After Louis XVI agreed to hold the Estates General for the first time since 1614, he established elections for delegates from each Estate. Within each state, members came together to discuss possible delegates and draft petition for change. Although they did not meet together, the three estates did reach a general consensus: the abolitionist government needed to become a constitutional monarchy where laws and taxes required the consent of Estate Generals. Even though the estates had agreed, the Parliament of Paris announced that the delegates of each estate would sit separately, thus leading to the alliance of the nobles and clergy, and excluding and demeaning the commoners. When the coalition of delegates gathered in May 1789, they met immediate opposition. The third estate refused to work with the clergy and the nobles, until the estates could sit together as a whole. After six weeks a few parish priests relented and joined the third estate. On June 17, the third estate voted to call itself the National Assembly. On June 20, the third estate moved from their hall because of repairs to a large indoor tennis court, where they swore the Oath of the Tennis Court, pledging not to disperse until they had written a new constitution. In the earlier part of Louis XVI reign he was very subdued, but in reaction to the tennis court situation, he ordered the three estates to move together, and resolved the Estates Generals all together.
In 1788, the state of the third estate worsened as a result of an inferior grain crop. The price of bread skyrocketed, thus causing many peasants to spend as much as half of their pay checks on bread. The crisis then lead to the collapse of the need for manufactured goods, which left thousands of people out of work. Further, it was rumored that the king’s troops were prepared to “sac” the city. On July 13, people seized weapons and gunpowder, and on July 14 they stormed to the Bastille tower in order to gather more supplies for the coming of the king’s army. The Bastille tower was a retired medieval fortress that had eighty-eight former retired soldiers and thirty Swiss mercenaries guarding it. When the governor saw the people approaching the tower, he ordered the guards to open fire; ninety eighty people were killed. Finally the governor surrendered (he was later hacked to death and his head was stuck on a pike and paraded through the city), thus causing the king to refute his previous order to the finance minister to disperse his troops. Still, the peasants continued to rebel against society. In the countryside, angry peasants plagued their lords with violence and refused to pay their taxes. The peasants’ uprising caused what is now known as the Great Fear. On August 4th, 1787, a coalition of some liberal nobles and middle-class delegates at Versailles, rebuked all of the nobles’ privilege. The result was an astounding victory for peasants. Moreover, on August 27 1789, the National Assembly issued the Declaration of Rights. Like the Bill of Rights of the American Constitution, the Declaration of Rights guaranteed equality before the law, among many other basic rights. Why did the National assembly relent to third estate aggression so easily? Why was this rebellion so much more successful than Shay’s rebellion of the American Revolution?
While the Declaration of Rights was very progressive and beneficial, the wrath of the peasants continued. On October 5th, some 7,000 women marched from Paris to Versailles demanding action. The women were armed with scythes, sticks, and pikes, and murdered many royal body guards. The women also desperately looked to kill the royal family (especially Marie Antoinette), but the family was saved. The nest day the royal family headed to Paris and for the next two years the National Assembly saw the consolidation of the liberal revolution. In July 1790, Louis XVI reluctantly agreed to a constitutional monarchy. Also, new laws broadened women’s rights to seek divorce, to inherit property, and to obtain financial support for illegitimate children from fathers. Why do you think the women of the French Revolution received rights following the revolution, but the women of the American Revolution did not? Was it because the women of France used violence, or did their violence limit their rights?
Although the National Assembly gave out many rights, they also made one grave mistake. They abolished all monasteries, and made all of Catholic Church’s property public. While doing this they also gave religious freedom to Jews and Protestants, thus bringing them into conflict with the Catholic Church. Then, they made all Catholic priests swear an oath to the new established national church, yet only half of the Catholic priests agreed to this. Why was establishing a national church, and abolishing past religious affiliations detrimental to France’s future?
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