New Ideas are put into Practice
Fueled by the new ideas of the Enlightenment, and the success of the American Revolution, the people of France desired change after hundreds of years of abuse by the French Monarchy. They wanted recognition of their natural rights, and a more equal representation in their government. Unfortunately, this attempt at democracy for the French turned into a bloody tyranny after only a few short years. The French Revolution (1789-1799) would shake the foundations of French society, and help usher in a new era of conflict.
What was France Like?For hundreds of years, France operated under what is called "The Old Regime," which was a series of three estates: The clergy, the nobility, and everyone else. They were ruled over by the King, who had absolute control. The problem, though, is that nearly all of France's wealth resided with the King, the nobility, and the clergy, and none of them paid taxes on that wealth.
Economically, France was beginning to fall into ruin by 1780. King Louis XVI was an incompetent and weak ruler, who had no concept of how to run a country. His wife, Marie Antoinette, was Austrian, and a foreigner to the French people. The two of them became the symbols for royal extravagance: they threw expensive parties in the royal palace of Versailles, ate the best food, and wasted France's money on gifts for themselves. Even worse, France was already nearly bankrupt from funding the American Revolution, and the people were starving due to bad harvests and harsh weather. |
The People Have Had EnoughKing Louis XVI called a meeting of the Estates General (the meeting of the estates, which had not met in nearly 200 hundred years), and asked the representatives to list their grievances in their cahiers (or notebooks). After days of arguments and calls for more equal taxation policies, the Third Estate found themselves locked out of the meetings. They formed the National Assembly in protest, and refused to leave until France had a new written constitution which guaranteed tax reform and freedom of the press. This was the first outspoken opposition to the King.
After Louis failed to respond to these demands, and fired the popular finance minster, Parisians (people living in Paris) rioted. They looted food stores, fought policemen, and eventually marched on the Bastille, which was a symbol of the Old Regime inside the city. The people quickly overwhelmed the prison's defenders, killed the guards, and seized any weapons in the armory. The French Revolution had begun. |
The Monarchy Falls |
The Revolution Turns Bloody |
Having tasted the power they held, the people wanted their King to do what they asked of him. A number of women, called the poissards, marched on Versailles (the royal palace), and overpowered the guards there. They piked them (placed their heads on sticks), and paraded them in front of the King and Queen as they dragged them back to Paris. Louis XVI and his family were now at the mercy of the revolutionaries.
The National Assembly renamed themselves The Convention, and went about ruling the country. They were led by many men, especially the now infamous: Maximilien Robespierre. Every day, Louis had to sign away more of his powers, until he became little more than a figurehead. Eventually, Louis realized he had to leave France and gain the support of allies outside the country, in order to regain his throne. One night, he and his family escaped Paris under the cover of darkness, and attempted to reach the safety of Marie Antoinette's family in Austria. Unfortunately, they were found before reaching the border, and were brought back to Paris. Afraid over their intentions, The Convention declared war on Austria, and put the King in jail. Over a few months, the Austrian army repeatedly defeated the French army. After recieving a threat by the commanding Austrian general that they would regret it if any harm came to the royal family, Parisians went insane. They killed the King's personal guard, and he had to seek refuge inside The Convention. After a heated debate, the King was charged with treason, and the radicals (Jacobins) were able to overrule the moderates (Girodins) in the Convention, and sentenced the King to death by guillotine. This act inflamed all of Europe. |
With the King dead, the monarchy in France came to an abrupt end. The Queen was imprisoned, and her children were taken from her. They were eventually abused and starved to death by their captors. Power then shifted to the "Committee of Public Safety," made up of 12 men, led by Robespierre. Under their rule, they executed anyone they saw as a threat to the Revolution, and hundreds were guillotined every month. The death carts rattled through the streets at an alarming rate.
Throughout the countryside, the more moderate forces who wanted to slow the violence and return to normalcy began fighting back. Counter-revolutionary forces sprung up all over France, especially in an area called the Vendée. At the same time, Austria, joined by other countries like England, were cutting the French army to pieces. The Committee of Public Safety declared a radical state of martial law (military rule), which eventually became known as The Reign of Terror (1793-1794). Counterrevolutionaries and anyone who they saw as against the Revolution were immediately guillotined. The violence was unimaginable, and hundreds of thousands of people died in a frantic attempt to reestablish order in France. Though terribly bloody, The Reign of Terror was more or less successful at getting France back together, and focused on securing their borders from foreign armies. Finally, a man by the name of Napoleon Bonaparte defeated the British at Toulon, and turned the tide of war in France's favor. Fresh recruits went off to war to help the army, and eventually a peace treaty was signed, which ended the war. |
The Fall of RobespierreIronically, one of the last victims of the Reign of Terror, was the man who ordered it carried out in the first place. Robespierre began seeing himself as a divine figure, and he would not stop sending people to be executed, even when his former allies began saying that the Terror had served its purpose, and needed to stop.
He actually had two of his closest friends executed for not agreeing with him on the continuation of the Terror, and became even more radical. Fearing for their lives, the Convention arrested Robespierre and declared him an outlaw. After an unsuccessful suicide attempt, Robespierre was executed by guillotine on July 28, 1794, and in the days that followed, around 100 of his supporters were also killed. |
What Happened Afterwards?Well, the Committee of Public Safety lost power, and the Convention was replaced by The Directory, which guided the Revolution into a more moderate direction. They returned to bourgeois values and the corruption of the monarchy. Also, they were defined by constant military failures.
The Revolution lagged on for 5 more years. Then, in 1799, The Directory was overthrown by Napoleon Bonaparte in a military coup. Napoleon consolidated his power, and became an almost complete dictator. In 1804, he would declare himself Emperor of the French. The French Revolution was over, and though it succeeded in destroying the monarchy, it achieved little. Within ten years, France had returned to the corruption and control of a single man, instead of an elected group of people as they originally tried to put in place. The people wanted democracy, but did not achieve that goal. France would be forever changed by the events of the revolution, and the conflict which defined it would continue to occur throughout Europe in the coming years. Conflict and competition will soon become the image of life in Europe for the next 150+ years. |