THE FRENCH REVOLUTION
1789-1799
THE FRENCH REVOLUTION SOUGHT LIBERTY,
EQUALITY, AND FRATERNITY FOR ALL MANKIND
When Louis XV (1715-74) inherited the throne, the
French people waited hopefully for the reforms they
thought he would bring about. The bourgeoisie , or
middle class, sought a voice in the government and
an end to petty restrictions on trade. The peasants,
who were forced to pay over half their income in
taxes and feudal dues, were reduced to poverty.
But Louis disappointed both groups. He continued to
waste money and devoted his time to selfish
pleasures. In a series of wars with the British, the
French lost both their American colonies and their
settlements in India.
“After me, the deluge”, Louis XV is supposed to have
said, thereby admitting the corruption and
inefficiency that characterized his government.
The French nobles, however, were quite satisfied with
their special privileges, such as exemption from
almost all taxation. They did not want to see
conditions changed. But during the eighteenth
century there were a number of keen, critical
Frenchmen who spoke up for the common man.
The writings of the French reformers, aimed at the
injustices of the times, did much to stir the people
to action.
The most famous of the reformers was Voltaire. He was
twice a political prisoner in the Bastille, but he was so
clever that even royalty liked to listen to him.
In his most famous book, Letters on the English, Voltaire
praised England for its free speech and religious liberty
and contrasted it with the persecution in France. Here
are a few lines from one of Voltaire’s letters.
“… I agree with you that it is somewhat a reflection on
human nature that money accomplishes everything and
merit nothing…
“It is sad to see… those who toil, poverty, and those who
produce nothing, in luxury;… violence in high places
which engenders violence in the people: might making
right not only amongst nations but amongst
individuals.”
The most familiar statement attributed to Voltaire is:
“ I do not agree with a word you say, but I will
defend to the death your right to say it.”
Voltaire’s scathing attacks on the evils of eighteenth
century France did not advise revolt. But they
caused many Frenchmen to think that unless the
old order changed, it would have to be swept away.
Another reformer whose writings stirred the French
people was Jean Jacques Rousseau. In The Social
Contract, Rousseau attacked the right of kings to
rule without the consent of the people they
governed. “ Man ,” he said, “ is born free yet is now
everywhere in chains. One man believes himself the
master of others and yet is after all more of a slave
than they.” The people, he claimed, had a right to
decide for themselves how they were to be
governed. He believed not only in the right of
people to determine their own government , but
also in each one’s obligation to take part in
government. Rousseau wrote, “ As soon as any man
says of the affairs of the State. ‘ What does it matter
to me?’ the State may be given up for lost.
THE PEOPLE OF FRANCE OVERTHREW THEIR MONARCH
It was Louis XVI’s misfortune to come to the throne in
1774, for it was he who was made to pay for the
misrule of his predecessors.
Louis was a fat, good-natured man who liked to tinker
with locks. When the American colonies revolted
against England in 1776, Louis XVI had an
opportunity to strike back at the English. He listened
willingly to the arguments of Benjamin Franklin that
France should aid the Colonies. France contributed
two and half million dollars to the American cause.
The aid enabled the United States to win its
independence, but it helped bankrupt the French
government.
The expense of maintaining the court at Versailles
continued to increase. Louis’ wife, Marie
Antoinette, earned such a reputation for
extravagance that she became known as “Madame
Deficit.” Louis ordered his officials to raise more
and more money. When they could not raise
enough money to please him, he dismissed them
and appointed others.
By 1789 the French government was hopelessly in
debt. The king’s officials were no longer able to
wring money from the overburdened merchants
and peasants. They could not tax the nobles or the
clergy. So the king was forced to call a meeting of
the Estates-General, the legislative parliament,
which had not met for 175 years. The meeting was
held in one of the palaces at Versailles.
The Estates-General was composed of representatives
of the three classes: The First Estate (clergy), the
Second Estate (nobility), and the Third Estate
(commoners). The Third Estate was composed of the
broadest segment of society.
It included merchants, professional men, the workers
of the towns and cities, and- the largest group of
all- the peasants. Because the Third Estate
accounted for about 96% of France’s population, its
representation in the Estates-General was equal to
the combined membership of the other two Estates.
Naturally the Third Estate wanted the three groups to
meet as one body and vote as individuals. In that
way, the Third Estate would have a majority and
would be in control. But Louis ordered the Estates
to meet separately, each Estate casting a single
vote. The representatives of the Third Estate
refused to obey. They knew that the first two
Estates would outvote them.
For six weeks the representatives of the Third Estate
stubbornly held out. The Third Estate declared that
the king must not levy any more taxes without its
consent. This made Louis XVI so angry that he
ordered his soldiers to prevent a further meeting in
the palace.
The members of the Third Estate, angry and aroused
at the king’s interference, met in an indoor tennis
court in Versailles. There they declared themselves
to be empowered to make laws for all of France,
and they took a solemn oath not to adjourn until
they had written a constitution for France. This
defiant Oath of the Tennis Court marked the real
beginning of the Revolution. Louis finally gave in
and ordered the three Estates to meet together as a
National Assembly. The days of divine-right
monarchy in France were almost over; the power of
Louis XVI was crumbling.
Meantime, political clubs of various shades of
opinion had been established among the members
of the Estates-General. The delegates sat together
according to their political views. From this seating
arrangement have come the political terms used
today: the left means the radicals (as the
revolutionary Third Estate was considered to be),
while the right means the conservatives ( as the
nobles certainly were). The center means the
moderates, or people whose views are between the
conservatives and radicals.
If Louis had decided to cooperate with the National
Assembly, France might have peacefully become a
constitutional monarchy and the Revolution might
have ended at this point. Instead, he listened to the
advice of his nobles and discharged a popular
finance minister. Then he ordered troops to
Versailles. The people of Paris interpreted this
move as a threat to the members of the Third
Estate and a sign that Louis intended to put down
the Revolution by force.
Someone suggested that there might be muskets and
powder stored in the hated fortress of the Bastille,
where political prisoners were kept. On July 14,
1789, the mobs stormed and took the Bastille.
STORMING THE BASTILLE 14 JULY 1789
The news frightened Louis. Turning his back on the
nobles, he tried to make friends with the National
Assembly. He withdrew his troops, recalled the
minister of finance whom he had dismissed and
drove into Paris with the tricolor- the blue, white,
and red symbol of the Revolution- in his hat. The
delegates to the Assembly cheered, and Paris
rejoiced. The motto “ Liberty, Equality, Fraternity”
became the watchword of the Revolution, and in
the years following it became the custom in France
to inscribe the words on public buildings.
The fall of the Bastille was the signal for outbursts of
revolt all over the country. The nobles in the
National Assembly realized that unless they gave in
to the peasants, the whole country would go up in
flames. In one dramatic session of the Assembly,
the nobles voluntarily surrendered the feudal and
manorial privileges that they had exercised for
centuries. Serfdom was ended, special rights for
nobles were repealed, and unfair taxes were
abolished. The old order was dead.
The National Assembly issued the “Declaration of the
Rights of Man and the Citizen” This famous
document declared in ringing tones that “men are
born and remain free and equal in rights.” Their
rights included “ liberty, property, security, and
resistance to oppression.” All men were guaranteed
freedom of speech, press, and religion, so long as
their actions did not injure someone else. All men
were declared equal before the law and given the
right of self-government.
The National Assembly was in desperate need of
money to run the government, just as Louis had
been. As a result, the members of the Assembly
voted to have the government take over, or
nationalized, all the land owned by the Church. It
was also decided that all clergymen would be
elected by the people and that their salaries would
be paid by the government.
Louis shocked began to plot with foreign powers to
put down the Revolution. He and the queen
managed to get away from Paris disguised as
servants. But there was an alert soldier, who had
never seen either of them before, recognized the
king having seen his likeness on French coins.
The French people lost all confidence in the king
from the moment, although it was more than a year
before he actually lost his throne. In September,
1792, the monarchy was abolished, and Louis XVI
was accused of treasonous conduct and summoned
for trial. He was condemned to death on the
guillotine, and a few months later, his wife, Marie
Antoinette, was also beheaded.
EXECUTION OF LOUIS XVI
LOUIS XVI MARIE ANTOINETTE
They were shocked and dismayed with Louis
execution, and they vowed revenge. Armies from
Austria and Prussia began to march against France.
The French responded with a patriotism and
quickly raised republican armies for the defense of
the nation. At this time a young French army
captain, Rouget de I’Isle, composed a stirring
marching song for young republican volunteers as
they made their way to Paris. The song, the
“Marseillaise”, has become the national song of
France.
Under the stress of a defensive war, the leaders of
the Revolution voted themselves dictatorial powers
to organize resistance. At the same time, to
prevent counter-revolution, they opened a Reign of
Terror against all suspected of sympathizing with
the king. The Terror was directed by a fanatical
young lawyer, Maximilian Robespierre, who was
responsible for the beheading of nearly forty
thousand people, many of them innocent of
disloyalty to the Revolution.
NAPOLEON USED THE REVOLUTION TO RISE TO
POWER IN FRANCE
The horrible Reign of Terror that had taken so many
lives came to an end with the execution of
Robespierre in 1794. Meantime , a convention had
been elected to write a new constitution for France.
When it was finished, the new constitution provided
for a republican government with a legislature and
an executive body called the Directory. But many
people objected to provisions in the constitution
which were designed to assure the re-election of
those who had favored the execution of the king.
They organized a rebellion and began to march
against the new government.
The task of holding off the mob was entrusted to a
young officer named Napoleon Bonaparte.
Napoleon drove them away with a volley of
grapeshot from his cannon.
Under the Directory, the new government turned its
attention to its foreign enemies. Great Britain and
Austria were the chief enemies of the republic at
this time. As a reward for his action in defending
the Convention, the government made Napoleon a
general.
General Bonaparte directed his small force with such
military skill that he was completely victorious. His
brilliant campaign in Italy forced the Austrians to
make peace with France. Napoleon also established
French influence in much of northern Italy. After his
first success, Napoleon met defeat in a campaign
against the English in Egypt. But in spite of the
setback, when he returned to Paris the people
greeted Napoleon as a national hero.
The new government of France, under the Directory,
had grown corrupt and inefficient, and it had lost
popular support. So in the last year of the
eighteenth century Napoleon overthrew the
Directory and made himself First Consul of the
French Republic.
Less than five years after he had become First Consul
of the Republic, Napoleon Bonaparte stood in the
famous Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris. There he
had come to be crowned emperor. Seizing the
crown from the hands of the Pope, he placed it
upon his own head and became “ Napoleon I,
Emperor of the French.”
In fourteen years the French government had passed
through the stages of absolute monarchy, limited
monarchy, republic, rule by a Directory, and then
back to the one-man rule of Napoleon. The course
of the Revolution seemed to prove the truth of an
old French proverb: “ The more things change, the
more they stay the same.”
Who is Napoleon Bonaparte?
Napoleon Bonaparte was not a native Frenchman. He was
born on the island of Corsica, which lies just off the
southern coast of France in the Mediterranean. He was
only five feet one inch tall. But Napoleon had matchless
ability to inspire others with faith in him. Once he said,
“ I am the child of destiny…,and again, “… I began to
make mistakes only when I listened to advisers.”
He freed France from invaders. Then he set out to
conquer all those who had opposed him: Spain, Austria,
many of the German states, Russia, and Great Britain.
His ideal was to bring all of Europe under one
emperor-himself.
Napoleon was interested in improving the land he
ruled. Like the Roman emperors, he built roads and
other public works. He erected buildings and
triumphal arches to remind people of his victories.
The most famous is the Arc de Triomphe, which
towers 165 feet above one of the prominent
squares of Paris. Today it shelters the grave of the
French Unknown Soldier of World War I.
During the Revolution, the church had been
frequently scoffed at. Napoleon reached an
agreement with the Pope. It was called the
Concordat. It restored the Church to an important
position in France. The Concordat lasted more than
a century.
NAPOLEON MET HIS WATERLOO
The tide turned against Napoleon at last. Napoleon
made the mistake of invading Russia. His enemies
managed to reach Moscow. But the Russian winter,
the long supply line, and the tough Russian
resistance forced Napoleon to retreat from Moscow.
It was one of history’s most disastrous routs. The
Russians gave thanks to “General Winter” and
“General Mud” for his defeat.
The next year, combined armies of the nations that
were allied against Napoleon defeated him in
Europe. He was sent to the island of Elba, off the
coast of Italy, as a prisoner.
One of Louis XVI’s brothers became king of France. But
Napoleon escaped from Elba to Marseilles in southern
France. He made a triumphal march to Paris.
Napoleon quickly raised an army. He met the allied
forces of England, Holland, and the German states at
Waterloo in Belgium. There, after a hard-fought and
bloody battle, he was finally defeated. His power was
forever crushed, and the old line of kings once more
returned to the throne of France. Napoleon threw
himself on the mercy of his bitter enemies, the
English. He was exiled to the distant island of St.
Helena in the South Atlantic. There he died six years
later.
With Napoleon out of the way, representatives of the
great powers met at Vienna to rearrange the
boundaries of the European nations.
All of Napoleon’s conquests were lost to her, and her
boundaries were redrawn along lines that are
approximately the same as her present boundaries.
The Congress of Vienna favored bringing back the old
royal families. It tried to revive the absolute power of
the kings over the people. However, the old order in
Europe was not fated to last for many years. While the
Congress of Vienna was significant as the first
attempt by an international conference to deal with
the problems of Europe, it failed to suppress the rise
of nationalism and overlooked the widespread social
changes created by the Industrial Revolution.
WHAT ARE THE CONTRIBUTIONS OF
NAPOLEON BONAPARTE TO FRANCE?
The idea of equal opportunity for everyone
remained alive in France.
The people had some say in government.
No king or emperor was ever again to rule France
without consulting a National Assembly.
In many countries people cherished a dream of the
ideals of justice and equality.
CORONATION OF EMPEROR NAPOLEON I BONAPARTE
BATTLE AT WATERLOO
