CHAPTER 19 NOTES

: France lost the Seven Years’ War, and was in debt.

: Supported the American revolt against Great Britian. This put them deeper in debt.

: The problem lay w/ the inability of the royal gov’t to tap the wealth of the French nation through taxes to service and repay debt. Paradoxically France was a rich nation w/ an impoverished gov’t.

: Maupeou was appointed by Louis XV to be chancellor. He was determined to break up parlements and increase taxes on the nobility. Maupeou abolished parlements and exiled thier members to different parts around the country. Maupeou then began a program of reform and efficiency. Maupeou’s plan was doomed because less the resistance of the nobility then the death of Louis XV. Louis XV’s successor Louis XVI in an attepmt to regian what he conceived to be popular support, restored all parlements and confirmed their old powers.

: Jacques Neckar was the newly appointed director-general of finances. Neckar was a Swiss banker. Neckar produced a public report that had suggested that the debt was not as bad as had been feared. Neckar said that if France stopped helping w/ the American Revolution then France would be in surplus instead of debt. Necakar revealed that a large part of the spending was going towards pensions for aristocrats and other royal officals.

: France supported the American Revolution against GB. France provied money. This did not help their debt problem.

: Gabelle was the name for a tax on salt. Charles Alexandre de Calonne was the minister of finance. Calonne proposed internal trade, to lower some taxes ( ex. gabelle), and to transform peasants’ services into payments. Calonne introduced a new land tax. This would require all landowners to pay payments regardless of their social status. If the land tax was used all other indirect taxes would have been abandoned. The gov’t would have also had less of a reason to check w/ aristocractically dominated parlement on make additional taxes. the All of the proposals would have undermined both the political and social power of the French Aristocracy.

: In 1787 Calonne met w/ an Assembly of Noteables from the upper ranks of the aristocracy and the church to seek approval of his plan. The assembly refused any such action; instead it demanded that the aristocracy be allowed a greater part in the direct gov’t of the kingdom. The Noteables wished to reappoint Necker. They claimed they had no right to consent to new taxes. The right was vested only in the Estates General of France (this had not met since 1614). The notables believed that if the Estates General was called then it would inly result in a victory of the nobility over the monarchy.

: Louis XVI dismissed Calonne and replaced him w/ Etienne Charles Lomine de Brienne, archbishop on Toulouse and a opponent of Calonne @ the Assembley of Notables. Brienne also wanted impose the land tax. The parliment of Paris said that they lacked the authority to authorize new taxes and only the Estates Greneral could do so.

: Brienne appealed to the Assembly of the Clergy (like the Parlement, the clergy were dominated by arisocrates) to approve a large subsidy to allow funding of that part of the debt then coming due for payment. The clergy refused th subsidy and reduced their existiing contribution to the gov’t (a.k.a. don gratuit).

: At the same time these political talks were happening, local arisotcratic parlements and estates in the provinces were making their own demands. They wanted the privilages they enjoyed in the early 17th century to be restored (before Richelieu and Louis XIV crushed their independence). In 1788 the king, through Brienne, agreed to call the Estates General the next year. Brienne resigned and Necker replaced him. The insitutions of the arisotcracy_and to a lesser degree, of the church_had brought the French Monarchy to their knees. Royal Absolutism was defeated.

: In 1789 the French aristocracy had forced Louis XVI to call the Estates general into session. When the General was called the political situation in France changed. Social and political forces that neither the nobles nor the king could control were unleashed.

: Their were three groups (a.k.a. estates) represented. The first estate was the clergy, the second estate was the nobility, and the third estate was everybody else. The voteing procedures went that it should be conducted by order and not by head. Each estate should have one vote, rather then each member. This would ensure that the First and Second estates would overvote the Third estate. In 1788 the Royal Council annouced that the Third estate should elect twice as many representives as the other two estates.

: When the representatives came to the royal palace, they brought w/ them cahiers de doleances (a.k.a. list of grievances), registered by the local electors, to be presented to the king. The papers recorded criticisms of gov’t waste, indirewct taxes, chruch taxes and corruption, and the hunting rights of the aristocracy.

: On June 1, the Third estate invited members of the First and Second estates to join them in organizing a new legislative body. On June 17, this group was called the National Assembley.

: After being locked out of their normal meeting place, the National Assembley met on a tennis court. There they took an oath to sit on that courtuntil they have given France a cinsitution. Louis XVI ordered the group to desist from their actions, but shortly afterward a majority of the nobles and clergy joined the assembley. The National Assembley which was made up of people from all three estates changed their name to the national Constituent Assembley. These people shared the dream of a administrative, constitutional, and economic reform for the country. The revolution in France against the gov’t privileged by hereditary orders had begun.

: On July 14, 1789 more then 800 people (mostly shopkeepers, townspeople ect.) marched to the Bastille in search of weapons. Bastille had once help political prisoners. The troops @ Bastille fired into the crowd and killed 98 people. The crowd stormed throught the fortress and gained entrance. they freed 7 peoplekilled troops and the governor. They found no weapons.

: The national guard was called, and offered its command to Marquis de Lafayette. hero of the American Rev. gave the guard new insignia: red and blue stripes of Paris,

and a white stripe in the middle for the king. This became the revolutionary cockade (badge) and then the flag of revolutionary France.

: The "Great Faer" was a rumor that royal troops would go into rural places. The result was as intensification of the peasent disturbances that begun un the spring. The "Great Fear" saw the burning of the chateaux, and the ditruction of records and documents, and the refusal to pay dues. On August 4, 1789, aristocrats in the NCA attempted to stop the disturbances in the countryside. By prearrangment , several nobles and clergy men rose in the council and renounced their fudal rights, dues, and tithes.

: The NCA decided that before writing a new constitution they should set political principles. On August 27, the NCA issued the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen. The declaration called upon much of the political language of the Enlightenment. The declaration claimed thatmen were "born and remain free and equal rights." The natural rights claimed were "liberty,property,security, and resistance to oppression." Gov’t exisited to protect those rights.

: On October 5-6 7000 women marched to Versailles armed w/ pikes,guns,swords, and knives demanding more bread. The people were suspicious of Louis XVI, so they demanded that he return to Paris so they could keep a eye on him. October 6, Louis XIV and his family settled in Tuileries.

: The Constitution on 1791 est. a constitutional monarchy. The major political authority was a unicameral Legislative Assembly, all laws would come from there. The monarch was allowed a suspensive veto that could delay but not stop legislation. War and peace were invested in the assembly.

: Citizens of France were split into two groups, active and passive. Only active citizens (men) , who earned daily wages and paid taxes were allowed to vote. In 1791 a bucher’s daughter named Olympe de Gouges (she became a big revolutionary radical in Paris) composed a Declaration of the Rights of Women. She addressed this to Queen Marie Antoinette.

: The NCA abolished the ancient French provinces, and est. in their place 83 departments. They were of almost equal size, and named after rivers and mountains. The NCA also abolished parlements and seigneural courts. Uniform courts w/ elected judges and prosecutors were in their place. The most degrading punishments were removed.

: Chaplier Law was something the NCA approved that forbade workers’ associations. To help w/ the debt that still plauge France, the NCA would confiscate church property, and then sell it back. Assignates (gov’t bonds) were issued. The value of the bonds were assured by the selling of church property.

: The Civil Constitution of the Clergy transformed the Roman Catholic Church within France into a branch of the secular state. The clergy who did not take an oath to support the constitution were known as "refractory" and removed from their clerical functions.

: On the night of June 20, 1791 Louis XVI and his immediate family left Paris dressed as servants. They traveled as far as Varennes, until the king was recognized. On August 27, 1791 Emperor Leopold II of Austria (brother of Marie), and of Fredrick II king of Prussia, issued the Declaration of Pillnitz. The two monarchs promsied to intervene to uphold the monarch and royal family if the other European powers agreed.

: The girondists were people who wanted a republic rather then a constitutional monarchy.

: The sans culottes (means w/o breeches) were shopkeepers,artisains,wage earners. These people wanted relief from food shortages.