I: French Revolution and Napoleon Flashcards
What were the key social, political and economic characteristics of the Ancien Regime?
The Ancien Régime was the political and social system of the Kingdom of France from the Late Middle Ages (c. 1500) until the French Revolution starting in 1789, which abolished the feudal system of the French nobility and hereditary monarchy.
The estates of the realm were the broad orders of social hierarchy used in Christian Europe from the medieval period to early modern Europe. Different systems for dividing society members into estates evolved over time. The best-known system is the three-estate system of the French Ancien Régime.
- The First Estate comprised the entire clergy, traditionally divided into “higher” (nobility) and “lower” (non-noble) clergy. In 1789, it numbered around 0.5% of the population.
- The Second Estate was the French nobility and (technically, although not in common use) royalty, other than the monarch himself, who stood outside of the system of estates. It is traditionally divided into “nobility of the sword” and “nobility of the robe,” the magisterial class that administered royal justice and civil government. The Second Estate constituted approximately 1.5% of France’s population. Importantly, they were exempt from the corvée royale (forced labour on the roads) and from most other forms of taxation such as the gabelle (salt tax) and most important, the taille (the oldest form of direct taxation). This exemption from paying taxes led to their reluctance to reform.
- The Third Estate comprised all of those who were not members of the above and can be divided into two groups, urban and rural, together making up 98% of France’s population. The urban included the bourgeoisie and wage-laborers. The rural included peasants. The peasants paid disproportionately high taxes compared to the other Estates and simultaneously had very limited rights. In addition, the First and Second Estates relied on the labour of the Third, which made the latter’s unequal status all the more unjust. The Third Estate men and women shared the hard life of physical labour and food shortages. Most were born within this group and died as part of it. It was extremely rare for individuals of this status to advance to another estate. Those who crossed the class lines did so as a result of either being recognized for their extraordinary bravery in a battle or entering religious life. Some commoners were able to marry into the Second Estate, although that was very rare.
The French estates of the realm system was based on massive social injustices that were one of the key factors leading up to the French Revolution. The population of France in the decade prior to the French Revolution was about 26 million, of whom 21 million lived in agriculture. Few of these owned enough land to support a family and most were forced to take on extra work as poorly paid laborers on larger farms. The fundamental issue of poverty was aggravated by social inequality as all peasants were liable to pay taxes from which the nobility could claim immunity, and feudal dues payable to a local lord. Similarly, the tithes which the peasants were obliged to pay to their local churches, were a cause of grievance as the majority of parish priests were poor and the contribution was being paid to an aristocratic and usually absentee abbot. The clergy numbered about 100,000 and yet owned 10% of the land. The Catholic Church maintained a rigid hierarchy as abbots and bishops were all members of the nobility and canons were all members of wealthy bourgeois families. As an institution, it was both rich and powerful. It paid no taxes and merely contributed a grant to the state every five years, the amount of which was self-determined. The upper echelons of the clergy also had considerable influence over government policy.
How does the French Revolution mark a transformation of the ancien regime?
The French Revolution had a major impact on European and Western history, by ending feudalism and creating the path for future advances in broadly defined individual freedoms. Its impact on French nationalism was profound, while also stimulating nationalist movements throughout Europe.
Society: The impact of the Revolution on French society was enormous and led to numerous changes, some of which were widely accepted, while others continue to be debated. Under Louis XIV, political power was centralised at Versailles and controlled by the monarch, whose power derived from immense personal wealth, control over the army and appointment of clergy, provincial governors, lawyers and judges. In less than a year, the king was reduced to a figurehead, the nobility deprived of titles and estates and the church of its monasteries and property. Clergy, judges and magistrates were controlled by the state, and the army sidelined, with military power placed held by the revolutionary National Guard. The central elements of 1789 were the slogan “Liberty, Equality and Fraternity” and “The Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen”, which Lefebvre calls “the incarnation of the Revolution as a whole.”
The Church: One of the most heated controversies during the Revolution was the status of the Catholic Church. In 1788, it held a dominant position within society; to be French meant to be a Catholic. By 1799, much of its property and institutions had been confiscated and its senior leaders dead or in exile. Its cultural influence was also under attack, with efforts made to strip civil life of religious elements such as Sundays, holy days, saints, prayers, rituals and ceremonies. Ultimately these attempts not only failed but aroused a furious reaction among the pious; opposition to these changes was a key factor behind the revolt in the Vendée.
Economics: Two thirds of France was employed in agriculture, which was transformed by the Revolution. With the breakup of large estates controlled by the Church and the nobility and worked by hired hands, rural France became more a land of small independent farms. Harvest taxes were ended, such as the tithe and seigneurial dues, much to the relief of the peasants. In the cities, entrepreneurship on a small scale flourished, as restrictive monopolies, privileges, barriers, rules, taxes and guilds gave way. However, the British blockade virtually ended overseas and colonial trade, hurting the cities and their supply chains. Overall, the Revolution did not greatly change the French business system, and probably helped freeze in place the horizons of the small business owner.
Constitutionalism: The Revolution meant an end to arbitrary royal rule and held out the promise of rule by law under a constitutional order, but it did not rule out a monarch. Napoleon as emperor set up a constitutional system (although he remained in full control), and the restored Bourbons were forced to go along with one. After the abdication of Napoleon III in 1871, the monarchists probably had a voting majority, but they were so factionalised they could not agree on who should be king, and instead the French Third Republic was launched with a deep commitment to upholding the ideals of the Revolution.
What happened during the French Revolution?
The French Revolution was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Its causes are generally agreed to be a combination of social, political and economic factors, which the existing regime proved unable to manage.
In May 1789, widespread social distress led to the convocation of the Estates General, which was converted into a National Assembly in June. Continuing unrest culminated in the Storming of the Bastille on 14 July, when revolutionaries stormed and seized control of the medieval armoury, fortress, and political prison. This led to a series of radical measures by the Assembly, including the abolition of feudalism, the imposition of state control over the Catholic Church in France, and extension of the right to vote.
The next three years were dominated by the struggle for political control, exacerbated by economic depression and civil disorder. Opposition from external powers like Austria, Britain, and Prussia resulted in the outbreak of the French Revolutionary Wars in April 1792, a series of military conflicts as the monarchies across Europe were outraged by the revolution and its upheavals, fearing spill-over effects to their own states. Disillusionment with Louis XVI led to the establishment of the French First Republic on 22 September 1792, followed by his execution in January 1793. In June, the Paris insurrection replaced the Girondins who dominated the National Assembly with the Committee of Public Safety, headed by Maximilien Robespierre, a member of the Assembly and the Jacobin Club. This sparked the Reign of Terror, an attempt to eradicate alleged “counter-revolutionaries”; by the time it ended in July 1794, over 16,600 had been executed in Paris and the provinces. As well as its external enemies, the Republic faced internal opposition from both Royalists and Jacobins and in order to deal with these threats, the French Directory took power in November 1795. In its first two years, the Directory concentrated on ending the excesses of the Jacobin Reign of Terror; mass executions stopped, and measures taken against exiled priests and royalists were relaxed. The Jacobin political club was closed, and the government crushed an armed uprising planned by the Jacobins. Despite a series of military victories, many won by Napoleon Bonaparte, political divisions and economic stagnation resulted in the Directory being replaced by the Consulate in in the coup of 18 Brumaire in 1799. This is generally seen as marking the end of the Revolutionary period.
What was Napoleon’s project for France – and for the world?
Napoleon brought political stability to a land torn by revolution and war. He made peace with the Roman Catholic Church and reversed the most radical religious policies of the Convention. In 1804 Napoleon promulgated the Civil Code, a revised body of civil law, which also helped stabilize French society. The Civil Code affirmed the political and legal equality of all adult men and established a merit-based society in which individuals advanced in education and employment because of talent rather than birth or social standing. The Civil Code confirmed many of the moderate revolutionary policies of the National Assembly but retracted measures passed by the more radical Convention. The code restored patriarchal authority in the family, for example, by making women and children subservient to male heads of households. Whilst working to stabilise France, Napoleon also sought to extend his authority throughout Europe. Napoleon’s armies conquered the Iberian and Italian peninsulas, occupied lands, and he forced Austria, Prussia, and Russia to ally with him and respect French hegemony in Europe.
Napoleon had wanted to conquer Europe (if not the world) and said, “Europe thus divided into nationalities freely formed and free internally, peace between States would have become easier: the United States of Europe would become a possibility.” He wanted to free Europe from tyranny, oppression and despotism.
To what extent was Napoleon a revolutionary – and a “liberator”?
We cannot forget that Napoleon was, in fact, a staunch supporter of the French Revolution. Furthermore, he led and led several successful campaigns during the Revolutionary Wars. In this sense, Napoleon was part of the revolutionary effort to replace the Ancien Régime in France, and he was indirectly defending the possibility and hope of other European states to rid themselves of their monarchies.
Most importantly, Napoleon directly overthrew remnants of feudalism in much of western Continental Europe. Napoleon implemented a wide array of liberal reforms in France and across Continental Europe, especially in Italy and Germany with ideas that underpin our modern world—meritocracy, equality before the law, property rights, religious toleration, modern secular education, and sound finances. He liberalized property laws, ended seigneurial dues, abolished the guild of merchants and craftsmen to facilitate entrepreneurship, legalized divorce, closed the Jewish ghettos and made Jews equal to everyone else. The Inquisition ended as did the Holy Roman Empire. The power of church courts and religious authority was sharply reduced and equality under the law was proclaimed for all men.
Napoleon’s set of civil laws, the Code Civil—now often known as the Napoleonic Code, was a fundamental change in the nature of the civil law legal system with its stress on clearly written and accessible law. The preliminary article of the Code established certain important provisions regarding the rule of law. Laws could be applied only if they had been duly promulgated, and then only if they had been published officially Thus, no secret laws were authorized. Even after the fall of Napoleon, not only was the Napoleonic Code retained by conquered countries including the Netherlands, Belgium, parts of Italy and Germany, but has been used as the basis of certain parts of law outside Europe including the Dominican Republic, the US state of Louisiana and the Canadian province of Quebec. The code was also used as a model in many parts of Latin America.
To what extent was Napoleon “anti-revolutionary” – and a “dictator”?
Although Napoleon did end lawlessness and disorder in post-Revolutionary France, his enemies attacked him as a tyrant and usurper. His critics charge that he was not troubled when faced with the prospect of war and death for thousands, turned his search for undisputed rule into a series of conflicts throughout Europe and ignored treaties and conventions alike. His role in the Haitian Revolution and decision to reinstate slavery in France’s overseas colonies are controversial and affect his reputation. During the Revolution, the National Convention had voted to abolish slavery in February 1794. Aware of the expenses required to fund his wars in Europe, Napoleon made the decision to reinstate slavery in all French Caribbean colonies.
The Coup of 18–19 Brumaire brought Napoleon to power in 1799, and he installed an authoritarian rule, with himself as First Consul.
Whilst the plebiscites employed by Napoleon may initially be seen as a direct form of popular sovereignty, allowing the people to provide judgement on laws, they were hollow and were a facade to a primarily authoritarian rule. The plebiscite on the Constitution of the Year VIII (1799) was marred by intimidation/malpractice which violated the principle of suffrage/liberty. Moreover, there was no secret ballot and fear of possible later victimisation led to many people voting against their will.
During Napoleons rule, there were no checks on power. The Tribunate and the Legislature, the two bodies established in order to impose checks on any legislation passed by the Senate (to prevent a dictatorship), became increasingly unimportant in the later years of Napoleon’s rule. The Tribunate was purged in 1802 to prevent any opposition to his regime, whilst Napoleon elected new, loyal members for the Legislature. In 1808 the Tirbunate was abolished, with the Legislature only surviving through its subservient attitude to Napoleon’s orders. The government became ran by the Senate and the Council of State, both of which were firmly under Napoleon’s personal control.
Napoleon knew the advantages of censorship and propaganda from the outset of his career. His control of the media was entirely repressive of free speech and expression, used crucially as a mouthpiece of the government as the purveyor of all official propaganda. In 1800, he reduced the number of newspapers published in Paris from 73 to 13, with 9 by the end of the year. In 1811, only 4 remained and were subject to strict supervision; editors relied on military bulletins or articles published in Le Moniteur, the government newspaper.
After Napoleon had himself crowned emperor in 1804, he felt the need for a court aristocracy that would lend lustre and credibility to his new image. Napoleon founded the concept of “nobility of Empire” by an imperial decree on 1 March 1808. The purpose of this creation was to amalgamate the old nobility and the revolutionary middle-class in one peerage system. He also reasoned that only by creating a new nobility based on merit could he displace and absorb the old nobility, which had lost its titles in 1790 but not its pretensions. By 1808 a new hierarchy of titles had been created, which were to be hereditary provided that a family could support its title with a large annual income—30,000 livres, for example, in the case of a count of the empire. To facilitate this, the emperor bestowed huge landed estates and pensions on his highest dignitaries. The Napoleonic nobility, in other words, would be a veritable upper class based on a combination of service and wealth.
