ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

SECTION LEADERS OF /THE CROWD ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton ­ (­DAN-​­tawn)

ou were born 32 years ago (October 26, 1759), the son of a clerk to a minor local ­official, in a village calledArcis- ­ sur-​­ Aube,​­ in a district known as Champagne, a scruffy hill country whose grain harvests were notoriously poor. Your family heritage was Y firmly of the peasant class, though your father’s choices and abilities enabled you to be born into the lower middle class. Your father died not too long after your birth, and your mother, Madeline Camut, who you adored, married a cloth maker. At the age of 13, you began to be educated by the Oratorians, who taught you Enlightenment philosophy along with classics and grammar. You showed aptitude in one subject ­only—Latin—​­ so​­ at 14 you were sent to the seminary at Troyes to become a priest. Within a few years, however, you showed a rebelliousness that suggested you were unsuited to the priesthood, and so you decided to try a career in law. To that end, you went to Paris and took an apprenticeship as an errand boy to a lawyer in Paris. On your own you read the Encyclopédie, , , Rousseau, Buffon, as well as, in English, Shakespeare, Milton, and Dante. Yet you knew that you needed a law degree and, acting on a tip from your master, spent a very brief time at the notoriously lax University of Rheims where, in the course of seven days, you completed the requirements for a law degree. You even began practicing law there, but you found that Paris was more to your liking; you moved back to the city and became a Freemason in the years immediately preceding the Revolution. You also were introduced to a smart set of ­well-​­connected freethinkers, members of the secret society of the Freemasons, into whose precepts you were initiated. Several years ago, you borrowed enough money to marry Gabrielle Charpentier. This silenced, to a degree, rumors of your ceaseless womanizing. You obtained a position as “Counsel to the King’s Bench,” a ­fancy-​­sounding title which in fact merely entitled you to represent a variety of clients in courts over which the king, or his designees, presided. You also met . But this ­middle-​­class peace was not to define your life, or even to last, for uprisings and drew you like a moth to a flame. You took up residence in the Cordeliers section of Paris. And you talked, incessantly, of the need for a profound change in France. When mass unrest over the price of bread caused revolts, you went to radical meetings, especially those held at the Cordeliers Club. You were “drawn to [them] by their proximity and the democratic spirit of the times. This was [your] entry, almost haphazard, into politics.” Within the Cordelier Club and at speeches in the Palais Royal, you became known as a powerful orator, and you argued for the redress of “the people’s sense of injustice” as a practical and political necessity.1 The drama taking place at Versailles in 1789 convinced you to devote yourself to revolution. In July 1789, after King Louis XVI had ordered that the Third Estate desist in its claims that it alone con- stituted the nation, you went to the Church of the Convent of the Cordeliers (a Franciscan monastery) and called on someone to ring the bells. Soon a crowd of thousands thronged round, and you “saw an irresistible tide sweep by, so [you] dived in and swam with it.”2 “Citizens!” you shouted, “Let us arm ourselves—­ ​­let us arm ourselves to repel the 15,000 brigands assembled in Montmartre, and the 30,000 military who are ready to descend on Paris, to loot the city and slaughter its inhabitants!”

1. Lawday, The Giant of the : Danton, a Life (New York: Grove Press, 2009), 35–7. 2. Ibid., 44–5.

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 1 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 1 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

A few hooted their doubts and said that you would be executed for such words. You responded: “The sovereign people rise against despotism. The monarchy is finished!” Hundreds shouted their assent, and volunteered to fight; you began organizing them into an armed band that called itself the Battalion of the Cordeliers. The next two days went by in a blur. Tens of thousands of people swarmed to the Invalides, and then to the Bastille, where they overwhelmed it and forced its capitulation. You arrived after it had fallen. Then you were elected President of the Cordeliers District Assembly, which, under emergency conditions, met nearly every day (and through much of most evenings). You were given a stage name by your followers: “the Thunderer.” You held court at the Palais Royal, mocking the king and even sentencing him to medieval death; in vengeance for the aristocrats’ cruelty, “the guilty were to be drawn and quartered alive, their hearts torn out and bunged into their mouths.”3 In October, you drafted a manifesto and had it printed and posted throughout the city, calling for all Paris to rise and move on Versailles, with the Cordeliers Battalion in the vanguard. On October 4, 1789, you ordered that the bells of the Cordeliers be rung, and soon a procession of tens of thousands, most of them women, was moving to Versailles. (You subtly proposed that, on second thought, the Cordeliers withdraw from the march: you worried that Lafayette’s National Guard might fire upon them.) The women succeeded on their own and brought the king and his family back to Paris. But the Cordeliers District Assembly gave you special honors for arranging it all. You have contributed essays to both Camille Desmoulins’s newspaper, Courrier de Brabant, and to Marat’s L’Ami du Peuple (“The People’s Friend”), but your strength is speaking and leadership. You did not run for a position as a delegate to the National Assembly, nor did you run for election as one of three hundred councilors to the mayor of Paris. Rather, you lead the latter by the force of your words. When the mayor, Bailly, began to assume excessive powers, for example, you cited Rousseau, to a thun- derous ovation: “If a law is not the expression of the General Will, then that law is worth nothing!” Then, when the National Assembly tried to arrest Marat, the radical editor whose journal made nearly everyone tremble, you sent the Cordeliers Battalion to ring his house to protect him. When Lafayette and his bourgeois National Guard showed up, they did not dare challenge your men. Then you marched to the Tuileries, demanded to speak to the National Assembly, and were refused. The President of the Assembly went so far as to request that it pass a resolution indicating that it “dis- approved” of your “conduct.” You left, despondent, until you learned that the National Guard had marched home, too. Marat was free, and now everyone credited you with saving him. You then spoke at the Club, which was increasingly coming under the leadership of Max- imilien Robespierre. You responded by befriending Robespierre and by founding your own club, more radical in tone, called the Society of the Friends of the Rights of Man, soon nicknamed for the place where it met: the Cordeliers. The Cordeliers Club charged membership dues and obliged members to present their credentials before being admitted: your club is truly of and for the people. The only rule is that all speakers must put on the “red cap” of the Revolution before climbing the ladder that leads to the Club’s podium. On the wall behind, you have had emblazoned the words “liberté, egalité, frater- nité”—and now these have become the watchwords of the Revolution. In late 1790, you began to invite the leaders of the ­forty-​­eight sections of Paris to attend meetings of the Cordeliers, and your power grew proportionately. When you next returned to the National Assembly and demanded to be heard, the President had no choice but to allow you to speak. You denounced the king’s ministers, and demanded that they all be dismissed. The National Assembly voted

3. Ibid., 46–7 (quotation on p. 47).

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 2 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 2 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

against your proposal, 513 to 340, but no one could doubt any longer that you were a force to be reck- oned with. Last spring you won a citywide election to serve as prosecutor, and then you addressed the Jacobin Club every few weeks, along with holding court at your own Cordeliers each night. At the , you spoke as a lawyer; but when speaking to the people of Paris, you addressed them in a language they understood: clear, forceful, humorous, and audacious. Two weeks ago, when the king escaped from the ­Tuileries—​­doubtless with Lafayette’s ­connivance—​ ­you raced to the Cordeliers and denounced the king and “the Austrian woman.” You attacked, as well, those in the National Assembly who endorsed a constitutional monarchy: By upholding a hereditary monarchy, the National Assembly has reduced France to slavery! Let us abolish, once and for all, the name and function of king; let us transform the kingdom into a republic! The Cordeliers voted in favor of your proposition, and then you went to the Manège, where a crowd had assembled. Many were grumbling about Lafayette and the National Guard. You called out: “You’re right. Lafayette made himself answerable for the king’s person! Where is he now? Where are either of them? Your leaders are traitors! You have been betrayed!” You exulted at their response: “Long live Danton!” and “Long live our father Danton!” That eve- ning, you went to the Jacobin Club and listened as Robespierre, leader of the Jacobins, denounced the king and declared that he offered his own life for the cause of liberty. You leaped to your feet and roared, “We will die with you!” “Gentlemen,” you continued, “if the traitors show their faces here, I swear I will prove that their heads should fall at the feet of the nation they have betrayed. If not, let my own head answer for it on the scaffold!” And then, who should appear but Lafayette himself, flanked by several leaders of the Feuillants? You did not shrink from them, but took them apart, beginning with Lafayette, who had schemed to weaken the will of the people by creating a ­two-​­chamber legislature in place of the single National Assembly; who had promoted all manner of factions so as to subdivide the people; who had denounced the Cordeliers Club as being composed “almost entirely of wastrels and beggars, united only in their desire to ensure anarchy”; who had promised to guard the king and yet had allowed him to escape. Let us make no mistake about it, gentlemen. The flight of the king is neither more nor less than the result of a gigantic conspiracy. The only way in which it could have been carried out was through the complicity of leading members of the executive branch. And as for you, Monsieur Lafayette—­ ​­you who undertook final responsibility for the king’s person!—do you think you can discharge the debt you owe by showing your face here? It is not so long since you were describing the Jacobins as mere factious troublemakers. Lafayette, the great general, shrank from your words, and you pressed on: “What? Nothing to say? Speak up, man! You swore the king would never escape . . . .One of two things must be true: either you are a traitor who has sold his country ­or—​­if you made yourself answerable for someone you could not ­control—​­you are a plain fool.” And then you demanded his resignation. Lafayette finally spoke a few vague sentences in his defense, saying something about how a people could become free only when they truly desired freedom. Yes: you destroyed Lafayette in the Cordeliers and in the Jacobins, or so it seems. But you must complete the work in the National Assembly, and throughout France. You must destroy, as well, the king and the constitutional monarchy. But how? One means is to pressure the National Assembly by getting tens of thousands of ­Parisians—​­the French people!—to sign a petition calling for the removal of Louis XVI, or by having his status put up for a vote by all Parisians. Another is to weaken Lafayette by passing legislation allowing the common people into the National Guard, people such as those who fill the streets whenever you ring the bell at the Cordeliers.

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 3 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 3 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

But you also have another idea, one that will require tremendous planning, leadership, and, above all else, audacity. You can see that if, at a moment’s notice, tens of thousands of people can every now and then be summoned to destroy the Bastille, or to flood the palaces at Versailles and drag the king back to Paris, then it should also be possible to plan a tremendous uprising involving hundreds of thou- sands of people, a flood tide of virtuous humanity sufficient to sweep away the Ancien Régime. You conceive it to be your job to prepare Paris for the great insurrection. To that end, you will first weaken the old order and those ­so-​­called moderates who unwittingly breathe life into its corpse. And then you will bury it, once and for all.

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 4 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 4 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

Faction Advisory SECTION LEADERS OF PARIS nlike most players in the game, you are not a delegate to the National Assembly. You cannot cast a vote there, nor do you wish to do so. Your authority comes from the sans-­ ​ culottes­ —​­the poor people—­ ​­who live in your “section” of Paris. You are their leader. For U the past two years, you have alerted them to danger by racing to the local Catholic church, pushing aside the priest or his workers, and ringing the great bells. Soon hundreds or even thousands of your neighbors would flock to the steps outside. There you would shout out to them, explaining the latest threat to the Revolution. They would respond almost as one, unified in heart and mind. And then they would act. That was how, two years ago (July 1789), the people of Paris prevented the king from crushing the National Assembly. Tens of thousands of sans-­ culottes​­ , summoned from dozens of sections of Paris, surrounded the ancient fortress of the Bastille and seized it by force. That night, the “electors” of the ­forty-​­eight sections of Paris, originally constituted to choose who would represent them for the Third Estate in the meeting of the Estates General, formed the Commune of Paris. It immediately voted to tear down the Bastille. The Commune became the new governing body for the city, and the ­forty-​­eight “electors” became the section leaders of Paris. They agreed to meet continuously to preserve the Rev- olution. Three months later, in October, the poor women of several sections led a march to Versailles and dragged the king and his family back to Paris. Another victory for the people. The people of Paris have been responsible for nearly every advance in the Revolution. Your critics claim that the Revolution has completed its work. You know this is wrong. Your job, as in the past, is to defeat the enemies of revolution to ensure complete victory. Depending on the size of the class, your faction will consist of one to eight players, as follows:

• Danton

• Andalle (woman)

• Hébert

• Léon (woman)

• Marat

• Rolin (woman)

• Varlet

• Babeuf

All are celebrated heroes, well-­ ​­known throughout Paris for their writings, speeches, and acts of bravery. If you wish, you can choose the specific section for which “you” are responsible (unless is it indicated in your biography). You can find a map of Paris listing all ­forty-​­eight sections by name in George Rudé’s The Crowd in the French Revolution (New York: Oxford University Press, 1959) and in Wil- liam Doyle’s A History of the French Revolution (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989), 128. The parts of Paris known as ­Saint-​­Antoine and ­Saint-Marcel​­ were among the most radical.

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 5 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 5 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

VICTORY OBJECTIVES Your individual biography outlines the story of your life, including your own personal goals and ­objectives. The members of your faction share the same general philosophy, and in the main, you win the game if your faction prevails. But each member of the faction will also pursue somewhat separate objectives. This complicates your task. For example, although everyone in your faction opposes the Royal Sanction (the king’s veto), Anne-­ ​­Marguerite Andalle, Pauline Léon, and Françoise Rolin also seek to ensure woman’s full political participation. Depending on the outcome of the game, therefore, some players of your faction may win and others lose. On the other hand, if you work together and make effective (if temporary) alliances with other factions, your entire faction may prevail. In other words, if you do well individually but your faction does poorly, you will probably lose. If one player stumbles or encounters fierce opposition, others in your team must come to that player’s assistance. Your faction must persuade other players, especially those who are undecided or “indeter- minate,” to support goals that uphold your faction’s philosophy. Your faction should schedule regular meetings outside of class to determine what exactly needs to be done and how best to accomplish it. Remember that other factions, intent on winning, are likely strategizing to ensure that your faction will lose! In general, you seek to meet the following goals:

1 Punish Catholic priests and officials who refuse to swear their sole allegiance to the French people.

The emergence of the pure and incorruptible General Will requires the elimination of all factions. “For the General Will to be well articulated,” Rousseau wrote, “it is important that there should be no par- tial society in the state” (Social Contract). That is, if a citizen claims allegiance to a foreign nobleman or to the leader of his guild, he cannot be fully committed to the General Will of France. This is perfectly illustrated in the example of the anti-­ ​­constitutional priests (i.e., those who refuse to take the Obligatory Oath that was added to the Civil Constitution of the Clergy). By insisting that their vows to the pope in the Vatican are more important than their duties as citizens of France, these priests place themselves outside of the nation. Some of these “non-­ ​­juring” bishops and priests even now take up arms against the Revolution, or encourage their parishioners to do so. And their pope, in his recent encyclical Chari- tas (see pp. 133–6 of the game book), has declared that all priests must adhere to their clerical vows, even if those vows are contrary to the laws of France. But if Catholic clergy swear allegiance to the pope, then they are opposed to the General Will of the French nation. They must be arrested and imprisoned.

2 Deprive the king of any real powers (such as the Royal Sanction, the right to veto legislation).

The proposed Constitution of 1791 gives the king the power to veto laws passed by the National Assem- bly, at least for five years. Rousseau has made it abundantly clear that the people of a nation must be ­sovereign—​­they must rule the nation. And the sovereignty of the people cannot be shared with an individual who exists outside of its General Will. “Sovereignty,” Rousseau wrote in The Social Contract, “is indivisible for the same reason that it is inalienable. For either the will is general, or it is not.”

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 6 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 6 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

3 End the ­monarchy—​­and Louis XVI!

The king insists that he alone, regarding his vast dominion from atop his lofty perch, is capable of encompassing its “general” will. He confuses the France of the past with the nation that is now emerg- ing. If the king decides to become part of the General Will, then he is subject to its laws and must be punished for failing to obey them. But first he must give up his title and power and become aCitizen— ­ ​ ­Citizen Capet, perhaps—­ ​­just like anyone else. If he refuses, then he is an enemy of the people and must be destroyed. Rousseau put it like this: Every malefactor who attacks the social right [the General Will] becomes through his transgressions a rebel and a traitor; in violating its laws, he ceases to be a member, and he even wages war with it. In that case, the preservation of the state is incompatible with his own. Thus one of the two must perish; and when the guilty party is put to death, it is less as a citizen than as an enemy. (The Social Contract)

4 End slavery and exercise your right to resist oppression.

The first Article of the Declaration of the Rights of Man asserts: “Men are born and remain free and equal in rights.” Yet France keeps nearly half a million blacks in slavery in the sugar colony of Saint-­ ​ ­Domingue in the Caribbean. The National Assembly, while propounding the Declaration of the Rights of Man, enslaves the people of Saint-­ ​­Domingue! You denounce such hypocrisy. It does not matter that France profits from slavery. Slavery is wrong. And if slaveholders and slave nations refuse to abandon such practices, then the slaves have a right to use force to free themselves. You and the virtuous poor of Paris will support them, eager to fight tyranny anywhere and everywhere. The Declaration of the Rights of Man (Article 2) also affirms that the basic rights of man include the right to resist oppression. You intend to defend that ­right—​­and exercise it forcefully!

5 End “passive citizenship” and take control of the National Guard.

When the National Guard was created during the early days of the Revolution, after the king’s troops threatened to crush the National Assembly, your people rose up and seized the Bastille, forcing the king to back down. Within days, the Marquis de Lafayette persuaded the National Assembly to create a National Guard, with himself as commander. He then confiscated the guns and weapons that you and your followers had acquired during the attack on the Bastille. Then, at Lafayette’s prompting, the National Assembly issued a requirement that all National Guard members be “active citizens”—those who pay taxes. Those who do not, such as your sans-­ culottes​­ , are now scorned as “passive” citizens, inel- igible to vote or serve in the National Guard. Composed of property-­ ​­owning taxpayers, the National Guard has become the enemy of the Revolution. You must pass laws allowing your people to serve in the National Guard. When they have guns, they will aim them at Lafayette and other enemies of the Revolution.

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 7 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 7 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

6 Eliminate the “right to property” from the constitution.

If a child is starving, no man can claim a moral or legal “right” to an extra loaf of bread. But the current draft of the Declaration of the Rights of Man insists that ownership of property is a “sacred and inviolable right” (Article 17). Anyone with a heart that beats knows that it is wrong that noblemen, kings, and offi- cials of the Catholic Church have amassed obscene wealth while the children of France starve. But for those who insist that justice must be based on philosophy, you refer them to Rousseau’s Discourse on the Origin of Inequality (Second Discourse). He explains that there is no moral basis for a “right” to property. Feudal “rights” evolved over time into a “moral principle” that cloaked naked power. Perhaps you were at the Social Circle Club that Friday evening in November 1790 when the radical priest Claude Fauchet exclaimed, “Sublime Rousseau! You heard one of the first commands of eternal justice! Yes, every man has a right to the earth and must possess enough land for his existence!” Some Jacobins accused Fauchet of a kind of socialism, of undermining the fundamental principle of private property. You demand that Article 17 be changed. All references to a “right” to property must be deleted.

7 Provide cheap bread to the ­poor—​­but never sacrifice freedom for food.

During the October Days of 1789, when the women of the Paris sections trapped the king and queen at Versailles, the nervous king opened his vast bakery and distributed countless loaves of bread. The poor people went away happy, a few baguettes in their arms. That was a mistake. Never again will your people sacrifice political principle for bread. The people should not have to beg for food; instead they should possess the political power to ensure that they never go hungry. Your people are willing to sac- rifice themselves to end despotism and tyranny.

8 Mobilize the people to wage war on foreign monarchs.

Sooner or later the monarchs of Europe will wage war on the Revolution. They seek to invade France, execute you and the other section leaders, shoot your followers, and restore the old order. You are will- ing to die for the General Will. So are the people of your section. You know that, in an instant, three thousand or so of your people will lay down their lives if it will help build a new France. Such a force cannot be stopped, especially not by the mercenary soldiers of Austria, Prussia, and Russia who fight only because they are paid to do so. You must persuade the ­Jacobins—​­and the National Assembly—­ ​­to declare war against the king’s brothers and the other monarchs who are now raising armies to invade France. Moreover, France must go on the offensive! King Leopold II of Austria, the brother of , rules the lands just beyond the Rhine (Austrian Netherlands). The people there clamor for independence and freedom. You and your people, if necessary, are willing to march into the Austrian Netherlands and beyond to liberate all of the peoples of Europe. You do not fear war; you welcome it. Demand that the National Assembly declare war on the monarchs of Europe!

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 8 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 8 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

9 Eliminate institutions and groups that oppose the General Will.

Every citizen’s sole allegiance must be to the nation, and the General Will of the people must be expressed by the people themselves, not by “representatives.” Once the sections have defeated the ene- mies of the Revolution, they must dictate policies to the National Assembly. The section leaders them- selves must decide on the future constitution of France. If necessary, you will remove those members of the National Assembly who oppose the will of the people and close down their newspapers.

RESPONSIBILITIES You are, first and foremost, a “Citizen” of France. From now on, you should identify yourself, and all others, by this title. This signifies that everyone’s personal identity is joined to the nation. You must persuade others to use this title as well. That you belong to a guild, or worship as a Catholic, or come from a particular ­village—​­none of that matters compared to your allegiance to France. If someone prefers not to be addressed as Citizen, then they are saying that their own private interest matters more than their obligation to the nation. In Rousseau’s terminology, they are choosing to exclude themselves from the “social contract.” And those who place themselves outside the social contract, he notes, are likely its enemies.

POWERS: SECRET AND OTHERWISE You are not a delegate of the National Assembly, which is why you must sit in the “galleries” (most likely the back of the room). You cannot vote in the National Assembly, and you have no desire to be part of a “representative” political system. But at least for ­now—​­until you have gained control of Paris—­ ​­you want the National Assembly to endorse your ideas, because farmers in the Loire and Picardy and other rural areas respect the National Assembly more than the urban poor of Paris. You must seek to per- suade delegates, especially the Jacobins, your natural allies, and the Feuillants, your sometime allies, to vote for your goals. You must also try to win over some of the undecided or “indeterminate” delegates. You must speak in the National ­Assembly—​­though you are not allowed to do so! Although the National Assembly’s rules say that only delegates can speak, you know that you have as much right to speak as they do. You and the people of your section have risked your lives for the Revo- lution. Your people embody the spirit of ­self-​­sacrifice from which the legitimate power of the General Will is derived. Without ­self-​­sacrifice—​­virtue—​­there is no General Will. Perhaps you should give your speeches, whenever the opportunity arises, in a loud voice from the galleries. Or perhaps you should walk to the podium, just like delegates to the National Assembly, and thereby assert your right to speak. If delegates challenge this right, explain to ­them—​­and especially the President of the National ­Assembly—​­that the people of France, especially the stalwart citizens of the sections, have earned the right to be heard and must be heard. If the President denies you the opportunity to speak, you may wish to warn him that you do not speak for yourself but for three thousand very active citizens of your section of Paris, most of whom can be summoned whenever you wish. This is something of a bluff: in fact, you can only summon up their wrath in certain ­well-​­prepared circumstances, as follows:

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 9 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 9 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

”ARISTOS”—UNLEASHING THE LATENT FURY OF THE POOR PEOPLE OF YOUR SECTION After you have received your role sheet, your Gamemaster will give your faction a certain number of “aristos“—paper certificates that represent the latent fury of the people of your section toward the enemies of the Revolution. You can—­ ​­and, if necessary, you must—­ ​­trigger that fury to crush these ene- mies. You do so by standing up in class, tearing up one or more aristos, and giving a speech calling on your people to rise up against some specific enemy of the Revolution (see rules below). The number of aristos assigned to your faction depends on the size of your class, as determined by the Gamemaster. If the Gamemaster fails to provide your faction with your aristo certificates, show her this table as a reminder. You and the other section leaders should determine whether the precious aristos will be kept in common or allocated to different players. (Note: do not lose your aristos!) Aristo Distribution by Class Size

CLASS SIZE 10–12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 25 30 35 40+ Aristos assigned 7 9 10 11 12 12 13 13 14 14 17 20 22 24

INITIATING RIOTS WITH ARISTOS You can use your aristos to initiate riots and other public disturbances, according to the following rules: 1) You cannot use aristos during the first Game Session. 2) In subsequent sessions, you must first get the attention of the Gamemaster and gain her permission to initiate a riot or Crowd action. 3) After she has nodded or otherwise signaled her approval, you (and other section leaders) must stand, tear up your aristos in plain sight of the Gamemaster and the National Assembly (you cannot incite a riot in secret!), and then, in a loud ­voice—​­ 4) Give a speech denouncing some enemy or enemies of the Revolution (it is a good idea to specify the name of major enemies: for example, “The people of the Twenty-­ ​­Sixth Section will not allow Lafayette and Maury to trample on their rights. I urge you, my people, to punish them for their treachery . . . .”). As you give your speech, you should look away from the National Assembly and instead address the other Crowd ­leaders—​­and the people of your section. Perhaps they are assembled beyond the windows of the classroom, on the streets of your section of Paris. Speak loudly: perhaps three thousand of your people are straining to hear your words!

REDUCING DELEGATE ­TOTALS—​­AND “KILLING” OPPONENTS While you are speaking, the Gamemaster will study various ­factors—​­the weather, the quality of your speech, the number of aristos you have torn up, and so on. After taking everything into consideration, the Gamemaster will role two die and consult a Riot Outcome Table. If the combined value of the two die is very low, your mass action has flopped: the people of your section have lost heart and gone home without venting their fury. On the other hand, if your die roll total is high, your mass action has likely been successful. This means that it created so much chaos that some conservative delegates and other enemies of the Revolution fled from ­Paris—​­or even from France itself. The Gamemaster will announce that the delegate totals for conservative leaders (or whoever was named in your speech) have fallen by a number indicated on the table. When individual players cease to have any delegates at all, the Game- master will announce that they have perished and that their roles are now out of the game.

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 10 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 10 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

At that time, too, the Gamemaster will privately inform the newly deceased players that they can continue the game but with new identities as section ­leaders—​­members of your faction! Your GM will likely give them a new section leader role sheet. Special Advisory: First, keep this special power secret! Second, focus your attacks on the opposi- tion’s strongest player, which improves your chances of simultaneously strengthening your own faction and weakening your opponents. Be prepared, however, if some ­strong-​­willed-​­but-​­now-​­deceased players refuse to join your faction. They may prefer to lose the game rather than be forced to endorse a posi- tion they have argued against for so long. It might be wise to flatter and welcome “deceased” players to your faction immediately: “We went after you because you were such a terrific speaker. We really want you to be on our side now! And besides, now you have another chance to win the game if you join us!” Warning: your major weapon, apart from your own powers of persuasion, is the destructive vio- lence symbolized by your aristos. When you lead your section into violent actions, you cannot worry about your own safety. You fully embody the selfless virtue of the General Will. But make no mistake: by invoking mass violence, you expose yourself to danger. And you never know exactly what will hap- pen when violence ensues. You may do everything possible and even have a high die roll and things may still go wrong; conversely, there is a very small chance that a poorly prepared street action may prove gloriously successful, catching fire and exploding into mass chaos. What If You Die? As Robespierre repeatedly declares: “And if I die, so what? I do not matter in the least.” The General Will, by definition, acts without regard to its own selfish interest. You must never hesitate to pursue the course of revolutionary virtue. When your enemies build a towering fortress to block the will of the people, you must charge toward it and blow it apart. That was the lesson you learned at the Bastille. Factors that Influence the Number of Deputy Losses in a Successful Crowd Action

USE MORE ARISTOS If you tear up two aristos, the number of delegate losses to the conservatives will likely be more than twice as high than if you expended just a single aristo. More important, on the final day of the game and not before, you can attempt a Grand Insurrection, a massive uprising of many sections. This requires that you expend at least six aristos. For example, the delegate losses resulting from use of a single aristo could range from 0 to 28, and for two aristos, from 0 to 50. A successful Grand Insurrection could result in from 100 to more than 300 delegate losses. (Reminder: high die rolls are better than low ones.)

ENCOURAGE PARISIANS TO WEAR RED CLOTHING—­ ​­A SYMBOL OF REVOLUTION If all of the section leaders are wearing red clothing prominently, the die roll is increased by 1; if, addi- tionally, all of the Jacobins and at least half of the Indeterminates are wearing red clothing prominently, the die roll is increased by two. The Gamemaster alone makes these determinations.

DISTRIBUTE A PETITION IN ADVANCE OF THE RIOT AND GET PEOPLE TO SIGN IT! If, for example, the National Assembly will be voting on whether to give the king the constitutional right to veto legislation, you should prepare a petition in opposition to the concept (“We, the under- signed, declare that the king has no right to veto the will of the people”). Bring the petition to class and persuade delegates to sign it; a petition with only a handful of signatures will not impress the Game- master. Inventive section leaders may wish to get the petition signed by other students, professors, and university administrators. Strong petitions—­ ​­especially those signed by many Indeterminate players—­ ​ ­will increase the die roll. (Advisory: you may want to encourage everyone you see on campus to sign

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 11 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 11 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

the petition. They may not understand what they are signing, and the Gamemaster may not accept the signatures, but perhaps she will be impressed by your revolutionary zeal and reward it accordingly!)

GIVE POWERFUL SPEECHES! Your task is to persuade the people of your section to engage in dangerous and even violent acts. This is not easy. But if you give a powerful speech, perhaps joined by another section leader, then the Game- master may increase the die roll further. You must persuade the people of your section to be willing to sacrifice their lives, if necessary, to defeat the enemies of the General Will. You must explain, again and again, that violence, for a just cause, is virtuous. The head of a hulking brute, impaled on a pike and dripping blood, is not a pretty sight, but if it spares a young girl from his depredations, that bloody pike will stand proudly as a symbol of ­justice—​­and a warning to other brutes.

SPECIAL RULES FOR THE GRAND INSURRECTION The Grand Insurrection, which can only occur during the final Game Session, requires special prepara- tions, in addition to the expenditure of six aristos: 1) Before class begins, the section leaders must have placed posters around the room calling on all Parisians to come today to the center of the city, toward the National Assembly, bringing pikes, swords, and clubs and other homemade weapons. 2) In addition to tearing up the six aristos, the section leaders must sing—­ ​­lustily—​­at least a few stanzas of “Ça Ira,” the dance hall tune that became the rallying cry of the crowds of Paris. The lyrics for the song appear in Handout 9.2. Remind the Gamemaster to give this to you. If You Gain Control of Paris If the Grand Insurrection succeeds and you gain control of Paris, you must have a plan to arrest and, if necessary, eliminate the enemies of the Revolution. Also be prepared to announce a new constitution reflecting your victory objectives. If the National Assembly refuses to accept it, you may wish to arrest and execute the counterrevolutionary obstructionists. (This requires yet another unexpended aristo.) There is a danger, of course, that such actions may incite a counterrevolution in rural France.

ASSIGNMENTS Before the game begins, the members of your faction must meet to choose an editor. The editor is the leader of your faction. If your individual biographies include more than one editor, you must together decide which editor will lead the faction; you must also determine the name of your newspaper. The editor will take the lead in assigning writing topics for each newspaper. The writer on any given topic will likely be the main proponent of that topic in National Assembly debates—­ ​­and in speeches to the sections. The editor, in consultation with the entire faction, should lay out an editorial plan for the first newspaper. In doing so, he should study the Table of Main Topics for Section Leaders (below). This will help ensure that all of the main issues are covered. You may need to adjust these assignments if neces- sary: your writing and speaking should be focused on doing what is necessary to achieve your victory objectives. The editor should then pressure the President of the National Assembly to include agenda topics that your faction wishes to discuss. Your class probably will not include all eight section leader roles, which means that you may be obliged to write papers or deliver speeches on some topics that are not listed in “your” column in the table below. If, for example, your game includes only Danton and Andalle and the agenda item for the

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 12 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 12 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

day is the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, either of the two leaders must take responsibility to speak on that topic, and perhaps write a paper on it as well. Table of Main Topics for Section Leaders TOPIC PLAYER Danton Andalle Hébert Léon Marat Rolin Varlet Babeuf For Civil Constitution of Yes* Ye s the Clergy? For Obligatory Oath Ye s Ye s Ye s Ye s Against king’s veto Ye s Ye s For women’s rights Ye s Women’s right Ye s to bear arms For unicameral legislature Ye s Ye s Against right to property Ye s Ye s Against “passive citizen” Ye s Ye s Ye s Ye s distinction Abolish slavery in Saint-­ ​ Ye s Ye s ­Domingue? Declare war on foreign Ye s Yes, and monarchs? women in army Other issues Destroy For price For Bailly, controls virtuous Lafayette violence *”YES” denotes a suggested topic for this player.

RELATIONSHIPS With Big Ideas and Texts

ROUSSEAU’S SOCIAL CONTRACT This is your most cherished text, for it provides a philosophical guide on how one might build a coop- erative society that preserves individual freedom. You should cite parts of The Social Contract in nearly every paper and speech you write.

ROUSSEAU’S SECOND DISCOURSE ON THE ORIGINS OF INEQUALITY (AVAILABLE ONLINE) Rousseau’s Second Discourse is especially useful to your faction because it provides strong arguments against the claim, now asserted in Article 17 of the Declaration of the Rights of Man, that the right to property is “sacred” and “inalienable.” Rousseau observes that, at the dawn of civilization, some people doubtless claimed that they “owned” a particular meadow, and the stream that passed through it. Such a claim must have puzzled everyone else, because how could one person “own” a stream or a field? But those who claimed such a right eventually succeeded in defending it: “Get off my land or I’ll hit you with this log!” And over time that person gained power over everyone else. In times of famine, the “landowner” of the meadow had plenty of food and hungry people enslaved themselves to him. Soon

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 13 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 13 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

he became powerful, as did his descendants. The “property” of the rich then became embedded in “law” and political systems. The “legal” wealth and power of kings, archbishops, and nobility stemmed from such ancient acts of theft. Their claim that they have a “sacred” right to those same meadows and streams today is absurd. Prior ownership, founded on ancient theft or plunder, does not constitute any moral right. You must study this document and master these arguments to persuade the National Assembly to renounce its enshrinement of a “sacred” and “inalienable” right to land and other forms of productive property. Productive property, like land and factories, should be held in common for all.

BURKE’S REFLECTIONS ON THE REVOLUTION: A POWERFUL WEAPON AGAINST YOU Your fiercest critics will repeatedly invoke the arguments of ’s Reflections on the Revolu- tion in France, written just last year. Burke hurls one argument after another at Rousseau; but make no mistake, his real enemy is you! He sees the section leaders and the people of the sections as the greatest danger, because they alone can destroy the Ancien Régime. An apostle of gradual change, he knows that your willingness to go to the barricades, to sacrifice and die for your beliefs, holds the promise of blowing apart the Ancien Régime. Read Burke’s book and be prepared to demolish it.

THE VIRTUOUS POOR: ROUSSEAU’S FIRST DISCOURSE The General Will, Rousseau insisted, must be founded on virtue and selflessness. But critics contend that that is impossible. You feel brotherhood with the Crowd in their festivals of celebration and their singing in the streets. Rousseau himself found the simpler people to be the purest. “Before art had fashioned our manners and taught our passions to speak an affected language,” he wrote in the First Dis- course, “our customs were rustic but natural.” Our court culture and bourgeois values—­ ​­fancy clothes, fine food, clever books, and concerts and ­plays—​­have distanced us from basic human concerns and moral behavior. The poor people of your section live life at a purer, more human level. Seven months ago, Robespierre published a pamphlet equating the Revolution with the virtue of the Crowd and stat- ing that the people are “good, patient, [and] generous.” These words are true, and they are also necessary. With Your Faction: The Women Leaders Your faction includes one or more female section leaders: ­Anne-​­Marguerite Andalle, Pauline Léon, and Françoise Rolin. They want the Declaration of the Rights of Man to explicitly apply to women, too. The Jacobins disagree: the task of women, they claim, is to rear the future citizens of the emerging French republic. The male leaders of the sections are surely inspired by the courage and fury of the female citizens of the French nation, but they are not obliged to endorse the women leaders’ crusade for the rights of women. With Conservatives The conservative Catholic clergy and nobility are enemies of the Revolution. During the early sessions you must make it clear to everyone how these groups wage war on the Revolution, even while pretend- ing to endorse it. Sooner or later, you may have no choice but to drive them from ­Paris—​­and even from France. Louis XVI is the main symbol of the old order: you must tear him down. With Feuillants Just a few weeks ago, the Feuillants belonged to the Jacobin Club, which has promoted the Revolu- tion within the National Assembly. The Feuillants, in other words, were once among your allies. But many of them abandoned the Jacobins because they grew fearful of you! These Feuillants say that you threaten public order by inciting the crowds of Paris to violence. You find such remarks infuriating. If it

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 14 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 14 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

had not been for the “violence” of the crowd at the Bastille, the king would have crushed the National Assembly; if it had not been for the violence of the market women in Versailles, the king and his family would not have been brought back to Paris, where you can keep an eye on him. You will try to persuade the Feuillants to endorse the Revolution more completely. But if you cannot win them over to your side, you may need to oppose them more forcefully . . . . Warning: inciting violence is dangerous, as is the violence itself. Lafayette and the twenty thousand men of the National Guard constitute the greatest threat. Whether the Guardsmen will remain loyal to Lafayette or come over to your side is not certain. You may wish to address articles and speeches to those of your neighbors (property-­ ​­owning, to be sure) who belong to the National Guard. Tell them that their duty, as Frenchmen, is to support the people, such as those of your “section” of Paris. Per- suade them not to take up arms against the Revolution that they helped win! With Indeterminate, or Undecided, Deputies Because you want the Jacobins to gain a working majority in the National Assembly, you will likely need to win over some “indeterminate” delegates to the Jacobin cause, or perhaps to your own. The problem is that your use of violence against the enemies of revolution will likely unsettle some Inde- terminates. Your ­task—​­and you should pursue it from the very beginning of the game—­ ​­is to show that violence, though regrettable, is sometimes necessary. For example, slavery in ­Saint-Domingue​­ is wrong, as you well understand; are the slaves then wrong for “violently” breaking their chains and pushing the slaveholder out of the way so that they can race toward freedom? Of course not. You need to show the delegates that your violence is morally defensible. This will not be easy, but it can be done. If you can make this argument, you may win over some of the Indeterminates or at least prevent them from branding your faction as “bloodthirsty.”

STRATEGY Ultimate Destruction of the Jacobins? The Jacobins disapprove of the sometimes violent measures you and the other section leaders endorse. The Jacobin delegates give speeches on virtue and deplore violence, but you know that the Revolution has succeeded only because good ­people—​­your people—­ ​­were willing to stand up and risk their lives in defending the Revolution and destroying its enemies. But once all of the enemies of France have been destroyed, you may wish to eliminate the Jacob- ins; you do not need them to rule France. Let the people who won the Revolution rule themselves, directly and forcefully. The Commune of Paris has provided a model. If, by the end of the game, the Jacobins have unanimous or nearly unanimous control of the National Assembly, and if you and the other Crowd leaders agree, and if you still have at least one unexpended aristo, you can summon your sections and place all or some of the Jacobins under arrest; if you wish, you may quickly form revolu- tionary tribunals (courts), pronounce the Jacobins guilty, and execute them. The people will at last be sovereign; the General Will can now prevail. How Can Illiterates Teach Anyone Else Political Philosophy? You must be prepared to rebut a question that may be flung into your face repeatedly. The Crowd con- sists, mostly, of semiliterate skilled workers without formal education. (­One-​­third of Parisian men and ­two-​­thirds of Parisian women are illiterate.) How can such persons explore difficult issues of politics and government policy?

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 15 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 15 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

Rousseau, as usual, provides the answer, this time in his First Discourse. Knowledge of a particular sort is cherished by the Ancien Régime and the culture it spawned. The royal family, the nobility, the court, and high church officials all delighted in the literary banter of political disputation, of the theater, of the salon, and of “learned books.” They showed off their own cleverness in order to gain the esteem of others, or they employed their skills and knowledge to acquire property which, as you know from Rousseau’s Second Discourse, enabled them to enslave those less clever (or greedy) than themselves. But you know that when a child cries from hunger, she must be fed. You know that when a hus- band is injured and cannot work, you must take him and his family into your own home, regardless of your own discomfort. The important truths come from the heart. You must teach these truths to the National Assembly and to the ignorant of France. For how can they claim to have been educated? They have not cradled an infant dying from hunger, or summoned the courage to risk their lives for a worthy cause. What do they know? Thus, when they contend that you are uneducated, you must teach them the meaning of true edu- cation. France has little need for the education that makes people shallow, heartless, greedy, and cruel (see Rousseau’s First Discourse). France must teach its people about the brotherhood of man and the need to aspire to virtue. Such persons, and they alone, can become true Citizens, in the pure and wor- thy meaning of the term. In Defense of Violence Some may say that violence is immoral, but they are wrong. If a young girl is being attacked by a hulking brute, every ­right-​­thinking person would kill him to save her. Now you must save France from those who threaten her. If you fail, the Revolution will fail. If you fail, you will have failed your cause and that of countless generations as yet unborn. Human beings will remain mere slaves, victims of oppression and want. If you fail, you will have failed mankind and the best hopes of humanity. But you shall succeed. First you must imagine a world worth dying for, and perhaps even worth killing for. Summon up all the powers of your imagination to envision a world such as Rousseau con- ceived. Such a glorious end, alone, justifies the repugnant means you must employ to achieve it. A Culture of Revolution You do not seek simply to change laws, constitutions, and governments, but to help lead your people to a new life and political culture. To that end, you want citizens to identify with the Revolution on a deeper level. You want them to signify their commitment by wearing red clothing (hats, preferably). You want to hold festivals at which the people come together to celebrate their commonality. You want them to sing songs together to show that revolution is a powerful collective experience: liberating, exhilarating, and joyous. You want to replace the fussy speechmaking with revolutionary theater, rem- iniscent of the medieval carnivals and Lords of Misrule, traditional folk festivals where conventions are briefly flouted or subverted. You will mock the stuffy pretensions of the others; you will win over all of France with your scandalous wit and audacity. People may read the other newspapers with interest, but they will read yours (L’Ami du Peuple) with delight and outrage!

TO LEARN MORE See Rudé’s The Crowd in the French Revolution, as cited above, for a classic study of this subject.

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 16 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 16 13/01/16 4:45 PM ROUSSEAU, BURKE AND REVOLUTION IN FRANCE, 1791

SUMMARY OF YOUR FACTION’S VICTORY OBJECTIVES

1. Punish Catholic priests and officials who refuse to swear their sole allegiance to the French people. 2. Deprive the king of any real powers (such as the Royal Sanction, the right to veto legislation). 3. End the ­monarchy—​­and Louis XVI! 4. End slavery and exercise your right to resist oppression. 5. End “passive citizenship” and take control of the National Guard. 6. Eliminate the “right to property” from the constitution. 7. Provide cheap bread to the ­poor—​­but never sacrifice freedom for food. 8. Mobilize the people to wage war on foreign monarchs. 9. Eliminate institutions and groups that oppose the General Will.

ROLE SHEET: ­Georges-​­Jacques Danton, Section Leaders of Paris/the Crowd 17 OF 17

214935_RS07_­Georges_Jacques_Danton_001-017_r2_el.indd 17 13/01/16 4:45 PM