z notes france

• Long Term Causes of the 1789 Revolution

  • Louis XVI's weaknesses
  • Taxation system
  • Structure of French society
  • The Enlightenment
• Short Term Causes of the 1789 Revolution

  • War
  • Financial crisis
• Meeting of the Estates-General

  1. 5 May 1789, Estates General met

  2. Third Estate broke away and formed the National Assembly on 17 June

  3. Tennis Court Oath on 23 June

  4. King forced to recognise the National Assembly and allow First and Second Estate to join
• Revolt in Paris


  1. King brought in 25,000 troops

  2. Necker dismissed

  3. Storming of the Bastille on 14 July 1789

  4. Commune of Paris set up and National Guard formed
• Revolt in the Provinces

  1. Old councils removed and National Guard formed in every town

  2. Peasants revolted by attacking nobles and landlords (Great Fear)
• August Decrees


  Reforms including abolishment of tithes and venality, abolition of all financial and tax privileges, all citizens eligible for all offices
• Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen


  Stated that all men are born free and equal, power rests with the people, freedom of expression, fair taxation
• October Days, 5 - 6

  1. King reinforced his guards, anti-revolutionary demonstrations

  2. Thousands of women marched from Paris to Versailles to demand bread

  3. National Guard joined them, got into the King's palace

  4. King forced to move to Paris and accept reforms
• Constitutional Monarchy 1789-92


  • Reforming programmes to create a constitutional monarchy
  • Concept of 'active citizens' who could vote
  • New taxation system based on equality
  • Sale of Church land to deal with financial crisis
  • Laissez-faire economic policies
  • Abolition of guilds and ban on trade unions
  • New judicial system with equality before the law
  • Civil Constitution of the Clergy to make Church independent of Rome and linked to the State
  • New constitution with legislative assembly elected every 2 years, King with suspensive veto
• Revolutionary Clubs


  • Jacobin Club
  • Cordeliers Club
  • Marat's L'Ami du Peuple newspaper
• Sans-Culottes


  Normal urban workers in Paris, suffered greatly from inflation and led riots as grain prices rose
• Revolutionary Clubs


  Played an important role as there were no political parties, informed the public on major issues, supported election candidates, pressured deputies in the Assembly
• Jacobin Club


  • Had a high entrance fee, were against a monarchy, Maximilian Robespierre was the leader of a minor group of radical Jacobin deputies
• Cordeliers Club


  • More radical than the Jacobin Club, had no entrance fee, supported direct democracy and the right to insurrection, its main support was from the working class though its leaders were bourgeois, George Danton and Camille Desmoulins were a part of this club
• Marat was a radical journalist that wrote the L'Ami du Peuple, a newspaper
• Sans-Culottes


  The normal urban workers in Paris, not a class, many were 'passive' citizens, suffered greatly from inflation and led riots as grain prices rose, clubs were able to use their discontent to demand the government for change, made the Revolution more radical in many ways
• The Flight of Varennes

  Louis XVI regretted accepting the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, wanted to flee to Lorraine and use their army to negotiate, left on 20 June 1791, was caught the day after and brought back to Paris, had left a letter which denounced the Revolution, lost all his popularity and the people's trust, the Assembly suspended the King until the new constitution was made
• Champ De Mars Massacre, July 1791

  50,000 went to the Champ de Mars to sign a republican petition, the National Guard was summoned and fired on the peaceful and unarmed crowd, leaders of the movement were arrested, meant the removal of any extremist opposition for a while
• Legislative Assembly


  • The King's acceptance of the constitution on September 1791 marked the end of the National Assembly, it was replaced by the Legislative Assembly, those in it were mainly bourgeois, the makeup was: The Left (136 deputies, most of them part of the Jacobins, a small group from the Girondins), The Right (264 deputies who were members of the Feuillant Club), The Centre (345 deputies who were on neither side)
• The Growth Of The Counter-Revolution


  The deputies were worried by the nonjuring clergy and the émigrés, whose numbers had increased greatly since the flight to Varennes, what alarmed the Assembly most was the desertion of army officers, the Assembly passed two laws in November 1791 declaring non-jurors as suspects and that émigrés who did not return to France would forfeit their property and be regarded as traitors, the King vetoed these laws which decreased his popularity
• The outbreak of Austria on April 1792 prevented the constitution of 1791 from surviving, the war directly led to the fall of the monarchy, civil war and the Terror
• Declaration Of Pillnitz (27 August 1791)


  After the flight to Varennes, the Austrians and Prussians felt that they had to support Louis, it appeared to threaten French internal affairs but did not have much of an impact on the French
• Supporters of the war

  • Marie Antoinette (hoped for France's defeat to regain Louis' old powers)
  • Army commanders like Lafayette and Dumouriez (wanted to increase their prestige and strengthen the Revolution)
  • Brissot (wanted to expose traitors and the King's true colours, hoped it would allow France to extend its revolutionary ideals)
• The Declaration Of War (20 April 1792)

  Austria and Prussia became allies on 7 February 1792, in response the King was forced to dismiss his Feuillant minister in March 1792 and replace them with a more radical government, the new ministers now obeyed the Assembly and not the King, when Austria's monarch died, France decided to declare war on 20 April 1792, they hoped to fight Austria solely but Prussia joined Austria
• Military Crisis


  • The French army was not prepared, over half of its 12,000 officers had emigrated, when France advanced into the Austrian Netherlands on 20 April 1792, they met firm resistance, by the end of May, all three commanders advised that peace should be made, treason and traitors were blamed for France's failures, Marie Antoinette had sent details of French military plans to the Austrians
• Royal Vetoes


  The government had to deal with opposition from refractory priests and counter-revolutionaries, the Girondins passed laws for the deportation of refractory priests, disbanding the King's guard, and setting up a camp of 20,000 National Guards, Louis refused to approve these laws and dismissed the Girondins on 13 June, there was now an expectation of a military coup in support of the King
• The Rise Of The Sans-Culottes


  Leaders of the Paris Sections held an armed demonstration on 20 June 1792 in response, they invaded the Tuileries, many of them part of the National Guard, the Assembly declared a state of emergency in which every Frenchman was called on to fight, in return the sans-culottes would get the vote
• The Fédérés


  • Many were militant revolutionaries and republicans, they became a powerful pressure group calling for the removal of the King, new insurrections were being prepared by radicals and the fédérés, the Girondins changed their stance and tried to prevent the uprisings, Robespierre was cooperating with the central committee of the fédérés and proposed the abandonment of the constitution of 1791, the overthrow of the monarchy, and the establishment of a National Convention elected by universal male suffrage
• The Brunswick Manifesto (1 August 1792)


  The Manifesto was issued by the commander of the Austrian-Prussian armies, its main terms and threats were to restore the liberty of Louis XVI and his family, that the city of Paris set Louis free, and that if the King was harmed, the Austrian-Prussian army would inflict 'an exemplary vengeance' on the city and its citizens, the Manifesto had the opposite effect and infuriated Frenchmen, many who previously supported the monarchy turned against it, the Major of Paris demanded the abolition of the monarchy on behalf of 47 out of the 48 Sections
• The Attack On The Tuileries (10 August 1792)


  On 9 August, the sans-culottes replaced the city council with a revolutionary Commune, on 10 August, several thousand men from the National Guard and 2,000 fédérés marched on the Tuileries, the rebels invaded the Assembly and forced it to recognise the new revolutionary Commune, the deputies had to hand over the King to the Commune, who imprisoned him, they also agreed to the election, by universal male suffrage, of a National Convention that was to draw up a new, democratic constitution
• The Proclamation Of The Republic (22 September 1792)


  Following Louis' overthrow, the constitutional monarchists went into hiding, the Girondins in charge of the Assembly passed several radical measures: refractory priests who did not leave would be deported, abolition of all feudal dues without compensation, on 21-22 September 1792, the monarchy was abolished and the National Convention was proclaimed
• Girondins Versus Jacobins In The Convention

  • In the elections to the Convention, all men over 21 could vote, all who showed royalist sympathies were disenfranchised, many deputies were Jacobins or Girondins, the rest were undecided and were called the Plain, until 2 June 1793, it would be a struggle between the Jacobins and Girondins, the Jacobins were also known as the Montagnards, neither group had a majority, so they had to appeal to the Plain who were bourgeois, at first, the Plain supported the Girondins
• The Trial Of Louis XVI


  The Jacobins wanted to put the King on trial, the sans-culottes wanted him tried and executed, the Girondins wanted to prevent the trial, before voting, Marat suggested that the decision should be reached by appel nominal to expose traitors, the votes came out to be 380 to 310 against the reprieve, Louis XVI was executed on the morning of 21 January 1793, this was the first Jacobin victory and worsened the relationships between the Jacobins and the Girondins
• The impact of war on the course of the Revolution

  In the summer of 1792, the situation of the French armies on the frontier was desperate, panic and fear of betrayal swept the country, Prussians crossed the French frontier and captured Longwy, by the beginning of September, Verdun, the last major fortress on the road to Paris, was about to surrender, the French capital was under immediate threat from enemy forces
• The September Massacres (2-6 September 1792)


  The Commune called on all patriots to take up arms, thousands volunteered to defend the capital and the Revolution, there were growing concerns about counter-revolutionary groups in overcrowded prisons, a rumour started that they were plotting to escape and kill the helpless population, the massacre of prisoners started on 2 September and continued for 5 days, the killers were the sans-culottes of the Sections, the Commune made no attempt to stop them
• The Battle Of Valmy (20 September 1792)


  On 20 September 1792 at Valmy, 52,000 French troops defeated 34,000 Prussians, this was a significant victory, the Prussians retreated to the frontier and the French armies took the offensive, on 19 November 1792, the Convention issued the Decree of Fraternity which promised to spread liberty to all European countries
• The War Of The First Coalition


  The Republican Convention posed a threat to European monarchs, especially the Decree of Fraternity, the Convention unanimously declared war on Britain and the Netherlands on 1 February 1793, between March and September 1793, it seemed France would be at war with most of Europe, the campaign in 1793 began very badly for the French, a French attack against the Netherlands failed, the French commander, Dumouriez, was defeated by the Austrians at Neerwinden in March, following his defeat, he plotted with the Austrians to march on Paris to overthrow the Convention and restore the monarchy, when his army refused to follow him, Dumouriez deserted to the Austrians, once again there was fighting on French soil
• The Vendée Rebellion


  In the winter of 1792-3, the counter-revolution in France had virtually collapsed, the cause of the uprising in the Vendée was the expansion of war and conscription, the government ordered a levy of 300,000 troops in February 1793, this triggered a massive uprising on 11 March 1793, discontent in the Vendée had been present long before 1793, since 1789, peasants had to pay more in tax and were openly hostile towards the Constitution of the Clergy, by May, the government had to withdraw 30,000 troops from the front to deal with it, however, the uprising never posed a serious threat as they were ill-disciplined and were not willing to move far from their local areas
• The economic problems caused by the war added to the government's difficulties, to pay for the war, more assignats were printed, reducing the value of those already in circulation, by February 1793, the purchasing power of the assignats had fallen by 50%, this pushed up the prices of goods which resulted in scarcity and widespread riots
• Of greater concern to the government was the threat of the First Coalition, the Austrians pushed into France while the Spaniards invaded from the South, however, the allies did not coordinate and broke into two, this allowed France to repel the invaders and the Republic was saved