The French Revolution

The French Revolution

France was having a really bad time during the 18th century,  the French government was deeply in debt and it wanted to restore its financial status through an unpopular taxation scheme, which enlarged  the  division between the nobility, the clergy and the bourgeoisie. In addition, the weather was not good, so farmers and peasants had smaller incomes. For these reasons France's population was forced to organize a revolution, in order to demand a change.  

Being part of the clergy or  the nobility meant that they had almost authority over the peasants. The population was divided into three estates. The first and second estates were made up of the clergy and the nobility while the third estate was made up by the bourgeoisie (wage earners and the peasantry).   The first and second estates were exempt from most taxes while the peasants had to pay taxes to their lord, to the king and to the church. That is why one of the major causes of the French Revolution was the fact that the peasants were forced to maintain the Feudal Lords and the clergy.

France was getting poorer.  It had spent a lot of money on expensive wars, and it continued spending too much money on luxuries. The weather was terrible, there were heavy rains, hard winters,  hot summers, and what was more, France suffered  three very bad  harvests, so as they could not plant seeds, peasants and farmers had smaller incomes. Many French farmers became unemployed, the population was starving, and France was getting into a financial crisis.

As a result of this crisis, the representatives of the third estate declared themselves a  national assembly representing the 96% of the population, feeling themselves as the true parliament. These members met at the Royal Tennis Court until the king agreed to meet their demands, and thus became part of the  Assembly.

In 1774 Louis XVI came to the throne . He was an absolute monarch, so he had complete power. Louis believed that his power had been given to him by God. Louis was dominated by his wife, Marie-Antoinette, whose brother was the Austrian Emperor. She was criticized by many for the way she interfered with Louis’s attempts to govern the country. On 5 – 6 October, 1789, the Paris mob came to Louis’ palace at Versailles and attacked. They captured Louis and his family, and imprisoned him in Paris. Louis could have ordered his guards to fire on the mob, but refused to do so. Louis claimed that he played the role of an English style ‘constitutional monarch’. The National Assembly decided to keep Louis as their constitutional monarch (a monarch who has to obey the rules of a constitution). On September 3rd 1791, the constitution was proclaimed and Louis swore an oath of loyalty to it. On 30th September 1791, the Assembly declared its work finished. It seemed the revolution was over, but in 1793, Louis was executed.

  The period following Louis’s execution became known as “The Terror” in France. Thousands of people suspected of anti- revolutionary activities or of helping France’s enemies were sent to the guillotine. Many areas of France were rebelling against the new radical Jacobin government. The Jacobins ordered 300 people to be executed by cannon fire as the guillotine was too slow. Many people were towed into the middle of the river and suck. By mid 1794, the Terror had died out. Many people looked for someone to blame for the Reign of Terror. The leading Jacobin, Robespierre found himself at the centre of the blame, was arrested and looked up. In July 1794, Robespierre found himself facing the guillotine.

To sum up, we can say that The French Revolution was a consequence of poverty. At those times, there were too many inequalities between the clergy, the nobility  and the bourgeoisie in France, so its poor population decided to take the power, and they started to rule themselves. As time passed by, they forgot the popular interests, and they began to govern, in order to achieve their personal  interests.