Study guide: French Revolution and Napoleonic Empire

📋 Course Outline

1. The Old Regime and Social Orders
2. A Liberal Nation and Political Order
3. The Political Revolution of 1789
4. The Constitutional Monarchy of 1791
5. The Republic and the King’s Trial
6. Emergency Rule and the Terror
7. The Directory and Censitary Politics

📅 Key Dates

1. 5 May 1789The Estates-General opened, and the king rejected political change in his opening address.
2. 14 July 1789Parisians seized weapons at the Invalides and stormed the Bastille, a symbol of royal absolutism and imprisonment without trial.
3. 1791The royal family’s flight to Varennes caused a major rupture between the king and the nation.
4. 10 August 1792Parisians demanded the king’s deposition and attacked the Tuileries, after which the Assembly voted to detain him.
5. 21 January 1793Louis XVI was executed by guillotine in a public regicide.
6. 27 July 1794Robespierre was arrested and later guillotined, ending his political rule.

📖 1. The Old Regime and Social Orders

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Absolute monarchy: A system that concentrates all powers in the king, whose legitimacy is presented as coming from God.

📝 Essential Points

• Under the Old Regime, society was divided into orders whose warrior, spiritual, and productive functions were assigned by birth.

• The clergy represented about 1% of the population, the nobility 2%, and the Third Estate 97%.

💡 Memory Hook

The king rules by divine right; the nation is divided by birth into orders.

📖 2. A Liberal Nation and Political Order

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Constitution: Defines the organization of powers and the principles governing them.

★ Must-know

• The Revolution’s new political order located power in the nation, understood as a community of free individuals who choose and control their rulers through constitutions.

• The Revolution’s principal natural rights were liberty and equality before the law.

Further detail

• The stated liberties included:
  • security from oppression
  • bodily integrity
  • private property
  • freedom of expression
  • freedom of movement
  • freedom of opinion
  • freedom of religion

💡 Memory Hook

Subjects serve the king; free citizens form the nation and control power.

📖 3. The Political Revolution of 1789

📝 Essential Points

• The French monarchy faced an economic crisis caused by poor harvests and debt, leading Louis XVI to summon the Estates-General, representing the kingdom’s three orders.

• 🔄 The political break unfolded as follows:

  1. The king prevented the deputies from meeting.
  2. The deputies formed a National Assembly.
  3. They swore to give France a constitution.
  4. Political legitimacy shifted from the king to the nation.

• During the Great Fear, rumors of armed attacks spread, peasants rose up and burned châteaux, and deputies abolished privileges on 4 August 1789 amid fears of disorder.

💡 Memory Hook

Estates-General → National Assembly → Bastille: authority shifts from king to nation.

📖 4. The Constitutional Monarchy of 1791

★ Must-know

• The Constitution promulgated on 13 September 1791 separated legislative, executive, and judicial powers, following principles associated in the course with Montesquieu.

• Voting under the 1791 Constitution was censitary: only citizens who paid the required taxes could vote, and women were excluded.

Further detail

• Under the 1791 Constitution, the king retained a veto over laws.

📖 5. The Republic and the King’s Trial

★ Must-know

• The Convention replaced the monarchy with a republic, in which political power was no longer hereditary.

• Under the Convention, men voted by universal male suffrage to elect their representatives.

Further detail

📌 In the debate over Louis XVI’s trial, Motion argued that the king was innocent and could not constitutionally be judged, while Saint-Just argued that he was guilty and should be put to death.

📖 6. Emergency Rule and the Terror

★ Must-know

• In 1793, France was at war with Austria, Prussia, and England while civil war also raged inside the country.

• The Convention created three emergency committees, including the Committee of Public Safety, dominated by Robespierre, to fight internal and external enemies.

• During the Terror, executive, legislative, and judicial powers were combined, and suspects could be punished without trial or presumption of innocence.

• The levée en masse called the whole nation to defend the Republic, while conscription applied to male citizens and women contributed to the war effort in industries and other roles.

Further detail

• The course estimates that 10,000 suspects were killed, including 4,000 by drowning.

💡 Memory Hook

War and internal revolt → emergency powers and repression.

📖 7. The Directory and Censitary Politics

📝 Essential Points

• The Directory’s Constitution divided legislative power between two councils and entrusted executive power to five directors.

📌 Boissy d’Anglas described civil equality as equality before the law and distinguished it from absolute equality in wealth, education, strength, virtue, and intellect. - Discours, 5 messidor an III