Centre for Comparative and Public History Department of History Chinese University of Hong Kong In-Service Teacher Training Course The Making of the Modern World

Lecture 1 The French Revolution

Generally regarded as the event that initiated modern European history, the French Revolution shook the world in its time and reverberates to this day. The pursuit of Liberté, Egalite, and Fraternité did and still do resonate among peoples seeking freedom, equity, and a full measure of citizenship. Up until the Russian Revolution, it was the sole event in European history that all else was measured against. It left no-one indifferent.

1. Prologue: France in 1789 A. A crisis in the most populous state in Europe 1. The “Old Regime” and its notion of privilege (lex privata) 2. The importance of tradition in the maintenance of authority a.) An absolute monarchy with a weak monarch, King Louis XIV 3. Budget predicament a.) Debt from support of American Revolution b.) No central bank c.) Aristocratic opposition to tax reform d.) Looming bankruptcy 4. The king calls the Estates General a.) First such assembly since 1614

2.) From the Estates General to the National Assembly B. Public opinion shifts 1. France’s population separated into three estates - a medieval division a.) First Estate, the clergy (those that pray) b.) Second Estate, the nobility (those that fight) c.) Third Estate, everybody else (those that work) i.) An anachronistic system at end of eighteenth century ii.) Weighted voting favors first two estates 2. Public expectations and the Estates General a) Privilege, previously seen as a check on state power, is increasingly rejected b.) Pamphleteers and criticism of the Ancien Regime i.) Mirabeau and Emmanuel Sieyes c.) Public grievances - the Cahiers de doléances i.) Suggestions for reform come from all over France. 3. The “Tennis Court Oath” a.) Louis XIV fails to provide leadership b.) Third Estate balks at separate chambers c.) 17 June 1789, Third Estate declares itself the National Assembly d.) The king locked the Third Estate out of its meeting room i.) King promises reforms ii.) Third Estate relocates to an indoor tennis and declares its inviolability until France has a constitution e.) King’s program promises tax equality, civil liberties, regular meetings of Estates General, but declares that estates system must endure f.) Third Estate refuses to adjourn; Louis XIV capitulates and recognizes the National Assembly; he orders other estates to join it; the Ancien Regime delegitimized i.) French Revolution begins as non-violent and legal

3.) Revolution commences and consolidates C. The Fall of the Bastille 1. Dismissal of liberal minister sparks fear of royal counterrevolution 2. 14 July 1789, Parisians in search of weapons lay siege to a royal prison, the Bastille a.) small group of soldiers resist but after pitched battle, they surrender 3. Royal officials ousted; citizen militias patrol Paris a.) Municipal revolutions break out in twenty-six of France’s thirty largest cities

D. Peasant Revolts 1. “Class tensions” in the countryside and concerns of aristocratic plots-- Great Fear (Grande Peur). 2. 4 August 1789, clerical and noble deputies in National Assembly renounce their ancient privileges 3. National Assembly does away with all feudal rights and with all privilege; protects property rights 4. “Bread and Patriotism,” Women march on Versailles and force the King from Versailles to Paris (October 5, 1789) a.) Traditional, ritualized protest (women’s role). -. b.) Louis XIV: from King of France to King of the French.

E. End of Privilege and a New France 1. Declaration of Rights of Man - establishes individual freedoms and rule of law along with duties of citizenship a.) Caste (birthright) done away with; not class b.) Radical dissent - Jean-Paul Marat and L’Ami du Peuple 2. Revolutionary Measures and Celebrations (November 1789 - July 1790) a.) Tax resistance; ongoing budget crisis b.) Confiscation of Church possessions (3 November 1789). c.) Issuing of “Assignats” (state bonds). d.) Revolutionary consensus; Feast of the Federation (14 July 1790)

4.) The Breakdown of Revolutionary Consensus (1790-1791) F. The Civil Constitution of the Clergy (November 1790) 1. “Juring” and “non-juring” priests. G. Polarization of the National Assembly 1. Jacobins and Girondins 2. Active citizens “Camille Desmoulins” 3. The slavery question. Toussaint l’Ouverture (Hispaniola). 4. Maximilien Robespierre and the Sans-culottes.

H. Breakdown of Order 1. The King’s Flight (June 1791) a.) King Louis XVI and family seek to escape Paris; captured in Varennes; forced to return to the capital 2. 17 July 1791, Champ-de-Mars Massacre: a republican demonstration is dispersed by bullets 3. Constitution of 1791 (went into effect September) establishes a constitutional monarchy a.) King has limited veto b.) Legislative power over executive c.) Endures less than a year I. Outside Threats 1 27 August 1791, Declaration of Pilnitz a.) Prussia and Austria threaten revolutionary France. b.) stimulates the “war party” in the Assembly; declaration of war on Austria (April 1792) 2. The Revolution abroad a.) Edmund Burke, Thomas Paine, Mary Wollstonecraft.

5. The Second Revolution J. Formation of revolutionary Institutions 1. 11 July 1792, Volunteers; National Guard; “sections”, patrie en danger 2. 9 August, Commune of Paris (August 9, 1792); a.) 10 August, storming of Tuileries Palace b.) September Massacres. 3. 20 September, Victory at Valmy a.) The war extends itself (Britain, Spain, Holland join anti-French Coalition). 4. 21 September, the Convention declares France a Republic. 5. The King put on trial a.) 21 January 1793, Citizen Louis Capet executed 6. The Counter-Revolution within a.) The Vendée uprising (March, 1793). K. Beginning of “The Terror (March, 1793) 1.) The rise of the Committee of Public Safety (the Jacobins) a.) The “Law of Suspects”: Danton, Desmoulins, Olympe de Gouges. L. Revolutionary culture. 1. The Revolutionary calendar and breaking with tradition.

6. Reaction M. 27 July 1794, The Thermidor Reaction 1. 28 July, Execution of Robespierre a.) Dismantling of apparatus of “Teror” N. The Directory (1795-1799) 1. Characteristics of the Directory regime. a.) “ Government by the best citizens” b.) Abandons Constitution of 1793 2 Military victories by young General Napoleon Bonaparte a.) Leads French Army over Austrians in Italy b.) Treaty of Campo Formio (October 1797) i.) Napoleon encourages Italian “sister” republics O. The "Eighteenth of Brumaire" 1. The Ascension of Napoleon Bonaparte (November 1799)