The French Revolution

I. Prelude to Revolution

The Ancien Regime

A. Louis XIV, “L’etat, c’est moi”

1. Absolutism

A. attempt to control both peasants and nobles

B. Versailles

C. Intendants - professionalize bureacracy

D. Repeal of the Edict of Nantes

E. By the time of Louis’ death in 1715, France the most powerful state in Europe

B. Fatal Flaws in the Ancien Regime

1. Church lands and most nobility exempt from taxes

2. Louis XV

3. “I have loved war too much”

4. Economic growth stagnant - loss of empire

C. Louis XVI, wrong man, wrong job

1. Distance from his people

2. Relied on Parlements

3. Out of desperation, Louis calls the Estates-General (3 estates)

clergy, nobility, commoners

II. First Stage of the Revolution, 1789-1792

A. Meeting of the Estates-General, 1789

1. Commoners (even women) play part in national politics

2. Commoners given 2x representation

3. Determination to write a Constitution

“Liberty” - Lockian, American influence

B. Third Estate becomes National Assembly

1. Sieyes and Mirabeau hold separate meetings

“Tennis Court Oath”

June 1789

2. The Revolution begins!

- King sends in troops to disband the National Assembly

“Storming of the Bastille”

July 14, 1789

3. National Guard

4. Peasant revolt

5. Women march on Versailles

October 1789

Lafayette

intensive revolution

C. French Constitution of 1791

1. Constitutional monarchy- the people are the basis of government

2. Church cedes property to state

3. Civil rights guaranteed to minorities- religious tolerance; ban on slavery

4. Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen

- Sovereignty resides in the Nation (people)- All citizens are equal before the law

- Embodiment of the Enlightenment

D. Doom of the Moderates

1. Emigrés, counter-revolutionaries, & war

2. The Church v. the Revolution

3. Louis’ loss of faith- attempts to flee in June 1791

Compare w/ US RevolutionLiberty v. Equality

How do you make people equal?

III. 2nd Stage of the Revolution, 1792-1795

How far should the Revolution go?

A. From Liberty to Equality

1. Sans-culottes

Aug. 1792 – the Tuileries Palace

- anti-monarchy, anti-bourgeoisie

- universal manhood suffrage

- decentralized power

2. Sept. 1792 – National Convention replaces National Assembly

- the First Republic- Louis XVI put on trial

The Death of the King Jan. 1793

3. Political factions

Girondins – moderates

1792 – 1st War of Coalition

June 1793 – “Prisoners of the Revolution”

Jacobins – moderates

- mob politics- fear of counter-revolutionaries

Robespierre

Radical Social Contract- Individual will/rights irrelevant to the nation

B. Reign of Terror, 1793-94

1. July 1793 – Committee of Public Safety “Terror is the order of the day”

300K dead

2. Revolution without end

3. Gender Revolution?Mary Wollstonecraft – Vindication of the Rights of Women, 1792

Olympe de Gouges - Declaration of the Rights of Woman and

the Female Citizen

Rousseau, Robespierre- women and the nation

4. The Thermidorian ReactionSummer 1794

- Fall of Robespierre/Jacobins- Counter-revolution- Democracy fails

Death of Marat - David

IV. Third Stage of the Revolution1795-99

War, Dictatorship and the Spread of the Spread of theRevolution to Europe

A. Rise of the Bourgeoisie

1. Class conflict and revolution - the French dilemma

2. Centralized power – The Directory

3. End to economic revolution- “Conspiracy of the Equals”

B. Europe reacts to the Revolution, 1790s

1. Austria, Prussia: Declaration of Pillnitz, 1791

1793-97, First War of Coalition

2. Levée en masse (1793) - precursor to modern war- “participatory democracy”

3. Save the Revolution- expand it

4. Great Britain suspends civil rights, 1792

(U.S. Alien & Sedition Acts, 1798)

5. Russia, Prussia expand their borders

6. Growth of German nationalism

V. Napoleon Bonaparte, 1769-1821

A. Revolution and Opportunity1. 1795, “whiff of grapeshot”

2. 2nd War of Coalition, 1798-1800

Italy & Egypt

B. 1st Modern Dictator1. First Consul of the Triumvirate

- weakened radicals on Left and Right- protected property- balanced budget- improved relationship with Church

2. 1802 plebiscite- charade or extension of the Revolution?

3. 1804, Napoleon declares himself Emperor- tax reform & public education- central banking system- aristocracy of merit- support scientific/technological

innovation Code Napoleon, 1804 a. Equality before the law b. freedom of religion c. separation of church and state d. protected interests of rising middle class (bourgeois)

4. 1803-1815, continuous warfare- Confederation of the Rhine- Puppet Spain- Spreads Revolution

& nationalism

5. Continental System (1806)- protect French industry- loss of overseas colonies

(Toussaint L’Ouverture, Haiti, La. Purchase)

- Battle of Trafalgar, 1805

C. Russia and the fall of the French Empire

1. Invasion of Russia (1812)

2. Russia prominent in European affairs

3. Exile, 1814

4. Waterloo, 1815

D. End of the Revolution?

1. Made some gains of the Revolution permanent

2. Spread ideals of Revolution

(1830, 1848)

3. Rise of nationalism

VI. Return to the status quo?1. The Pax Britannica

1815-1914

2. Future implicationsliberalism v. authoritarianism

industrialization

nationalism

Congress of Vienna - 1814