HISTORY

Subject : History
(For under graduate
student)

Paper No. : Paper-VI

History of Modern Europe

Unit No. & Title : Unit-1

Europe between 1780 & 1871

Lecture No. & Title : Lecture-12

Restoration and Revolution in
France

Subhas Ranjan Chakraborty, Asstt. Prof. (Rtd.), Presidency College, Kolkata

SUMMARY

The defeat and exile of Napoleon led to the Restoration of

the Bourbons on the throne of France. The restored
Bourbons, Louis XVIII and Charles X, ruled France from
1815 to 1830, when the July Revolution led to the final
overthrow of the Bourbons.
A quarter century of revolutionary change had
transformed France and this meant that Louis had the
difficult task of virtually ruling over two peoples: those
who supported the Revolution and those who returned
with him and were against it. He had started by giving
his people a Charter which recognized some of the
fundamental rights: equality of all before law; freedom
from arbitrary arrest; freedom of conscience and
confirmation of property rights acquired during the
Revolution. But while the Royalists believed that the
Charter was a gift of the king and could be withdrawn by
him, the opponents argued that the Charter was imposed
on the king by his people. Richelieu who assumed the
reins of government in September, 1815, introduced a
‘legal terror’. A series of emergency laws was introduced
suspending individual freedom and setting up courts for
summary trial, against whose judgement there could be
no appeal. Clerical control over education was re-
established. The situation ultimately proved to be
embarrassing for Louis and he was persuaded to dissolve
the chamber order fresh elections.
The importance of Louis was that he tried to reconcile the
Revolution with the Restoration. By the time he died, the
policy of reconciliation had been abandoned. The
portending conflict took place under his successor,
Charles X. The responsibilities of the king of France failed
to sober Charles X, and his determination to restore the
ancient regime in all its glory led to the July Revolution
and the overthrow of the Bourbons in 1830. It is possible
to divide his reign into three phases. The first was under
Villele (1824-28) which witnessed the first advance of
royalism, the second when Martignac (1828-29) was
the Prime minister was the retreat of royalism and the
third under Polignac (1829-30) that saw the second
advance and defeat of royalism.

Charles X decided to invoke Article 14 of the Charter, and

promulgated four Ordinances. This was the signal for
unrest in France. Resistance was organized and
journalists and liberals, led by Thiers, drew up a protest
in the office of Le National. The closing of the workshops
led to popular protests and the two seemed to merge.
The leadership quickly passed to the hands of the
republicans. By the 30th July 1830 the republican
agitators rallied to the candidature of Louis Philippe, the
Duke of Orleans as the next constitutional ruler of
France. The Charter was no longer a grant of the king; it
was imposed on the king. Article14, which gave the king
extraordinary powers, was removed. Censorship was
abolished and Catholicism was simply recognized as the
religion of the majority of Frenchmen. The Chamber was
given more powers.

The new regime, however, was far from democratic. A

majority of Frenchmen expected the revolution to extend
the social basis of the political life in France. The
republicans considered the installation of monarchy as an
act of betrayal. The Legitimists wanted the Bourbons to
continue. Another political movement that went against
the regime was the rise of socialism (of the Utopian
variety). Proudhon, Saint Simon, Fourier, Louis Blanc
brought into focus the misery of the new working class,
Another group that went against the regime were the
Bonapartists led by Napoleon’s nephew, Louis Bonaparte.
After 1846 there was uneasiness in France with a food
crisis and a crisis in the financial system. The social and
economic distress was compounded by a crisis of
confidence that touched politics and governance. The
cumulative result of the crisis was the crystallization of
opposition which ultimately led to the February
Revolution of 1848, and the establishment of the Second
Republic.

OBJECTIVE

The students will be able to:

 Learn about the politics of France following the
Restoration
 Know why the July monarchy failed to survive
 Comprehend the causes that led to the February
Revolution of 1848 in France

ASSIGNMENT

1. What were the political developments in France after

the Restoration of 1815?
 2. Why were the regimes of Louis XVIII and Charles X
unpopular?
3. Trace the events that led to Louis Philippe, the Duke
of Orleans becoming the ruler of France.
4. What were the major political groups in France in the
post-July Revolution phase, and what were their
demands?
5. Trace the events that led to the establishment of the
Second Republic in France.

GLOSSARY

1. Restoration – The term used to indicate the

arrangement of the Congress of Vienna to give the throne
of France to Louis XVIII of the Bourbon family.

2. Louis XVIII - Louis XVIII succeeded his nephew, Louis

XVII, as titular King, when the latter died in prison in
June 1795. When the coalition armies captured Paris
from Napoleon in 1814, Louis XVIII was restored to the
throne.
3. Charles X
A younger brother to Kings Louis XVI and Louis XVIII.
Ruled first as the Comte d'Artois, then as King of
France and of Navarre from September 1824 until
the July Revolution in 1830,

4. Decazes
A lawyer and judge; served as Prime Minister of
France from November 1819 to February 20, 1820.

5. Cardinal Duc de Richelieu-

A French statesman. An émigré from the French
Revolution, he served as chief minister of France under
King Louis XVIII; secured the quick payment by France
of the indemnity imposed by the Treaty of Paris (1815)
and thus hastened the evacuation of occupation troops.
In his domestic policy, Richelieu favoured leniency toward
the ex-revolutionists and Bonapartists, thus displeasing
the ultra-royalists headed by the king's brother, the
Comte d'Artois.
6. Comte deVillele-
Jean Baptiste Séraphin Joseph, (1773–1854), French
statesman and premier (1822–28). Elected in 1815 as a
deputy after the Bourbon restoration, he became leader
of the ultra-royalists in the chamber of deputies. He
entered the ministry of the Duc de Richelieu in 1820, and
in 1822 King Louis XVIII named him president of the
council, or premier.

7. Adolphe Thiers
A liberal who believed in the sovereignty of the people.
He played an active role in the July revolution; supported
Louis-Philippe when he came to power, and became
Minister of the Interior and then Minister of Agriculture
and Trade. He was in permanent opposition with
legitimists, republicans and the supporters of Bonaparte.

8. Utopian Socialists
The early socialist thinkers like Saint Simon, Charles
Fourier and Louis Blanc, who thought in idealistic terms
of improving the conditions of workers.

9. Jules de Polignac
A French statesman; an ultra-royalist who was appointed
to the ministry of foreign affairs in1829 by Charles X;
effectively one of the most powerful politician in France.

10. François Pierre Guillaume Guizot (1787-1874)

A French historian, orator, and statesman; a dominant
figure in French politics prior to the Revolution of 1848, a
liberal who actively opposed the reactionary King Charles
X before his overthrow in the July Revolution of 1830;
served the “citizen king” Louis Philippe, as the Minister
of Education,

QUIZ

1. The King of France after the Restoration was

A) Louis XVI B) Louis Philippe C) Louis XVIII

2. The dynasty that ruled France from 1815-1830 was

A) Bonapartist B) Bourbon C) Romanov
3. The Comte d’Artois was the
A) Brother of Louis XVIII B) Nephew of Louis
Philippe C) Son of Louis XVIII

4. To which political group did Polignac belong?

A) Legitimists B) Republicans C) Ultra-royalists

6. Who was known as the citizen king?

A) Charles X B) Louis Philippe C) Napoleon

7. Which of the following was a Utopian Socialist?

A) Saint Simon B) Marx C) Adolphe Thiers

8. The remains of Napoleon Bonaparte were preserved

at the
A) Champs de Elysee B) Louvre C) Invalides

9. Martignac was a
A) Democrat B) Moderate royalist C)
Republican

10. The revolution of 1848 in France took place in

the month of
A) February B) March C) July
 FAQ

1. What does Restoration mean?

Restoration is a term used to signify the return of the
Bourbons to the throne of France following the
deliberations at the Congress of Vienna in 1815. The
Bourbons had been removed from power following the
guillotine of Louis XVI during the French Revolution.

2. What do you know about the mortal remains of

Napoleon Bonaparte?
Napoleon Bonaparte has lived in the memory of most
French people as a hero. His mortal remains were
brought from the island of St Helena to France, and
buried in the Hôtel des Invalides in Paris in 1840, on
the initiative of Adolphe Thiers and King Louis-Philippe.

3. What was the Invalides?

The Musée de L'Armée at Les Invalides was originally

built by Louis XIV as a hospital and home for disabled
soldiers. It now houses the tomb of Napoleon and the
 museum of the Army of France. The famous architect
Ludovico Visconti designed a circular crypt without a
ceiling, so that it is possible to view it from ground
level. Napoleon’s sarcophagus stands in the middle on
a granite pedestal.

4. When and where was the Duc de Berry murdered?

On February 13, 1820, Charles Ferdinand Duc

de Berry, the nephew of Louis XVI, and the son of the
Comte d’Artois, was murdered on the steps of the Paris
Opera while helping his pregnant wife into a carriage,
by a madman.

5. What were the significant developments that took

place just before the death of Louis XVIII?
Villele took an extremely reactionary stance when the
radical and Bonapartist risings rocked France. He
reintroduced censorship and summary trial, tightened
clerical control over education and introduced a law to
compensate the émigrés nobility. France even sent an
army to Spain to quell a liberal uprising. At this juncture
Louis died and was succeeded by his brother, Comte
d’Artois, who became king as Charles X.

6. What sort of attitude did Charles X have about his

position?
The responsibilities of the king of France failed to sober
him, and he was determined to restore the ancient
regime in all its glory. It was this dogmatic attitude that
led to the July Revolution and the overthrow of the
Bourbons in 1830.

7. How can the different phases of Charles X’s reign be

classified?
It is possible to divide the reign into three phases,- a)
under Villele (1824-28)-the first advance of royalism; b)
under Martignac (1828-29) -the retreat of royalism and
c). under Polignac (1829-30) - the second advance and
defeat of royalism.

8.Why was Villele unpopular ?

Villele was extremely unpopular on account of the
reactionary and repressive measures he enforced. Most
of the political groups in France like the republicans,
Bonapartists, socialists and even some royalists wished
to end his sway. At the following elections he was
defeated.

9. What were some of the significant changes introduced

during the reign of Louis Philippe?
The Charter was no longer regarded as a grant of the
king; it was imposed on the king. Article14, which gave
the king extraordinary powers, was removed. Censorship
was abolished and Catholicism was recognized as the
religion of the majority of Frenchmen. The Chamber was
given more powers. Voting age was reduced to 25 and
one could be a Deputy at the age of 30. The franchise
was extended to include about 200,000 people. In 1832,
the National Guard was permitted to elect its own
officers. The tricolour was adopted once more as the flag
of France. Another special legislation was Guizot’s law on
primary education .It was stipulated that every commune
must have a primary school.

10 What were the ‘dinner banquets’?

In 1847, frustrated in their efforts to pass changes
through normal legislative means and forbidden by law
from holding political meetings, opposition leaders
organized dinner parties to promote the cause of reform.
Seventy banquets were held over the course of the
winter, attended by members of the parliamentary
opposition and republicans who accepted the institution
of the constitutional monarchy.

-----------------------------------------------------------
HISTORY

Subject : History
(For under graduate
student)

Paper No. : Paper-VI

History of Modern Europe

Unit No. & Title : Unit-1

Europe between 1780 & 1871

Lecture No. & Title : Lecture-12

Restoration and Revolution in
France

Transcript

RESTOTRATION AND REVOLUTION:

1815-1848 IN FRANCE

The final defeat and exile of Napoleon, led to the

restoration of the Bourbons to the throne of France. Louis
XVIII and after him Charles X returned after the defeat of
Napoleon, and became the king of France. They ruled
France from 1815 to 1830 when the July Revolution led
to the final overthrow of the Bourbons. Louis had some
excellent kingly virtues as Guizot had said, - some
negative and some positive. Louis knew that he had the
difficult task of virtually ruling over two groups of French
- those who had supported the Revolution, and those
against. He therefore, followed a policy of reconciliation.
The real significance of Louis lay in his failure. By the
time he died, the policy of reconciliation had been
abandoned. A quarter century of revolution and warfare
had indeed transformed France, and it would have been
extremely difficult to achieve a social restoration to the
structure before 1789. For that matter even royal
absolutism would have been extremely difficult to be
effectively established. Therefore Louis had virtually
started by having a Charter whereby he granted the
people some of the basic liberties that the French had
enjoyed after the revolution. But there was a difference
in the approach of the French to the Charter. A majority
of believed that the Charter was imposed by the people
on the King, while the royalists argued that the Charter
had been a free gift of the king, and could be withdrawn
if he so desired. In a way the Charter defined the new
regime as a constitutional monarchy.
The Charter stipulated that there would be an elected
Lower House or the Chamber of Deputies, and a House of
Peers that would be nominated. The deputies were to be
elected on the basis of restricted, property-based
franchise. The deputies had to be over forty and had to
pay a thousand francs in direct taxation, while the
electors had to be over thirty and pay a tax of three
hundred francs. About 90,000 people thus constituted the
pays legal. The Charter also granted certain liberties like
equality of all before law, freedom from arbitrary arrest,
freedom of conscience and confirmation of property
rights. The confirmation of the right to property was
especially significant as it constituted the confirmation of
a right which had been acquired in course of the
revolutionary quarter century,- both under revolution and
under Napoleon At a level the position of various groups
of politicians and people in relation to the Charter defined
their position. To the right of the Charter were the ultra-
royalists, a group which believed in absolute monarchy,
which made them want to make the restoration a full-
fledged restoration of the old order, and was led by the
king’s brother, Comte d’Artois. The constitutional party
for whom the Charter symbolized the sheet anchor of the
regime, stood firmly behind it, and was led by men like
Decazes and Richelieu. To the left of the Charter stood a
motley crowd, which included liberals, republicans and
even the enemies of the regime, who generally believed
that it needed to be transformed into a more liberal, and
more democratic one. This group included men like
Casimir Perier, Laffitte, and Benjamin Constant.
The regime started in an atmosphere of hope, when Louis
granted general amnesty to his people. But what followed
has sometimes been called the ‘white terror’ and it
indeed matched the worst excesses of the terror during
the revolution. Nineteen generals were court martialled
and this including Ney, who had been described as the
bravest of the brave. The elections were held in this kind
of an atmosphere characterized virtually by a civil war in
the countryside between the supporters of the revolution,
and those who had returned with Louis and were seeking
to re-win their prerogatives and privileges. The elections
returned the moderates to power. Richelieu who led the
government now, was willing to adopt a policy of
reconciliation, and to try to bring about some recovery in
France. Indeed from 1816 to about 1840, France was
ruled with moderate success by Richelieu and then
Decazes. The huge indemnity was paid off, the army of
occupation left France, and it seemed France was on its
way to recovery. France was readmitted as one of the
major European powers, when the Quadruple Alliance
was enlarged into the Quintuple Alliance by 1818. In a
situation like this when a man like Abbe Gregoire was
elected, the ultras picked up a terrific row, and the
election had to be set aside. This revealed that the ultras
were trying to make themselves heard, and were
becoming active in French politics. Richelieu was obliged
to resign, and was followed by Decazes. But the real
turning point came with the murder of Duc de Berry, the
younger son of Comte d’Artois, the younger brother of
Louis XVIII. The ultras now pressurized Louis into
adopting a fairly ultra royalist stance. Decazes was a
talented administrator and he tried to introduce reforms,
like opening up the society, and removing censorship.
But his hands were very seriously tied, and he was
obliged to resign, Richelieu, now leaning more to the
right, became the minister. He suspended individual
freedom, freedom of the press, and introduced what was
called the double vote, or the process of setting electoral
districts, in order to establish a political advantage for a
particular party or group by manipulating geographic
boundaries to create partisan, incumbent-protected
districts. This provided leverage to the ultras who were
now able to return in larger numbers to the chamber. But
Richelieu found the going very hard, and was replaced by
Villele, a candidate of the ultras. Villele started adopting
a fairly reactionary policy. What helped Villele take this
stance, was the radical and Bonapartist risings which
rocked France. He reintroduced censorship and summary
trial, Clerical control over education was tightened and a
law was introduced to compensate the émigrés nobility.
At this juncture Louis died, and was succeeded by his
brother, Comte d’Artois, who became king as Charles X.
Charles X ruled France from 1824 to 1830. He had some
virtues, and could probably have been a good and
effective king but his antecedents and opinions prevented
him from being so. He was a die-hard ultra royalist, one
of his characteristic sayings being that he would have
preferred to chop wood than be the King of England. The
events of Charles’ reign can be seen under the three
successive ministers, Villele from 1824 to 29 which
witnessed the first advance of royalism. Then under
Martignac (1828-29), the retreat of royalism and finally
during Polignac’s term from 1829-30, the second
advance and defeat
of royalism. What Charles and his ministers did was to
gradually bring back the old order. First of all they passed
a legislation deciding to pay a huge compensation to the
émigrés. Interest on national debt was reduced to help
the government pay compensation. This affected the
people, particularly the middle class who had invested in
government bonds. Secondly they decided to return the
prerogatives and privileges to the clergy and church.
Clerical control over education was tightened, and indeed
the clergy became so powerful that it was later quipped
by Wellington that it had become a government by the
clergy, through the clergy and for the clergy. It became
increasingly clear that Charles and his ministers aimed
not just at absolutist monarchy but at bringing the entire
old order back to France in all its glory.
In response to mounting criticism, Villele dissolved the
Chamber and ordered fresh elections. The result was a
clear verdict against Villele, who resigned. Martignac now
led a group of moderate royalists. His task was difficult.
He adopted a conciliatory policy and took a position
against the priests. He failed to satisfy anybody and had
to resign in August, 1829 after a parliamentary reverse.
Then came Polignac, a personal friend of the king. He
announced his determination to ‘reorganize society, to
give back the clergy its weight in state affairs, to create a
powerful aristocracy and to surround it with privileges.’
Soon after he had come to power, the Liberals had been
making some forays into the Chamber of Deputies.
Twenty-one deputies submitted a petition and raised the
question of ministerial responsibility. They said that
Polignac did not have the support of the majority and
should resign. What Charles did was to prorogue the
Chamber and then dissolve it and order fresh elections.
The fresh elections in July returned two hundred and
seventy four Liberal deputies. Their numbers had indeed
increased, and it was expected that there was still a
possibility of a compromise. What Charles did not realize
was that the majority of the well-to-do bourgeoisie
deputies would be unwilling to open the flood gates for
popular movements to overtake them once more as they
did in 1792 and 1795. Charles adopted the hard line and
invoked Article 14 of the Charter and went on to
introduce four ordinances whereby he suspended the
freedom of the press, dissolved the Chamber, changed
the electoral law and asked for new elections. The
moment the ordinances were promulgated, the battle
lines were drawn. From 27th July onwards, consultations
were going on in the newspaper offices and journalists
and Liberals played a significant role in opposing the
ordinances. In the office of the Tribune, they were
preparing for a showdown. The people of Paris were once
again on the roads prepared to fight the government.
Marmont, the commandant of the troops in Paris, was
still in control of the situation; but on the 28 th, trying to
take the offensive against the barricades which had been
put up, he lost the eastern districts and fell back on
Tuileries. On the 29th, he gave orders for retreat. In the
meantime, the deputies had intervened, alarmed at the
strength of the popular movement. At Guizot’s
suggestion, Lafayette was appointed the commandant of
the Municipal Guards. A Municipal Commission of five
members was set up. By the 30th, faced with growing
republican agitation, they rallied to the candidature of
Louis Philippe, the Duke of Orleans, proposed by Thiers.
Louis Philippe, the Duke of Orleans, appeared beside
Lafayette on the balcony of the Hotel de Ville, or the
Town Hall, and promised to surround his throne with
‘republican institutions.’
The July Revolution had taken place and the Bourbons
finally fell from power. A middle-class bourgeoisie
monarchy of Louis Philippe was inaugurated in France
and lasted till 1848.

Louis Philippe ruled France from 1815 to 1848 and indeed

presented a different image altogether. The new king of
France was a citizen king chosen by his people. He was
everything a liberal ruler was expected to be in France in
1830, - middle-class, respectable and unspectacular. The
image he presented was that of a middle-class king, with
his top hat and a rolled umbrella in his hand, and his
tailcoat. His period was characterized by the domination
of the higher bourgeoisie in France. A change that one
notices immediately after the inauguration of this
monarchy was that the Charter was no longer even
claimed to have been a free grant of the king. He started
by accepting the Charter as virtually the Constitution of
the regime. Article 14 which gave emergency and
extraordinary powers to the king was withdrawn, and it
was followed by a further expansion of the electorate.
The Chamber was given more powers. Voting age was
reduced to twenty-five and one could be a Deputy at the
age of thirty. Now the electorate comprised 200,000
people. The property qualification was also somewhat
modified. The National Guard was reconstituted, and
given the right to elect its own officers. More importantly,
the tricolour was accepted as the flag of the new regime.
The tricolour was the flag of the Revolution, and so this
was a gesture that honoured the Revolution, It was
symbolically very significant as it meant that the regime
had started by paying tribute to the memory of the
Revolution. Over the next eighteen years, the Revolution
came to mean the Republican Revolution rather than the
Moderate Revolution of 1789.
Another significant legislation was Guizot’s law on
primary education, according to which it was stipulated
that every municipality must have a primary school. This
led to a growth in primary education, and consequently a
growth in the number of reading public. By the 1840s
there were many more people in France who could read
and who could directly or indirectly receive the new ideas
which tended to celebrate the Republic and the
Republican memory.
Recent French historians have noticed that between 1830
and 1848, there had been a significant rise in Republican
sentiments. Henri Cuillemin has called the revolution of
1848 the first resurrection of the republic. Indeed the
evolution of mentalities over the next two decades would
explain this rise of republicanism. The revolution of 1789
was compatible with the consulate phase of Napoleon.
With Louis Philippe what was brought back into memory
was the abortive constitution of 1793. This was a period
when even the Jacobin phase or the so-called terror also
gained a certain legitimacy. After 1830, the old
republicans, even Jacobins, thus gradually returned to
open public life. Their political role during the revolution
and their collective memory influenced the younger
generation. Some of the early acts of the July regime
buttressed this mentality. Delacroix painted the ‘Liberty
leading the people’; Hugo or Alfred de’Vigny, represented
the age of revolutionary romanticism. Romanticism which
was conservative, even reactionary in the beginning of
the century with men like Chateaubriand representing the
more conservative hue, now acquired a revolutionary
value. In the 1840s came the histories- Jules Michelet
and Louis Blanc’s History of the Revolution, Lamartine’s
History of the Grenadines and Esquiros’s History of the
Mountains. All these celebrated the republic and the
Revolution came to be associated with the republic
established in 1792. George Sand introduced an entirely
new, perhaps a more radical social and political
sensibility. All this tended to valourize and celebrate the
more radical phase of the Revolution and the Republic.
This period also witnessed the gradual growth of
Socialism, particularly the utopian variety. Utopian
Socialist thinkers like Proudhon, Saint Simon, Fourier,
and Louis Blanc brought into focus the misery of the new
working class. The result of the industrial revolution was
being gradually felt and these men tried to highlight the
negative socio-economic results of the economic
changes. Socialism was therefore becoming a factor in
French politics. Another group called the Bonapartists, led
by Napoleon’s nephew, Louis Napoleon wrote a book that
contained the basic Bonapartist ideas. They wanted to
use the memory of the emperor to buttress their political
power in France. Indeed by 1839, the remains of
Bonaparte were brought from St. Helena and installed
with pomp in the building known as Invalides and a
monument was erected in his memory.
The political developments may be divided into three
phases. 1830 to 1836 constituted the phase of acute
disturbances, there were working-class disturbances and
the government resorted to some force to quell them.
From 1836 to 46, France was ruled with relative ease
mainly by Guizot, who was in power for a very long time,
though there were some setbacks in the sphere of foreign
policy. The third and last phase was from 1846 to 48
which was characterized with a great and general crisis
not just in France but the whole of Europe. The
opponents of the regime had decided to organize ‘reform
banquets’ to hoodwink the government. When even the
banquets were banned, people took to the streets and
familiar scenes of barricades and street fighting were
witnessed. When the surge of revolutionary wave became
unmanageable, Louis had to abdicate and France once
again became a republic with Lamartine, the famous poet
as the acting President France became a Republic once
more. The government even included Albert, a member
of the working-class. The crisis of the July monarchy had
been economic, social, and political but there was also a
crisis in the governing classes. Some recent historians
have tried to understand it in psychological terms. The
confidence of the ruling classes had also been
undermined by the spectre of a popular revolution
emerging once more. Lamartine called it a Revolution of
public conscience and a Revolution of contempt,-
contempt for the bourgeois domination. The crisis was
compounded also by a moral crisis among the governing
classes, but the totality of the crisis really did not allow
the July Monarchy to survive and therefore the February
Revolution of 1848 ultimately consumed Louis Philippe’s
July Monarchy which had witnessed the predomination of
the higher bourgeoisie in France and led to yet another
revolution which produced the Second Republic in France.
……………………………………………………………
x………………………………………………………………..