Ch. 20 The Revolution in Politics
Maximilien Robespierre
"The incorruptable;" the leader of the bloodiest portion of the French Revolution. He set out to build a republic of virtue.
Edmund Burke
(1729-1797) Member of British Parliament and author of Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), which criticized the underlying principles of the French Revolution and argued conservative thought. He wrote "Reflections on the Revolution in France".
Louis XVIII
(1814-1824) Restored Bourbon throne after the Revoltion. He accepted Napoleon's Civil Code (principle of equality before the law), honored the property rights of those who had purchased confiscated land and establish a bicameral (two-house) legislature consisting of the Chamber of Peers (chosen by king) and the Chamber of Deputies (chosen by an electorate).
The American Revolution
(why are we learning this? this is euro, not apush... anyway 'murica)
Financial Crisis: Effects
-1780s fully 50 percent of France's annual budget went for interest payments on debt. Another 25 percent went to maintain the military. 6 percent to king. Less than 20 percent of the entire national budget was available for the productive functions of the state -NO MONEY
Successes of the Committee of Public Safety: Activities/Effects
-Committee claimed that they alone could speak for the "general will" of the French people -sought to impose republican unity across the nation on pain of death if necessary -collaborated with the fiercely patriotic and democratic sans-culottes who retained the common people's faith in fair prices and a moral economy -controlled the economy -government set maximum allowable prices for key products -"bread of equality" -people worked for the war effort
Causes for Revolutionary Aspirations
-French Revolution -"Code Noir" (Black Code) set the parameters of slavery had granted free people of color the same legal status as white; they could own property, live where they wished and pursue any education or career they desired -colonial administrators began to rescind these rights -news of abolitionist movements in France and the royal gov'ts own attempts to rein in the worst abuses of slavery led to hopes that the mother country might grant them freedom -looked to reforms in Paris as a means of gaining political enfranchisement and reasserting equal status with whites
Against Women
-Jacobins took actions to suppress wommen's participation in political debate which they perceived as disorderly and a distraction from women's proper place in the home -ban in groups like the Society of Revolutionary Republican Women that called for the creation of female armies to combat counter-revolution -Olympe de Gouges sent to the guillotine :(
Events
-National Assembly, cowed by colonial representatives ruled that each colony would draft it's own constitution with free rein over decisions on slavery and the enfranchisement of free people of color -July 1790 Vincent Ogé, a free man of color, returned to Saint-Domingue from Paris -raised an army of several hundred and sent letters to the new Provincial Assembly of Saint-Domingue to the new Provincial Assebmly of Saint-Domingue demanding political rights for all free citizens -army defeated, Ogé was tortured and executed by colonial officials :(
Seven Years' War
-REALLY EXPENSIVE -gov't tried to maintain emergency taxes after the war ended -the Parlement of Paris protested and even challenged the basis of royal authority claiming the king's power had to be limited to protect liberty -gov't caved in and withdrew the taxes -Louis has no backbone -the judicial opposition then asserted the king could not levy taxes without the consent of the Parlement of Paris
National Assembly
-The first French revolutionary legislature, made up primarily of representatives of the third estate and a few from the nobility and clergy in session from 1789 to 1791
Girondists
-a division of the Jacobin Club -a moderate group that fought for control of the French National Convention in 1793 -accepted guilt of Louis XVI, but did not want to kill him -determined to continue the war against tyranny
Constitutional Monarchy
-a form of gov't in which the king retains his position as head of state, while the authority to tax and make new laws resides in an elected body
Estates General
-a legislative body in prerevolutionary France made up of representatives of each of the three classes or estates; it was called into session in 1789 for the first time since 1614
Jacobin Club
-a political club in revolutionary France whose members were well-educated radical republicans named after the former monastery -many deputies belonged to this club
Everybody else
-almost 98 percent of the population -anyone a commoner was legally a member of the third estate -few commoners were well educated and rich and they might have purchased manorial rights as a way of obtaining profit and social honor -vast majority of the third estate consisted of peasants, rural agricultural workers, urban artists, and unskilled day laborers -conglomerate of very different social groups united only by their shared legal status
King's Response
-ambivalent -made a conciliatory speech to a joint session in which he urged reforms -four days later ordered the three estates to meet together -at the same time, the vacillating and indecisive (why does McKay say vacillating and indecisive... vacillating means indecisive) followed the advice of relatives and court nobles who urged him to dissolve the National Assembly -then asserted his divine right to rule, the king called an army of eighteen thousand troops toward the capital -dismissed his finance minister and other liberal ministers -monarchy prepared to renege on its promises for reform and to use violence to restore control
Parlements: Characteristics
-ancient right to evaluate royal decrees publicly in writing before they were registered and given the force of law -magistrates of the parlements were leaders of the robe nobility who passed their judicial offices from father to son -well entrenched and highly articulate branch of the nobility -a counterweight to absolute power
King Louis XVI's attempt to flee: Effects
-attempted flight was proof that the king's professed acceptance of the constitution was a sham and that he was a traitor intent on procuring foreign support for an invasion of France
Actions of Louis XIV: Royal Despotism
-began to defend his absolutist inheritance -Louis appointed a tough career official named René de Maupeou as chancellor and ordered him to crush the judicial opposition -abolished the existing parlements and exiled the vociferous members of the Parlement of Paris to the provinces -created new and docile parlements of royal officials -once again to tax the privilege -now widespread of criticism of "royal despotism" (Despotism: the exercise of absolute power, esp. in a cruel or aggressive manner)
Dechristianization
-campaign to eliminate Christian faith and practice in France undertaken by the revolutionary government -eliminate symbols and beliefs -churches humiliated and persecuted and religious images and statues were destroyed -rural areas really hostile towards this- Robespierre halted this in mid-1794
Events of October 5, 1789: Effects
-caused for the king to move to Paris to calm the disorder
Election of Delegations
-clergy, nobility, and commoners separately elected delegates in each electoral district and prepared their own list of grievances -local assemblies of clergy mostly elected parish priests rather than church leaders -nobility voted in a majority of conservatives primarily from the provinces where nobles were less wealthy and more numerous -third estate, almost all male commoners allowed to vote, voted -elected primarily lawyers and government officials
Oath of the Tennis Court
-declared the National Assembly -to establish the constitution of the realm and bring about the regeneration of public order, and maintain the true principles of the monarchy
Reaction of Great Britain: Conservatives
-deeply troubled by the aroused spirit of reform -"Reflection on the Revolution in France" by Edmund Burke -defended inherited privileges in general and those of the English monarchy and aristocracy in particular -glorified the unrepresentative Parliament and predicted that reform like that occurring in France would lead only to chaos and tyranny
Events of October 5, 1789: Characteristics
-desperate women marched the twelve miles from Paris to Versailles to demand action -carried scythes, sticks and pikes invaded the National Assembly demanding for food -voiced the genuine voice of the people
Successes of the French Revolutionary Army: Causes
-determination to fight against tyranny -nationalistic identity
Committee of Public Safety: Characteristics
-dictatorship -led by Robespierre
Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen: Effects
-disseminated throughout France and Europe around the world (will have a huge impact on Haiti/Saint-Domingue)
Events of August 4, 1789
-duke of Aiguillon declared that the peasantry was seeking to overthrow their inequality -urged equality in taxation and the elimination of feudal dues -all old noble privileges were abolished, along with tithes to churches -peasantry achieved an unprecedented victory in the early days of revolutionary upheavel -peasants seek to maintain, protect and consolidate their triumph
King Louis XVI's attempt to flee: Causes
-felt threatened by the message in the revolution
Financial Crisis: Causes
-financing the many wars of France starting from Louis XIV to Louis XV's wars and then to the American Revolution
Reign of Terror: Activities
-forty thousand French men and women executed or died in prison -Terror was a political weapon directed against all suspected of opposing the revolutionary government
Aspirations in Saint-Domingue
-free the slaves!
Toussaint L'Ouverture
-freed slave who joined the revolt and was named a Spanish Officer -in September, British navy blockaded the colony -newly elected National Convention promised freedom to slaves who fought for France -they had abolished slavery by October 1793 -Touissant L'Ouverture switched sides bringing his military and political skills along with four thousand well-trained soldiers to support the French War Effort -emerged as a key leader and French beginning to win -
The Second Revolution
-from 1792 to 1795 the second phase of French Revolution during which the fall of the French monarchy introduced a rapid radicalization of politics
Consensus among the Three Estates: Examples
-general agreement that royal absolutism should give way to a constitutional monarchy in which laws and taxes would require the consent of the Estates General in regular meetings -individual liberties would have to be guaranteed by law and that economic regulations should be loosened
Problems: Voting Procedure
-gov't confirmed that each estate should meet and vote separately -critics denounced this situation and demanded a single assembly dominated by the third estate to ensure fundamental reforms -gov't conceded that the third estate should have as many delegates as the clergy and the nobility combined, but then rendered this act meaningless by upholding voting by separate order
Consensus among the Three Estates: Causes
-hatred for the monarchy and disagreements with the monarchy's use of power
Reaction of Great Britain: Liberals
-hoped that the French example would lead to a fundamental reordering of Parliament, which was in the hands of the aristocracy and a few wealthy merchants -"A Vindication of the Rights of Woman" by Mary Wollstonecraft -demanded equal rights for women, she advocated rigorous coeducation which would make women better wives and mothers good citizens and economically independent -women could manage businesses and enter politics if only men would give them the chance
Practical and Ideological impact on France
-huge impact in practical and ideological terms -people fascinated by the political lessons in the American Revolution -begun with a revolutionary defense against tyrannical oppression and they had been victorious -shown how rational beings could assemble to exercise sovereignty and write a permanent constitution- a new social contract -gave greater reality to the concepts of individual liberty and representative gov't and reinforced by the primary idea of the Enlightenment- that a better world was possible :) -many French officers were inspired by their experience -French intellectuals and publicists engaged in passionate analysis of the new federal Constitution
Effects
-in an attempt to respond to what it perceived as partly justified grievances, the National Assembly granted political rights to free people of color born to two free parents who possessed sufficient property -colonial governor refused to enact it -violence erupted between groups of whites and free coloreds in parts of the colony -the liberal revolution had failed to satisfy the contradictory ambitions in the colonies
Similarities between Bourgeoisie and Nobles
-investment in land and gov't service were the preferred activities of both groups -as well as the ideal of merchant capitalist was to gain enough wealth to retire from trade, purchase an estate, and live nobly as a large landowner -wealthy members of the third estate could even move into the second estate by serving the gov't and purchasing noble positions -wealthy nobles often acted as aggressive capitalists, investing in mining, metallurgy and foreign trade -key sections of the nobility were liberal and generally joined the bourgeoisie in opposition to the gov't
Execution of Louis XVI
-killed him because he ran away -attempted flight was proof that the king's acceptance of the constitution was a sham and that he was a traitor intent on procuring foreign support for an invasion of France
Financial Crisis: Events
-king too weak to declare partial bankruptcy and force his creditors to accept greatly reduced payments -gov't forced to finance all of tis enormous expenditures during the American war with borrowed money -national debt and annual budget deficit soared -king could not print money and create inflations to cover their deficits -no central bank, paper currency or means of creating credit -no alternative but try to increase taxes -increased revenues only possible through fundamental reform -Assembly of Notables were called to help -insisted sweeping tax changes required the approval of the Estates General -attempt to restore authority, dismessed notables and est. new taxes by decree -Parlement of Paris promptly declared the royal initiative null and void -king tried to exile judges (that's a no-no) wave of protest -investors no longer advance more loans to state
Revolution in Paris
-knowledge spread of the massing of troops near Paris -angry crowds formed and passionate voices urged action
The Mountain
-led by Robespierre, the French National Convention's radical faction which seized legislative power in 1793 -wanted to kill Louis XIV (yeah regicide!) -by a narrow majority, the Mountain got to kill Louis XVI -determined to continue the war on tyranny
Reaction from leaders of Revolution
-little sympathy among the leaders of the Revolution -thought that women should speak in assemblies, but not to vote or serve as representatives -women should stay and do domestic work while the father of the family leaves to defend or lay claim to the rights of property, security, equality or liberty in a public assembly
Events of October 5, 1789: Causes
-luxury markets and foreign markets shrank and unemployment among the urban working class grew -women (traditional managers of food and resources in poor homes) could no longer look to the church which had been stripped of its tithes for aid
Civil Constitution of the Clergy
-many delegates distrusted popular piety and superstitious religion -established a national church with priests chosen by voters -then forced the Catholic clergy to take a loyalty oath to the new government
Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen: Characteristics
-men are born and remain free and equal in rights (what about black slaves huh? racists) -maintained that mankind's natural rights are liberty, property, security, and the resistance to oppression -every man is presumed innocent until proven guilty (what about women?) -an expression of the general will; all citizens have the right to concur personally or through representatives in its formation -free expression of thoughts and opinions is one of the most precious rights of mankind -ideal guaranteed equality before the law, representative gov't for a sovereign people and individual freedom
Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen: Causes
-moved forward with it's mission to reform France and create a constitution
Clergy
-nation's first estate -about one hundred thousand and had important privileges -owned about 10 percent of the land and paid only a "voluntary gift" rather than regular taxes to the government every five years -church levied a property tax (tithe) on landowners
Revisionist History
-new interpretations -revisionist historians question the existence of growing social conflict between a capitalistic bourgeoisie and a reactionary feudal nobility in eighteenth-century France -bourgeoisie and nobility highly fragmented riddled with internal rivalries Ex: ancient sword nobility (descended from ancient noble roots) was separated by difference in wealth, education, and worldview from the newer robe nobility who acquired noble titles through service in the royal administration and judiciary) Ex: differences within the bourgeoisie (wealthy financiers and local lawyers), -nobility and bourgeoisie formed two parallel social ladders increasingly linked together at the top by wealth, marriage, and Enlightenment culture
Legislative Assembly
-new representative body that convened in Paris in October 1791, called the Legislative Assembly had completely new delegates and a different character -great majority of the legislators were still prosperous, well educated middle class men, but were younger and less cautious than their predecessors
War against Habsburgs: Causes
-new representatives to the Assembly whipped themselves into a patriotic fury against the Declaration of Pillnitz -if kings incite the French with war, then they will go to war with them
War against Habsburgs: Events
-only Robespierre and a very few others argued that people would not welcome liberation at the point of a gun -France's crusade against tyranny went poorly at first -Prussian forces joined Austria against the French who broke and fled at their first military encounter with this First Coalition -road to Paris lay open, France only saved due to conflict between the Eastern Monarchs over the division of Poland
Effect of calling the Estates General
-opened a Pandora's box of social and political demands across the country -process of electing delegates and formulating grievances politicized the French as no event in their prior history had done -unleashed a flood of debate and discussion across France helping to galvanize public opinion and demands for reform
Internal Conflict in France: Causes
-peasants revolted against being drafted into armies (hey look! it's the Vietnam war) -devout Catholics, royalists and foreign agents encouraged rebellion and the counter-revolutionaries recruited veritable armies to fight for their cause -struggles between the Mountain and the Girondists with the radicals accusing the Girondists of inciting sedition in the provinces -laboring poor emerges as the decisive political factor
Storming of the Bastille: Effects
-people began to seize arms for the defense of the city and marched to the Bastille to search for weapons and gunpowder -people stormed in, fighting until the prison surrendered -governor of the prison was hacked to death and his head was stuck on a pike and paraded through the streets -popular uprising forestalled the king's attempt to reassert his authority -Louis announced withdrawal of troops from Paris -National Assembly free to continue its work without the threat of royal military intervention
Scandalous Libels
-people turning against him for moral as well as political reasons -ex. Louis XV broke the pattern of mistresses when Madame Pompadour had a lot of political influence even after the affair -Pompadour's low birth and hidden political influence generated a stream of resentful and illegal pamphleteering (McKay sure likes to make up a lot of words) -stream of scandal mongering became a torrent -lucrid and pornographic (ew) depictions of the court ate away at the foundations of royal authority, especially among the common people
War of Austrian Succession
-plunged France into financial crisis and pushed the state to attempt a reform of the tax system -Louis XV's finance minister decreed a 5 percent income tax on each individual regardless of social status -vigorous protest from those previously exempt from taxation -monarchy retreated and the new tax was dropped
Riots of April/May 1788: Causes
-poor grain harvests, price of bread to soar -unleashed a classic economic depression of the industrial age -food expensive and with so much uncertainty, the demand for manufactured goods collapsed -people thrown out of work -BREAD RIOTS
Reaction of the Church
-pope formally condemned this attempt to subjugate the church and only half the priests of France swore the oath -many sincere Christians were upset by these changes in the religious orders -attempt to remake the Catholic Church sharpened the conflict between the educated classes and common people
Declaration of Pillnitz
-professed the rulers' willingness to intervene in France to restore Louis XIV's monarchical rule if necessary -between Austria and Prussia
Reorganization of religion
-radical reorganization of religious life -granted religious freedom to the small minority of French Jews and Protestants -nationalized the Catholic Church -church property and abolished monasteries as useless relics of a distant past -used all former church property as collateral to guarantee a new paper currency, the assignats -sold the property in an attempt to put the state's finances on a solid footing
Historic Provinces
-replaced the complicated patchwork of historic provinces with eighty-three departments of approximately the same size
Revolution in Saint-Domingue: Events
-revolts began on a few plantations on the night of August 22 -uprising had swept much of the northern plain -April 4, 1792 National Assembly issued a decree enfranchising all free people of color -Spain decides to support the rebel slaves and began to bring slave leaders and their soldiers into the Spanish Army
Riots of April/May 1788: Effects
-riots everywhere -in Paris, 150,000 out of the 600,000 were without work -entered decisively onto the revolutionary stage, believing in steady work and enough bread at fair prices to survive -feared that the dismissal of the king's moderate finance minister would put them at the mercy of aristocratic landowners and grain speculators
Nobles
-second estate -consisted of some four hundred thousand nobles -owned about 25 percent of the land in France and were lightly taxed -continued to enjoy certain manorial rights or privileges of lordship that dated back to medieval times -exclusive rights to hunt and fish, village monopolies on baking bread and pressing grapes for wine, fees for justice, and lots of other entitlements -had "honorific privileges", right to precedence on public occasions and the right to wear swords -rights conspicuously proclaimed the nobility's legal superiority and exalted social position -this is why everybody hates rich people
Great Fear: Effects
-seized the rural poor and fanned the flames of rebellion -more riots, ransack everything -liberal nobles and middle-class responded to peasants demands as they abolished serfdom and gave more rights to peasants
Olympe de Gouges
-self-taught writer and woman of the people -took up the pen and protested the evils of slavery as well as the injustices done to women -published the "Declaration of the Rights of Women" -direct challenge to the revolutionaries -equality for everyone!
Revolution in Saint-Domingue: Causes
-slaves, who had been witnesses to the confrontation between whites and free coloreds for over a year, took events into their own hands (rebellion!) -groups of slaves held a series of nighttime meetings to plan a mass insurrection -included religous ceremonies in which participants made ritual offerings and swore a sacred oath of secrecy and revenge -later called "voodoo" (ooohhh)
Problems: Other issues
-some argued that the nobility was a tiny over privileged minority and that the neglected third estate constituted the true strength of the French Nation -Third Estate wants more say in the matters
Reign of Terror: Causes
-special revolutionary courts responsible only to Robespierre's Committee of Public Safety tried enemies of the nation for political crimes
Successes of he French Revolutionary Army: Effects
-stopped Prussians at the Battle of Valmy -French armies invaded Savoy, and captured Nice, moved into the German Rhineland and by November 1792, were occupying the entire Austrian Netherlands (how is this possible? they're literally at war with 5 other nations!!!!)
Consensus among the Three Estates: Effects
-striking similarities led to a shared commitment to a basic reform platform among the educated elite
Successes of the Committee of Public Safety: Causes
-success in harnessing the explosive forces of a planned economy, revolutionary terror and modern nationalism in a total war effort
War against Habsburgs: Effects
-the Assembly declared the country in danger and volunteers rallied to the capital -rumors of treason by the king and queen spread in Paris -revolutionary crowd attacked the royal palace at the Tuileries while teh king and his family fled for their lives to the nearby Legislative Assembly -rather than offering refuge, the Assembly suspended the king from all his functions, imprisoned him, and called a new National Convention to be elected by universal male suffrage -monarchy in France was on it's deathbed
Mobilization of Population
-the all-out mobilization of French resources under the Terror combined with the fervor of modern nationalism created an awesome fighting machine -force of this size unprecedented in the history of European warfare -deployed to combat internally as well as external enemies -well-trained, well-equipped and constantly indoctrinated the enormous armies of the republic were led by young impetuous generals
Great Fear: Causes
-the fear of noble reprisals against peasant uprisings that seized the french countryside and led to further revolt
Parlements: Definition
-the high court os France
Desacralization
-the king being stripped of the sacred aura of God's anoited on earth and was being reinvented in the popular imagination of a degenerate
Sans-culottes
-the laboring poor of Paris, so called because the men wore trousers instead of the knee breeches of the aristocracy and middle class; the word came to refer to the militant radicals of the city -Mountain sensed an opportunity to outmaneuver the Girondists, joined with sans-culottes activities in the city government to engineer a popular uprising -June 2, 1793, armed sans-culottes invaded the Convention and forced deputies to arrest twenty-nine Girondist deputies for treason -all power passed to the Mountain
Estates: Definition
-the three legal categories, or orders, of France's inhabitants: the clergy, the nobility, and everyone else
Defeat of First Coalition
-third and perhaps most decisive element in the French republic's victory over the First Coalition was its ability to draw on the explosive power of patriotic dedication to a national state and a national mission -common language and common tradition newly reinforced the the ideas of popular sovereignty and democracy -large numbers of French people were stirred by common loyalty -developed an intense emotional commitment to the defense of the nation and they saw the war as a life and death struggle between good and evil
Committee of Public Safety: Powers held
-to deal with the threats from within and outside France -given dictatorial power to deal with the national emergency
Arrest of Louis XVI
-tried to escape from France -death of monarchy coming
Storming of the Bastille: Causes
-troops coming to Paris -monarchy prepared to use violence in order to establish order
Bourgeoisie
-upper middle class -growing tensions between the nobility and the bourgeoisie -increasing in size, wealth, culture and self-confidence, the rising bourgeoisie became progressively exasperated by feudal laws restraining the economy and by the pretensions of a nobility that was closing ranks against middle-class aspirations -eventually rose up to lead the entire third estate in a great social revolution that destroyed feudal privileges and established a capitalist order based on individualism and market economy
September Massacres
-wild stories that imprisoned counter-revolutionary aristocrats and priests were plotting with the allied invaders seized the city -angry crowds invaded the prisons of Paris and slaughtered half the men and women they found -September 1792 the new popularly elected National Convention proclaimed France a republic, a nation in which the people instead of a monarch held sovereign power
Legislative Assembly
..., A French congress with the power to create laws and approve declarations of war, established by the Constitution of 1791
The Directory
1785-1799. Five man group. Passed a new constitution in 1795 that was much more conservative. Corrupt and did not help the poor, but remained in power because of military strength. By 1797 it was a dictatorship.
Danube, Italy
1805; France vs. Britain, Austria, & Russia; 3rd Coalition; Ulm - France defeated Austria; Austerlitz - France defeated Austria & Russia
Sea Power
1805; France vs. Britain; Trafalgar (Lord Nelson: French Navy Lost!)
Berlin Decree
1806-issued by Napoleon, instituted the Continental System, in the response to British blockade of commercial ports under French control.
Poland
1806; France vs. Russia; a.k.a. Grand Duchy of Warsaw; Friedland - France defeated Russian Troops; France occupied Konigsberg, capital of East Prussia
Continental System
1806; France vs. Spain, Portugal; Portugal did not comply with this system; France wanted Spain's support to invade Portugal; Spain refused, so Napoleon invaded Spain as well
Third Estate
97% of the population (the rest of France) They consisted of the bourgeoisie (the top-layer), the san-culottes and the peasants; they paid high taxes and had no special privileges
Abbe Sieyes
A French clergy man who wrote an essay called "What is the 3rd estate?" Argued that lower classes were more important than the nobles and the government should be responsible to the people.
National Assembly
A French congress established by representatives of the Third Estate and reform minded members of the First and Second Estate, on June 17, 1789, to enact laws and reforms in the name of the French people. They swore the Tennis Court Oath.
Lazare Carnot
A French soldier appointed by the Committee of Public Safety to help reorganize the failing war effort against Austria and Prussia. Carnot did so very effectively and made enough of a name for himself to earn a seat as one of the first members of the Directory. Although he was removed from this position during the overthrow of September 4, 1797, he went on to hold various posts in future governments.
Civil Constitution of the Clergy 1790
A body of legislation passed in July 1790 that redefined the relationship between the clergy and the state in France. It allowed for the confiscation of church property formerly used to support the clergy, replacing it with a guarantee of state salaries for clergymen instead. It also stipulated that parish priests and bishops be elected just like public officials. The National Assembly attempted to enforce it by requiring the clergy to take an oath, divided public opinion of the French Revolution (1789-99) and galvanized religious opposition.
plebiscite
A direct vote in which a country's people have the opportunity to approve or reject a proposal
oligarchy
A form of power structure in which power effectively rests with a small number of people. These people could be distinguished by royalty, wealth, family ties, education, corporate, or military control.
Assembly of Notables
A group of nobles and aristocrats invited by the king of France to discuss reform of the government.
National Convention
A national meeting of delegates elected in primaries, caucuses, or state conventions who assemble once every four years to nominate candidates for president and vice president, ratify the party platform, elect officers, and adopt rules.
Law of Maximum
A planned economy to respond to economic problems like food shortages, maximum allowed prices fixed prices which poor can afford, rationing, nationalized workshops, equalizing of grain and bread, arms and munitions now produced, The fixing of prices on bread and other essentials under Robespierre's rule.
Tennis Court Oath
A pledge made by the members of France's National Assembly in 1789, in which they vowed to continue meeting until they had drawn up a new constitution
Vindication of the Rights of Women
A political pamphlet, written by the 18th-century British feminist Mary Wollstonecraft, which attacks aristocracy and advocates republicanism. Wollstonecraft's was the first response in a pamphlet war sparked by the publication of Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), a defence of constitutional monarchy, aristocracy, and the Church of England.
Girondins
A political party that emerged in revolutionary France after the fall of the monarchy in 1792 when the Jacobins split into two factions. Named for the region in southwestern France where many of their leaders were from. They were members of the professional class (lawyers and merchants) who wanted a constitutional government, opposed the growing influence of Parisian militants, and championed the smaller provinces beyond the city of Paris. They agreed the king was guilty of treason but were reluctant to execute him, arguing for exile or a referendum on his fate. They were first to be targeted as the beginning of the Terror. Charlotte Corday, Jean-Paul Marat's assassin sympathized with the Girondins.
Girondins
A political party that emerged in revolutionary France after the fall of the monarchy in 1792 when the jacobins split into two factions. Named for the region in southwestern France where many of their leaders were from. They were members of the professional class (lawyers and merchants) who wanted a constitutional governemnt, opposed the growing influence of Parisian miltants, and championed the smaller provinces bewond the city of Paris. They agreed the king was guilty of treason but were reluctant to execute him, arguing for exile or a referendum on his fate. They were first to be targeted as the beginning of the Terror.
Olympe de Gouges
A proponent of democracy, she demanded the same rights for French women that French men were demanding for themselves. In her Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Female Citizen (1791), she challenged the practice of male authority and the notion of male-female inequality. She lost her life to the guillotine due to her revolutionary ideas.
Thermidorian Reaction
A reaction to the violence of the Reign of Terror in 1794, resulting in the execution of Robespierre and the loosening of economic controls It is associated with the end of the Reign of Terror and reassertion of bourgeoisie power in the Directory.
Organic Articles
A series of laws to help supervise the rights of other religions in France besides Catholicism.
Great Fear
A wave of senseless panic that spread through the French countryside after the storming of the Bastille in 1789
Enlightened Despot
Absolute rulers who imposed reforms that would benefit their subjects as well as themselves.
Paris Commune
After France's defeat in the Franco-Prusian War, the liberal National Guard rebuffed the Third Republic's effort to disarm them and formed an independent Paris, with it's own government. The conservative president of France, Adolph Thiers, sent more troops to capture Paris and a bloodbath ensued. Independent Paris was defeated.
was divided into departments rather than provinces
After the French Revolution and the Napoleon era, France...
Law of Suspects
Allows anyone who is merely suspected of challenging the republic or the revolution can be arrested without trial. If that do go to trial. they can be executed for the most minor of things.
Battle of Leipzig
Also known as the Battle of the Nations; in October 1813, the combined armies of the fourth coaliton decisively defeated Napoleon and the French army
The Spanish Ulcer
Also known as the Peninsular War. Napoleon decided to conquer Spain and after forcing the Spanish king to abdiccate, Napoleon made his brother king. The British sent an army to help the Spanish and Portuguese drive out the French. He failed to suppress the Spanish uprising and defeat the British. Lasted from 1808 to 1814. Napoleon continued to control Spain's government, but the campaign drained the French military resources. In 1814, the Spanish, with British helped drive out Joseph Bonaparte. They drew a new constitution that provided a limited monarchy. The Spanish revolt with the new constitution illustrated the tremendous influence of the ideals of the French Revolution.
Thomas Paine
American Revolutionary leader and pamphleteer (born in England) who supported the American colonist's fight for independence and supported the French Revolution (1737-1809). He wrote the "Rights of Man".
Concordat of 1801
An agreement between Napoleon and the Papacy which declared Catholicism " the religion of the majority of the French citizens."
Rosetta Stone
An ancient Egyptian stone inscribed with a decree issued at Memphis in 196 BC on behalf of King Ptolemy V. The decree appeard in 3 scripts: the uppertext is text is Ancient Egytian hieroglyphics, the middle portion Demotic script, and the lowest Ancient Greek.
Legion of Honor
An executive group consisting of talented and meritorious people from the French population, for their service to the nation.
Storming of the Tuileries
August of 1792. Working class of Paris with support from provincial troops stormed the Tuilieries Palace, massacred the Swiss Guard and imprisoned the king and queen. Stimulated establishment of revoltionary commune which forced the calling of a Constitutional Convention to write a more democratic constitution than the one of 1791.
storming of the Tuileries
August of 1792. Working class of Paris with support from provincial troops stormed the Tuilieries Palace, massacred the Swiss Guard and imprisoned the king and queen. Stimulated establishment of revoltionary commune which forced the calling of a Constitutional Convention to write a more democratic constitution than the one of 1791.
"order in council"
Britain proclaimed any ship stopping in Britain would be seized when it entered the continent
Mary Wollstonecraft
British feminist of the eighteenth century who argued for women's equality with men, even in voting, in her 1792 "Vindication of the Rights of Women."
Battle of Trafalgar
British victory in 1805 which destroyed Napoleon's plan to invade England and secured Britain's dominance over naval power during the 19th century.
bourgeoisie
Comfortable members of the 3rd estate. Basically middle class, wanted the privileges of the nobility and upper clergy.
Confederation of the Rhine
Composed of 16 German states who excepted French presence in southern Germany, and promised to support Napoleon if war broke out. It also ended the Holy Roman Empire.
Fourth Coalition
Comprised of Prussia, Russia, Britain, Saxony, and Sweden, they fought against Napoleon from 1806-7. The war featured several major victories for the French, who conquered almost all of Prussia and Poland; the war ended with the Treaties of Tilsit.
Vendee
Counter revolution led by conservative forces (nobles, clergy, and the peasantry).
Coup d'Etat Brumaire
Coup necessary to overcome the opposition. Nov 9, 1799 the legislature was driven from its chambers and the Consulate was declared. Napoleon would be one of the new consuls.
Jacques Hebert
Created a far left political party which wanted the proscription of the Girondins, and hoped to drive forwards Economic reforms. This party was strongest in section clubs and Commune, One of the most radically left-leaning of the Jacobins, he proposed the Cult of Reason in opposition to Robespierre's Cult of the Supreme Being, and for his troubles was guillotined during the climax of the Terror.
refactory clergy
Created in response to when the Civil Constitution of the Clergy created a national church with 83 bishops and dioceses. They had the support of the King, former aristocrats, peasants, and the urban working class.
Committee of Public Safety
Established and led by Robespierre, fixed bread prices and nationalized some businesses. Basically secret police and also controlled the war effort. Instigated the Reign of Terror in which 40K people were guillotined. 1792-1795.
corvee
Forced labor that required peasants to work for a month out of the year on roads and other public projects
Consulate
Form of government which followed the directory -established by Napoleon-ended when Napoleon was crowned emperor.
Toussaint L'Ouverture
Former slave whom aided in the independence of Haiti from the French.
Estates General
France's traditional national assembly with representatives of the three estates, or classes, in French society: the clergy, nobility, and commoners. The calling of the Estates General in 1789 led to the French Revolution.
Napoleon Bonaparte
French general who became emperor of the French (1769-1821)
Emigres
French nobility who fled country to escape the Revolution
Parlement
French noble councils that regulated the legislation of the king, high courts of justice
War of the First Coalition
French revolutionary forces were soundly defeated by the Austrian military; only the conflict between eastern monarchs over the division of Poland saved France from defeat; intensified existing unrest and dissatisfaction of unpropertied classes
Jean-Paul Marat
French revolutionary leader (born in Switzerland) who was a leader in overthrowing the Girondists and was stabbed to death in his bath by Charlotte Corday (1743-1793)
Georges-Jacques Danton
French revolutionary leader who stormed the Paris Bastille and who supported the execution of Louis XVI but was guillotined by Robespierre for his opposition to the Reign of Terror (1759-1794)
Reign of Terror
From 1793-94 during the French Revolution. 40K were executed for "disloyalty" including the king and queen. The Reign of Terror also consumed Danton, and its incorruptible leader Robespierre.
Admiral Hiratio Nelson
He was a flag officer, famous for his service in the royal navy, particulary during the Napoleonic Wars. He was noted for his inspirational leadership and superb grasp stategy and inconventional tactics, which resulted in a number of decisive naval victories.
he replaced the empire with the Confederation of the Rhine
How did Napoleon deal with the Holy Roman Empire?
Goya
I depicted the cruelty of the French in their attacks on Spanish citizens in my paintings.
Flight to Varennes
In June of 1791 LXVI and his family attempted to escape and join the emigres who were agitating outside France to overthrow the revolution. King left a written message repudiating the revolution. He was spotted and arrested in Varennes in Lorraine in northeastern France. He was returned to a hostile Paris which now distrusted him and he was forced to accept the constitutional monarchy. His actions disoriented the revolution since now a system modelled on the English constitutional monarchy was impossible since he was obviously not a willing participant.
equality under the law, but not political freedom
In general, Napoleon championed...
sans-culottes
In the French Revolution, a radical group made up of Parisian wage-earners, and small shopkeepers who wanted a greater voice in government, lower prices, and an end of food shortages. In order to be heard they supported the Jacobins and Robespierre.
Brunswick Manifesto
Issued by Prussia and Austria on July 25, 1792. Stated that if harm done to the king or queen there would be severe retribution. This was a mistake by Prussia and Austria because it played right into hands of radical revolutionaries in France. They used it to panic France into thinking invasion imminent. Began recruiting soldiers for the defense of revolutionary France.
Louis XVI
King of France (1774-1792). In 1789 he summoned the Estates-General, but he did not grant the reforms that were demanded by the Estates, particularly the Third Estate, and revolution soon followed. Louis and his queen, Marie Antoinette, were executed in 1793.
levee en masse
Law for the draft that obligated all French men between certain ages to enlist in the army during the French Revolution.
Haratio Nelson
Leader of the English fleet in the Battle of Trafalgar, he died in the battle but the success of his fleet was one of history's most decisive victories
Conspiracy of Equals
Led by "Gracchus" Babeuf an attempt to renew violent rebellion after the Thermidore reaction,-communistic in nature.
September Massacres
Louis's imprisonment was followed by the September massacres. Wild stories seized the city that imprisoned counter-revolutionary aristocrats/priests were plotting with the allied invaders. As a results, angry crowds invaded the prisons of Paris and summarily slaughtered half the men and women they found.
Congress of Vienna
Meeting of representatives of European monarchs called to reestablish the old order after the defeat of Napoleon
Equality, Liberty and Fraternity
Motto of the French Revolution: Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite
Confederation of the Rhine
Napoleon formed this in 1807 from a league of about 20 German princes. Each was sovereign and the confederation included the kingdoms of Saxony, Bavaria, Wurtemburg and Westphalia. Westphalia was made up of Hanover and bits of Prussia. Napoleon put his youngest brother, Jerome, on the throne.
Jacobins
Napoleon joined the _________ shortly after the French Revolution
Waterloo
Napoleon mobilized his army against the English and Prussians after his return from Elba. The Prussian army comes to the aid of the English and defeat Napoleon's army
Grand Armee
Napoleon's army that consisted of 614,000 men
Peninsular War
Napoleon's attempt to march across Spain in order to conquer Portugal. Napoleon attempts to secure French control over Spain and is meet with opposition by Spanish guerrillas.
allowing the countries to govern themselves for 6 years
Napoleon's conquest of Spain claimed its American Empire by....
Continental System
Napoleon's efforts to block foreign trade with England by forbidding Importation of British goods Into Europe.
100 Days
Napoleon's escape from Elba back to France where he is reunited with his old army am marches through southern France
defeat England through economic war
Napoleon's purpose in instituting the Continental System was...
Women's March on Versailles
On October 5, 1789 an angry mob of Parisian women stormed through Versailles demanding Louis XVI end the nationwide food shortage and that the royal family return to Paris with them.
Women's march to Versailles
On October 5, 1789, rumors spread in Paris that the royals were hoarding all the grain. A hungry mob of 6,000 largely working-class women decided to march on the Palace of Versailles, taking with them pieces of cannon and other weaponry. They forced the royal family to live in Paris.
What is the Third Estate?
Pamphlet written by Abbe Sieyes in January 1789. It declared the nobility to be a useless caste that should be abolished. Only the Third Estate was necessary and was identical with the nation - should therefore be sovereign. Through these writings of Sieyes the ideas of Rousseau 's Social Contract entered the revolution. They also added to the fear between the classes even before the meeting of the Estates General.
assignats
Paper currency, the French churches were used as collateral -the first French paper currency issued by the General Assembly.
storming of the Bastille
Paris-July 14, 1789, the storming of this medieval fortress and prison known as the Bastille became the symbolic start of the French Revolution. Insurgents believe munitions were in the Bastille, but in fact it only contained only seven prisoners. The warden was killed by the mob and his head paraded around on a pike.
Marie Antoinette
Queen of France, wife of Louis XVI, who was unpopular her extravagance and opposition to reform contributed to the overthrow of the monarchy. She was nicknamed Madame Deficit because of all the money she spent while the masses of French starved. She was guillotined along with her husband (1755-1793).
Jacobins
Radical republicans during the French Revolution. They were led by Maximilien Robespierre from 1793 to 1794. They were allied with and found their power base with the sans-culottes who demanded radical change.
Madame de Stael
Ran a salon, or a meeting place for philosophes. She deplored subordination of women to men. She was Jacques Necker's daughter and she wrote widely read books.
Louis Saint-Just
Revolutionary who wanted to execute the King without trial. A proponent of mob rule. Led to the Committee of Public Safety. Put 850,00 men under arms. Muzzled the press. At least 20,000 people were killed.
Gallican Church
Roman Catholic church in France, headed by the monarch, not the pope
Josephine de Beuharnais
She was the first wife of Napoleon Bonaparte, and thus the first Empress if the French. Her first husband was guillotined during the Reign of Terror, and she imprisoned in the Carmes prison until her release 5 days after her husband's executuion
Lycees
State secondary schools, intended to give it's students technical training and to produce loyal military officers and government officials from the graduates
Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen
Statement of fundamental political rights adopted by the French National Assembly at the beginning of the French Revolution.
Napoleonic Code
The French legal system enacted in 1804 containing the details for French civil , commercial, and criminal war.
Mountain or Montagne
The Mountain was a political group whose members called Montagards sat on the highest benches at the Assembly. They were successively with a group of men called Marat, Daton, and Robespierre. The term was used for the Legislative Assembly until 1793.
Britain, Austria, Prussia, and Russia
The Quadruple alliance against Napoleon consisted of what European powers?
Hundred Days
The brief period during 1815 when Napoleon made his last bid for power, deposing the French King and again becoming Emperor of France
War of 1812
The edicts of the Continental System eventually led to the...
Continental System
The establishment of a French blockade of English ships from docking in European ports, therefore, crippling English trade
First Estate
The first class of French society made up of the high clergy of the Roman Catholic Church. 1% of the French population at the time of the Revolution.
Age of Montesquieu
The first phase of the French Revolution whose constitution provided for a constitutional monarchy
Metternich
The foreign minister of Austria who helped to manage and control the agreement made by European nations in the Congress of Vienna. He was a conservative and believed in absolutism.
Consulate
The government established after the overthrow of the Directory to bring political satiability and strengthen Napoleon's executive power
Elba
The island where Napoleon was exiled to after his first defeat as emperor in France.
Madame de Pompadour
The mistress of Louis XV who used her ability to take away her "services" to gain power and to give advice about and make important government decisions
ancien regime
The old order before the Revolution in France
The "Big Blunder"
The retreat from Spain came on the heels of Napoleon's disastrous Russian campaign (1812-1813); In July 1812, Napoleon led his Grand Armee eastward across central Europe and into Russia. - Russians avoided direct contact with Napoleon - Retreated to Moscow, drawing French into interior of Russia. - Russian nobles abandoned estates and burned their crops to the ground.
Marie-Louise (of Austria)
The second wife of Napoleon. They were married on March 12, 1810 in Vienna, creating an alliance between Austria and France.
Elba
The tiny island that Napoleon was granted after his abdication. Off the coast of Italy. (1st exile)
enrages
These were even more extreme than the sans-culottes . They were leftist, extremists in Paris and the provinces who declared that parliamentary methods were useless. Included women. Worked thro-out the whole country. Formed revolutionary armies scouring countryside for food, denouncing suspects and preaching revolution.
Treaty of Fountainbleau
This finalized the exile of Napoleon to a Mediterranean island off the coast of Italy where Napoleon would be emperor of Elba alone.
Concordat of 1801
This is the agreement between Pope Pius VII and Napoleon that healed the religious division in France by giving the French Catholics free practice of their religion and Napoleon political power
Lycees
This was established in 1801 as educational reform. It initially enrolled the nation's most talented students. They did have to pay tuition, although, there was some financial help for poorer students. This was where they trained the nation's future bureaucrats
Napoleonic Code
This was the civil code put out by Napoleon that granted equality of all male citizens before the law and granted absolute security of wealth and private property. Napoleon also secured this by creating the Bank of France which loyally served the interests of both the state and the financial oligarchy
Council of 500
This was the lower house of the legislature of france during the period commonly known as the Directory, from August 22,1795 until November 9, 1799, roughly the second half of the period generally referred to as the French Revolution.
1812 Invasion of Russia
This was the result of Napoleon's growing frustrations with the inefficiency of the Continental system and his growing interests in the Mediterranean region.
Prussia
What country was NOT ruled by a member of the Bonaparte family during the first decade of the 19c?
Napoleon's invasion of Spain
What was the direct cause of the rebellions in Latin America in the first part of the 19c?
cahiers des doleances
When the Estates general's met in Versailles, they were asked by Louis XVI to write their complaints in the cahiers des doleances, or notebooks of grievances
it was a symbolic gesture to show his independence
Why is it significant that Napoleon crowned himself as Emperor of the first French Empire in 1804
Reflections on the Revolution in France
Written by Edmund Burke, the philosophical conservative, in England. He had previously adivsed SLOW adaptation of liberties for England and commenting on the revolution in France he predicted anarchy and dictatorship as result of too rapid advance of liberties. Said each country should shape its government based on national circumstances and historical background and character. Advised against wholesale liberalization. Book translated and read by Catherine the Great and Gustavus III.
Rights of Man
Written by Thomas Paine. It has been seen as a defense of the French Revolution, but it's also an influential work that embodied ideas of liberty and human equality.
Cult of the Supreme Being
a religion based on deism devised by Maximilien Robespierre, intended to become the state religion after the French Revolution
lettre de cachet
a warrant formerly issued by a French king who could warrant imprisonment or death in a signed letter under his seal
Montagnards
also known as the "Mountain". members of the radical faction within the Jacobin party who advocated the centralization of state power during the French Revolution and instituted the Reign of Terror
Battle of Trafalgar
an 1805 naval battle in which Napoleon's forces were defeated by a British fleet under the command of Horatio Nelson.
Battle of Austerlitz
battle between Austria, Russia, and France; the French under Napoleon defeated the Russian armies of Czar Alexander I and the Austrian armies of Emperor Francis II
Renee de Maupeou
chancellor of France who succeeded in temporarily (1771-74) depriving the Parlements (high courts of justice) of the political powers that had enabled them to block the reforms proposed by the ministers of King Louis XV. By rescinding Maupeou's measures, King Louis XVI (reigned 1774-92) lost his opportunity to institute fundamental reforms that might have prevented the outbreak of the French Revolution.
Third Coalition
consisted of Britain, Russia, Austria, Sweden, and Prussia, defeated by Napoleon in brilliant victories (only defeat was off southern coast of Spain)(stopped invasion of England and ensure British Naval supremacy)
Consulate Era
era after the directory with napolean acting as head, took public vote of support that reaffirmed napoleans right to lead
Jacques Necker
financial expert of Louis XVI, he advised Louis to reduce court spending, reform his government, abolish tariffs on internal trade, but the First and Second Estates got him fired, he was well liked by the Third Estate
Hebertistes
followers of Hébert; party of extreme terror, most of its leaders were executed in March 1794, had been responsible for for deaths of 2,000 people at Nantes where they were loaded on barges and deliberately drowned, Paris Commune was thus destroyed
83 departments
france became a centralized national gov't based in paris once the feudal institutions, parlements, estates, provincial law codes, and tarrif and tax bodies were replaced by them
Second Coalition
in 1799, the two remaining members were Austria and Great Britain, which had been formed against France in 1798. when these overtures were rejected, French armies led by Napoleon decisively defeated the Austrians.
Milan Decree
in 1807 which proclaimed that any vessel that submitted to British regulation or allowed itself to be searched by the Royal Navy was subject to seizure by France.
Duke of Wellington
leader of the combined British and Prussian army; would defeat Napoleon at Waterloo
Temple of Reason
new name for the Cathedral of Notre Dame during the Radical Phase of the Revolution
St. Helena
place of napoleons second/last exile and death
Age of Rousseau
second phase of the French Revolution-Republic, execution of Louis, Committee of Public Safety, Reign of Terror, Thermidorian Reaction, Directory
Second Estate
the French nobility, 2% of population, rich nobles, owned 20-25% of land, no taxes-hated enlightenment
Battle of Jena
the battle in October 1806 in which Napoleon decisively defeated the Prussians., To punish Prussia for joining the Third Coalition, Napoleon engaged in this battle. He obliterated the Prussian army and occupied their capital city of Berlin. King of Prussia Fredrick william the third asked protection from the Tzar of Russia against Napoleon
Waterloo
the battle on 18 June 1815 in which Napoleon met his final defeat, Located in Belgium, the place where the british army and the prussian army forces attacked the french. Napoleon's final defeat against the British and Prussians
Battle of Borodino
the bloodiest battle of the Napoleonic era, fought outside of Moscow; both sides had terrible losses, but the Russian army was not defeated; Napoleon gained nothing substantial and when Moscow was burned, the French forces were left completely cut off. Napoleon regarded this battle as a loss.
Declaration of Pilnitz
the statment made by Austria and Prussia that they would attack France if anything happened to the King or Queen
Goal of the Continental System
to isolate Britain and promote Napoleon's mastery over Europe
Peninsular Campaign
when Napoleon sent troops into Portugal to impose the Continental System there
The Rights of Woman
written by Olympe de Gouges during the French Revolution and it demanded equal rights for women