French Revolution

French Revolution

   Inspired on the new ideals from the Enlightenment that proposed a new way of political system based on reason, knowledge and education, the French Revolution was an intention to fight against absolutism and to replace this with a republic. There were many causes to revolt but the way in which they did it in fact did not bring a solution.
  In the XVIII century, an absolute monarchy reigned over France. This corrupt leadership had lead a rigid social structure that was divided into three states. The First State was a privileged one; this consisted of the clergy that was associated to the catholic church. The Second Estate was another privileged estate, represented by the Nobility. Not only did they collect the taxes from the peasants, but they were also involved in various respected professions like banking, insurance, finance and manufacturing etc. The Third Estate was the lowest in the society but the biggest. Most of the citizens belonged to this social class. It was 96% of the population, basically everyone else, from peasants in the countryside to wealthy bourgeoisie merchants in the city. Every people from this third unprivileged estate had to pay half of their income in taxes and had none of the rights and privileges of the other two Estates. On the contrary, neither the first nor the second estate had to pay any taxes.

   As this situation was not enough, there was a sequence of events that resulted on France on the brink of revolution by 1789. One of them was France government bankrupting, it had wasted a lot of money in war outcomes. Also, the royals were accused of spending much money on luxury and the taxes were not sufficient for supporting all this, so the First and Second estates were asked to pay taxes but they refused. Another unexpected event was the bad harvest that the terrible weather had left. Many farmers became unemployed, meanwhile prices were rising and it was impossible for them to find a job, so they were dying of hunger. In order to give a solution, the King Louis XVI called the Estates General to set new taxes, but this was useless. Even worse, as nothing seemed to have a solution, the Third Estate called themselves a “national assembly” in order to draw up a constitution.

  Louis was left alone to deal with all the difficulties that the French revolution involved since most nobles had decided to leave France after their chateaux were burned. The king and the Queen needed to organize an invasion over France so as to stop the revolution and restore an absolute monarchy, so, Louis allowed his wife Marie-Antoinette to write letters to other monarchies asking for help to leave France secretly. Then Louis himself wrote to the kings of Prussia, Spain, Sweden, Austria and Russia to suggest an alliance to put down the revolution. This fact clearly showed that the King had no intention at all of reforming the country; he just wanted to be an absolute kingdom again. During the night of June 20-21, 1791, Louis and his family tried to escape to Montmedy, near the Austrian Netherlands secretly. They disguised themselves and carried false passports. However, Louis’s plan failed because they committed several mistakes: They had to use a large and slow coach because the Queen wanted all the family to travel together; the bodyguards wore easily recognizable uniforms. What is more, some people recognized Louis on the route to Varennes, and a French mob prevented his coach from proceeding. Louis could have taken the decision of shooting his way through the mob, but he preferred not to do it. As a consequence, Louis and his family were captured and brought back to Paris.

 After the execution of King Louis, society was divided into two groups: the JACOBINS who were a radical sort of French revolutionary and the GIRONDINS, who were moderate sort of French revolutionary. In February, it was clear that the war was still going badly for France. Every person who was suspected of being anti-revolutionary was sent to the guillotine. In August, the Jacobins declared that ‘Terror is the order of the day’. By the late summer, many areas of France were rebelling against the new radical Jacobin government. More than 12,000 were officially guillotined, but many others were shot, drowned or put to death some other way. The Terror was supposed to help the revolution survive, but it was not just the former members of the first and second estates who suffered at its hands. There were many incidents of horror during the Terror. In Lyons, a Jacobin ordered 300 people to be executed by cannon fire as the guillotine was ‘too slow’. Birds hovered above the water, eating dead flesh. The river water was so contaminated that fishing was banned. In Paris, thousands watched the executions. Women took their knitting with them, bets were placed on the order the prisoners would be executed in.

   In conclusion, the French Revolution was the beginning of a new way of thinking that allowed new ideas to flourish like fraternity, equality and liberty that changed Europe however, it was a cruel and bloody period in which thousands of people died.