Module 1: The French Revolution and

Napoleon, 1789-1815

Read: History Channel Summary (Link)

Quick Note
In many texts, Pre-Revolutionary France is called the " ancien régime"
referring to the political system that gradually evolved out of the
decentralization of the Roman Empire. So if you see that term, it only
means Pre-Revolutionary France.

Back to the Revolution

Influences:
It is important to understand that the Revolution had diverse influences
that helped to shape its trajectory.

Influence: The Enlightenment

(Ben Franklin pictured here is a perfect example of a
Philosophe. He was interested in the natural sciences, read
and spoke several languages, authored newspaper articles,
books and a best-selling Poor Richard's Almanac. Franklin
aslo helped edit the Declaration of Independence was a
long-time politician and a master of publicity.)
The Enlightenment was an intellectual movement that stressed Reason.
Enlightenment figures generally were critical of the Medieval Church
which they argued had been a barrier toward the pursuit of knowledge.
They looked back to the Greco-Roman traditions for inspiration as ancient
thinkers had sought to find solutions to problems based upon reasonable
observation. The Enlightenment was concerned with all types of
intellectual inquiry, and Philosophes (or Enlightenment thinkers) were
often interested in many fields. Philsophes often met at Salons or
parties that stressed intellectual culture and debate.

(A Salon)

Women played key roles as hostesses of Salons and some were involved in
the new forms of intellectual activity. One of the favored forms of
philosophy was in the realm of political theory. Philosophes gradually
began to construct the ideology of classical liberalism that emphasized
human equality, natural rights and private property rights. They argued
that such a system was based upon logic and the necessity of human
progress. Generically, we can think of this as a gradual development of
Democratic thought.
Influence: The American Revolution
Not only did the American Revolution provide an example of how a
democratic society might be organized; it also helped set the
preconditions for the French Revolution. Hoping to fight the British
through the American colonists, the French King had loaned great sums of
money to the fledgling American government. After the war's conclusion,
the American government (under the Articles of Confederation) had no
funds to repay the French King, leaving Louis XVI flat broke.

Understanding Pre-Revolutionary France

(Louis XVI, King of France during the Revolution was probably less tyrannical than
earlier French Kings)

The French Social System

Be sure that you can identify the three classes of French Society and
their social, economic and political roles in Pre-Revolutionary France.
First Estate: Clergy
Second Estate: The Nobility
Third Estate: Everyone else, from professional to peasants.
Industrialists, merchants, bankers, and professional are generally
referred to as The Bourgeoisie.
- This term basically means Middle-Class
- Will merge with "Enlightened" elements of the Nobility to form the
Bourgeois Class. They will control the Revolutionary government

The French social system was in place in much of Europe-although with

regional variations. It had emerged in the wake of Roman collapse (circa
500s) and crystallized during the medieval period.

The Evolution of the Revolution

Stage One: Estates General to National Assembly (1789-92)
During this period, the bourgeoisie were in firm control of the
Revolution. Their goal was simply to gain political rights for their social
class and to institute a Constitutional Monarchy. Ultimately, Paris
citizens and the rural peasants would push the Revolution into far more
radical change than the Middle-Classes had intended.

In order to garner support for financial reforms and to placate the nobles Louis XVI
summoned the Estates General, a representative body made of the three estates
(clergy, nobility, and middle class) to meet May 5, 1789.

Overtime, as the proceedings were stalled the middle class adopted the name the
National Assembly. Liberal nobles and many clerical representatives joined the NA
with time. King Louis the XVI eventually consolidated the 3 representative branches
into a single National Assembly

 Oath of the Tennis Court

This pact was made by the NA (before the consolidation of the branches), in
which they vowed not to disperse until constitutional reform had been achieved

 The intervention of the common people and the Fall of the Bastille

Note: The Bastille was not all that important as an actual arsenal or jail
(it was an antiquated structure by Revolutionary times). It was far more
important as a symbol of the King’s arbitrary power to put people into
jail. As such, when the common people took control of the Bastille, they
illustrated their new-found power of the King.

 Peasant Rebellions and the Great Fear

Note: Peasants sought to push the Revolution farther than the
Bourgeoisie desired. They had long suffered under exploitive systems of
taxation and manorialism (Political, economic, and social system by which
the peasants of medieval Europe were tied to their land and their lord
through serfdom) and sought to gain ownership of land at the expense of
the Nobility and the Church.
The Bourgeoisie, on the other hand, wanted to uphold private property.
As primarily a business class (and with considerable wealth) the
Bourgeoisie feared the radicalism of land appropriation by peasants.

 Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen

Adopted by the National Constituent Assembly - proclaimed the Assembly’s commitment

to replace the ancien régime with a system based on equal opportunity, freedom of speech,
popular sovereignty and representative government.

 Olympe de Gouges and the Declaration of the Rights of Women

This work parallels the one for men (Man and Citizen), thus criticizing the deputies for having
forgotten women. She addressed the pamphlet to the Queen, Marie Antoinette, though she also
warned the Queen that she must work for the Revolution or risk destroying the monarchy
altogether. In her postscript she denounced the customary treatment of women as objects easily
abandoned. She appended to the declaration a sample form for a marriage contract that called for
communal sharing of property. De Gouges went to the guillotine in 1793, condemned as a
counterrevolutionary and denounced as an "unnatural" woman.

 Decline of the Catholic Church (Civil Constitution of 1790)

Made the Church a department of the State, effectively removing it from papal authority

 Declaration of Pillnitz

Pilnitz organized Conservative monarchies against the Revolution in France.

Stage Two: The Revolution Turns to the Left
(Radical)
(Robespierre is notorious for his attempts to purge the Revolution of traitors during
the Reign of Terror)

 Girondins vs. Jacobins (Moderate/Conservative vs. radical)

 The Paris Commune

Government of Paris from 1789 until 1795. Established after

the storming of the Bastille, it consisted of 144 delegates
elected by the 48 divisions of the city. The Paris Commune
became insurrectionary in the summer of 1792, essentially
refusing to take orders from the central French government.
It took charge of routine civic functions but is best known for
mobilizing extreme views and actions among the people
and sponsoring the September Massacres of over 1000
priests and other prisoners, and for its campaign to de-
christianize the churches and the people. It lost much power
in 1794 and was replaced in 1795

 Committee of Public Safety

 Maximillien Robespierre & the Jacobins

 The Reign of Terror

the guillotine -a new technology- was used freely

10-month period in which suspected enemies of the revolution were guillotined

by the thousands. Many of the killings were carried out under orders from
Robespierre, who dominated the draconian Committee of Public Safety until
his own execution on July 28, 1794.

 Republic of Virtue
  Toussaint L’Ouveture and the Fall of French Colonial Slavery. The
ideologies of freedom once unleashed were powerful. Slavery was
banned in France in 1791, although the planters in the French West
Indies tried to hold out. Eventually, (1794) slavery was banned
there as well. But in Haiti, slaves led by Toussaint L'Ouvetue would
rebel and eventually led a successful revolt.

 Mass Conscription Army: The Declaration of Pilnitz organized

Conservative monarchies against the Revolution in France. In
response to this threat on all borders, the Revolutionary
government introduced conscription (draft) and formed the first
mass army. Formerly, armies had been of professional soldiers,
many of them from the nobility. In the French system peasants
became soldiers and the entire nation mobilized for war. This was
the beginnings of the modern system of warfare.

 Thermidorian Reaction: In the month of Thermidor (July) the

Revolution went through its final upheaval with a move toward the
Right. Robespierre was executed.

Stage Three: The Directory

The Directory, a slightly conservative coalition of five political

leaders made almost no one in France happy. When Napoleon overthrew
the Directory in 1799, few mourned its passing.

Gracchus Babeuf: A communist, Babeuf scorned the Revolutionary gains

and sought to implement a society composed entirely of equals. Babeuf
would be an inspiration to 19th century Utopian Socialists, Communists
(including Marx and Engels) and Anarchists.
 Napoleonic Era

The Napoleonic Era (1799-1814)

Napoleon Bonaparte changed the face of Europe like no other ruler
before him. He carved out a European Empire for France that rivaled the
ancient Roman Empire. He claimed to be furthering the Revolution, yet he
reintroduced the nobility. Democracy more or less died during his reign,
yet Napoleon had great domestic successes-arguably more than the
Revolution. While a military genius who would dominate military theory
and practice for a century, ultimately, he was undone by his vanity. The
master of Europe, but unable to control his promiscuous wife Josephine,
Napoleon is a study in contrasts.

Napoleon Bonaparte came to power via coup against the Directory.

Extremely ambitious, Napoleon sought to carve out an Empire in Europe
and he used the French mass army to achieve his aims. His reign saw the
intensification of French Nationalism.

(Source: http://nersp.nerdc.ufl.edu/~malavet/comparat/notes/napoleon.gif)
(Napoleon enraged Italian and German states by placing his relatives on
hereditary thrones)
(Napoleon's wife Josephine, who he would discard after she (in reality ‘he’) failed to
produce a heir)

Napoleon's key successes were:

 Concordat with the Catholic Church (1801)

Reestablished the Roman Catholic Church in France, but stated that it was
not the official state religion, maintaining freedom of religion.

 Code Napoleon - Napoleonic Code

Written in the vernacular, it stressed clearly written and accessible law, and was inspired
by Justinian's sixth-century codification of Roman law. The code forbade privileges
based on birth, allowed freedom of religion, and specified that government jobs should
go to the most qualified.

Bureaucratic reform

 Spread of some Revolutionary principles

Napoleon's Main failures were:

 Growing despotism - crowns himself Emperor in 1804

 Unable to control his Dependent and Allied States

 Great Britain and his defeat at Trafalgar

 Continental System: Napoleon hoped to isolate Great Britain’s

economic power. He insisted upon a trade system that barred
British goods in the French Empire. Opposition to this policy helped
to revive overall resistance to French tyranny.

Nationalism and Napoleon’s Downfall

Napoleon’s French Empire was built on French nationalism. Ironically,
Nationalism also led to his downfall. When his fleet lost to British
Admiral Lord Nelson at Trafalgar in 1805, France's greatest enemy would
remain beyond Napoleon's grasp. Other nation states began to invest in
their own historical identities and opposition to Napoleon intensified
after 1810. When Russia stopped participating in the Continental System,
Napoleon decided to invade. His Grand Army of more than 600,000 men
(keep in mind that the current US Army numbers about 250,000 troops!)
invaded Russia. The Russian Army used a ‘scorched Earth’ retreat (not
unlike the method they would later use against Hitler) in which they
destroyed all potential supplies drawing the Grand Army deeper and
deeper into the Russian frozen hinterland. Napoleon retreated, but by
the time he arrived in Poland, only 40,000 French troops remained.
Napoleon was ultimately defeated and exiled to Elba, a small Island-where
he remained the nominal ruler.

Why didn’t the Conservative Allies just kill Napoleon? The

Conservative powers hated patricide or the killing of a king. Rather than
continue the practice of killing nobility, the Conservatives merely sought
to isolate and humiliate the former French Emperor.

The 100 Days

Napoleon escaped his imprisonment on Elba with 1,000 troops. He staged
a dramatic march through the Alps and returned eventually to Paris
forcing the restored Bourbon King to flee. Again the Conservative Allies
gathered and they defeated Napoleon for the final time at the battle of
Waterloo in 1815. Napoleon would die in exile in the South Atlantic in
1821.

Conclusions
The French Revolution marked the beginning of a period when European
Liberals would struggle against Conservatives for political power. It also
gave birth to the “isms” of Nationalism, Communism, and Socialism. These
ideologies would dominate the 19th century political landscape. The
Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen symbolized European’s
growing interest in Civil and Human Rights. On the other hand, the
Napoleonic era introduced Europeans to a new form of dictatorial rule
disguised as a legacy of the Revolution. Nevertheless, the French
Revolution should be understood as a moment when personal rule by a
monarch was overthrown by the Will of the People.