directory face in its first few years? (p. 576)