Secrecy and Transparency in Eighteenth- Century France

IN THE KINGDOM OF SHADOWS: SECRECY AND TRANSPARENCY IN EIGHTEENTH- CENTURY FRANCE Nicole Bauer A dissertation submitted to the faculty at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of History. Chapel Hill 2018 Approved by: Jay M. Smith Lloyd Kramer William Reddy Donald Reid Ellen Welch © 2018 Nicole Bauer ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ii ABSTRACT Nicole Bauer: In the Kingdom of Shadows: Secrecy and Transparency in Eighteenth-century France (Under the direction of Jay M. Smith) This dissertation explores how the idea of secrecy took on a radically new meaning in the eighteenth century. The government and elites had long been seen as possessors of secrets, but what emerged in the eighteenth century was the idea that elites kept secrets illegitimately. By the eve of the French Revolution, writers voicing concerns about corruption saw secrecy as part and parcel of despotism, and this shift went hand in hand with the rise of the idea of government transparency. At century’s end, transparency had come to be seen as the cure-all for social ills. The emergence of the idea of transparency as a desired quality in a regime, however, was not inevitable or predetermined; it was not simply a development characteristic of what scholars like to call modernity. Rather, the emphasis placed on government transparency, especially the mania for transparency that we see in eighteenth-century France, was a result of a convergence of several factors. Rising nationalism and worries about hidden influences helped the Jansenists, a French Catholic sect with a Manichaean worldview, heap suspicion onto the Jesuits, a religious order loyal to the pope in Rome that was often portrayed as secretive and steeped in intrigue. Changing notions of the individual led to new ideas about personal responsibility and honor; where secrecy once sheltered and protected family honor, openness and honesty were now the safeguards of personal honor. Furthermore, a traditionally secretive state did nothing to counteract rumors of iii fictional abuses both in the courts and the prisons. All of these factors led to the emergence of the fledgling and often thorny issue of government transparency. iv To my parents v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS It is no secret that the dissertation writer, no matter how solitary her labors and habits, could not complete such a project without the aid and support of a network of mentors and friends. I have been incredibly lucky on many fronts. Firstly, I have been very lucky to complete my graduate work in a wonderful, collegial department with the best of advisors. I am very grateful to Jay Smith for being a great mentor, sounding board, role model, and friend. His talents include listening for hours on end to rants or long, rambling digressions on historiography or theory, purchasing quaffable beverages, and being tolerant of a student who still aspires to the virtue of punctuality. When I started down the path towards this dissertation project, he happily supported me in exploring topics, applying for grants, presenting my research, assuaging uncertainties and doubts, and finally by scrupulously reading drafts; in short, being the gold standard, what everyone could wish for in an advisor. I am also grateful to the members of my committee who played vital roles both in shaping my project and my identity as a scholar. I would like to thank Lloyd Kramer for “bouncing back” whenever I came into his office to bounce ideas off of him, and Donald Reid for his innumerable pep talks, confidence-boosting encouragement, and active listening. I owe much to William Reddy for getting my mind tangled in knots over modernity or culture, and to Ellen Welch for her always supportive and helpful feedback and comments. I would also like to thank my friends who have been so selfless, enthusiastic, and helpful. Completing this project would not have been the same without Michelle Coates who took me out vi for drinks when I was first published, or Lindsay Ayling who often listened to me work through my argument and who provided colorful anecdotes about Robespierre. Molly Barnes was an invaluable friend through all my stages of graduate school. Scott Krause read many drafts, and both he and Gregory Mole showed me what a beautifully-written and well-done dissertation could look like. Zardas Lee is always willing to talk about post-structuralism, and Bethany Keenan, Julia Osman, and Sara Shurts have been so warm and helpful in my research. Last but not least, I would like to thank my family, especially my parents, who provided all the different forms of support a family could give, always encouraging me during this long journey through all its surprises, joys, and rough patches. My mother let me talk endlessly about Jansenists and Jesuits, and always told me to believe in myself because she did. My father gave me some of the best advice I have ever gotten: reach for the moon and maybe you’ll land among the stars. For supporting me every step of the way, inspiring me to work hard and have faith in myself, I can only say thank you to my parents. This dissertation is dedicated to them. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction ................................................................................................................................................. 1 Chapter 1: A Matter of Honor: Lettres de cachet and the Uses of Secrecy...................................... 13 Chapter 2: The Fate of Secrets in a Public Sphere: the Comte de Broglie and the Demise of the Secret du roi…………………...........................................................................................................................55 Chapter 3: Those Who Know Your Secrets: Jesuit Secrecy and the Proto-nationalism of the Jansenists ................................................................................ …………..…………………………………………………..88 Chapter 4: “I Promise Never to Speak to Anyone”: The Bastille and Police Secrecy .................. 128 Chapter 5: The Famine Plot: The Case of a Jansenist Conspiracy Theorist ................................... 168 Chapter 6: Desire, Dread, and the Grateful Dead: The Bastille, Its Cadavers, and the Revolutionary Gothic Imaginary .......................................................................................................... 203 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................... 240 References ............................................................................................................................................... 248 viii INTRODUCTION Where there is secrecy, there is fear. Or so Gérard Vincent surmises in an essay on secrecy in the history of private life. For centuries, families, governments and individuals have been motivated by their fear of shame or humiliation to keep an incident like a crime--or the person who committed it--secret. Fear of public condemnation, fear of ridicule, or fear of reprisals have been strong incentives to keep supposedly shameful individuals and their acts undisclosed and unmentioned. In his long meditation on secrecy, however, Vincent does not dwell on fear alone. He sees a connection between secrecy and power wherein those who possess power use secrecy to maintain it, or they use secrecy to project the illusion of power. Thirdly, Vincent believes that secrets fascinate, hence the interest in and conspiracy theories about the free masons, for example.1 In many ways, the three observations that Vincent makes about secrecy—fear, power and fascination—trace the narrative arc of this project and the story of secrecy more broadly in the early modern period. In the summer of 1790, a year after the storming of the Bastille, the French press reported that so many cadavers were being found in the ruins of the fortress that the accumulation of remains was beginning to get in the way of demolition work. Workers were being bribed by curious onlookers, eager for a glimpse of the long-hidden victims of the despotism of the royal regime. Speeches were given to commemorate the dead who had been killed in secret but were now finally honored in public. This event and the curiosity it garnered 1 Gérard Vincent, “A History of Secrets?” A History of Private Life, Vol. V, ed. Philippe Ariès and Georges Duby, trans. Arthur Goldhammer (Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1987). 1 reflected both fear of secrecy and the association of secrecy with power by the time of the Revolution. Ordinary people and the journalists who wrote for them feared the putative horrors of a despotic regime, interpreted those cadavers as a sign of unchecked, despotic power, and also revealed an undeniable fascination and hunger for spine-chilling tales. In this dissertation, I look at the strange and unexpected path secrecy took in eighteenth- century French culture, and the surprising forces that led to the emergence of the notion of government transparency. By the French Revolution, the drive for transparency was a defining feature of the political culture. Countless scholars, including Lynn Hunt, Timothy Tackett, and Thomas Kaiser to name only a few, have documented the culture of transparency during the Revolution, especially the Terror: the fear of secrecy, the paranoia about conspiracies, and the obsession with false patriots who had hidden motives. As Marisa Linton has noted, most of the politicians arrested and executed during

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