French+Revolution

Keith Harness

Outline the French Revolution from the formation of the National Assembly to Napoleon.


 * Drew inspiration from Enlightenment political thought.
 * Wanted to get rid of ancien regime "the old order" and sought to replace it with new political, social, and cultural structures.
 * Needed more money from taxes, but peasants were already overburdened, so King Louis XVI taxed the French nobility, which had previously been exempted from many taxes.
 * Nobles wouldn't stand for bing taxed and forced the Estates General to assemble.
 * Estates General- three classes(first estate- Roman Catholic clergy) (Second estate- Nobles) (Third Estate-Rest of the population)
 * Third estate called for political and social reform, but the first and second estate kept them from pushing things through.
 * Third Estate seceded from the Estates General. Declared themselves the National Assembly.
 * Violent protests and movements soon erupted.
 * National Assembly forced political and social reform. They also wrote The Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen which proclaimed the equality of all men, declared that sovereignty resided in the people, and asserted individual rights to liberty, property, and security.
 * Assembly abolished the feudal system along with the many fees and labor services that peasants owed to their landlords. Permanently altered the role of the church taking away a lot of its power.
 * France became a constitutional monarchy.
 * Other world powers invaded and tried to reestablish the ancien regime, and caused the Convention to form as a response and proclaimed France a republic.
 * Guillotine put into practice.
 * Jacobines unleashed a rain of terror and took more power away from the churches and promoted a new cult of reason as a secular alternative to Christianity.
 * Changed seven day weeks to ten day units.
 * Gave more right to women.
 * The instability of revolutionary leadership eventually undermined confidence in the regime itself. A group of conservative men of property soon seized power and ruled France under a new institution known as the Directory.
 * Directory leaders couldn't solve the economic and military problems
 * Soon Napoleon Bonaparte staged a coup and seized power.