Radical Phase of

the French Revolution

The Second Revolution:8 or 9/1792- 7/1794

September MassacresSept 2-6Over 1,500 prisoners

The JacobinsJacobin Meeting House

Started as a debating society.

Membership mostly middle class.

Political & educated

Created a vast network of clubs

Drove much of the 2nd Fr Rev

Not the only political club, but the most influential

The Sans-Culottes:The Parisian Working Class

The Sans-Culottes

Depicted as Savages by a British Cartoonist.

The Political SpectrumOf the National Convention

Jacobins

Montagnards

(“The Mountain”)

GirondistsMonarchíe

n(Royalists)

1790s:The Plain

(swing votes)

TODAY:

Sans culotte

s

Economic & Social Policies of the National Convention

• Abolished the monarchy & established a Republic• Universal male suffrage

• Abolished feudalism• Also abolished slavery

• Planned economy • “Embryonic war-socialism” • Law of Maximum Price controls insisted on by sans-culottes

• On “goods of the first necessity”• Keep price gauging to a minimum

The “Cultural Revolution” Brought About by the Convention

* It was premised upon Enlightenment principles of rationality.

* The metric system of weights and measures Was defined by the French Academy of Sciences in

1791 and enforced in 1793. It replaced weights and measures that had their

origins in the Middle Ages.

* The Convention legalized divorce and enacted shared inheritance laws [even for illegitimate offspring] in an attempt to eradicate inequalities.

L’armoire de fer(the iron chest)

Louis XVI’s Head (January 21, 1793)

c The trial of the king was hastened by the l’amoire de fer.

c The National Convention unanimously agreed Louis was guilty; they voted 361 to 360 to execute the monarchs.

The Death of “Citizen” Louis Capet

Matter for reflection

for the crowned jugglers.

So impure blooddoesn’t soil our land!

The Reign of Terror

c The Committee of Public Safety was given power by the National Convention to take “all measures necessary for the internal and external defense of the Republic.”

c The use of terror was a conscious effort- the CPS wanted “to horrify conspirators” that “the blade of the law [was] hovering over them.”

c Law of Suspects- Arrested ALL former nobles, including women and children, who couldn’t PROVE they supported the Rev

5 September 1793 – 28 July 1794Terror is nothing other than justice, prompt, severe, inflexible... Let terror be the order of the day! -- Robespierre

Maximillian Robespierre(1758 – 1794)

Georges Jacques Danton

(1759 – 1794)

Jean-Paul Marat(1744 – 1793)

“The Death of Marat”by Jacques Louis David, 1793

The Guillotine

The “Monster” Guillotine

The Guillotine Song :An “Enlightenment Tool”?

Oh, thou charming guillotine, You shorten kings and queens;

By your influence divine,We have re-conquered our rights.

Come to aid of the CountryAnd let your superb instrument

Become forever permanentTo destroy the impious sect.

Sharpen your razor for Pitt and his agentsFill your divine sack with heads of tyrants.

Different Social Classes Executed in Reign of Terror

28%

31%

25%

8%

7%

"Gallic Declaration of War, or, Bumbardment of all Europe"This scatological English cartoon mocks France’s claim that it was going to war for "liberty," suggesting instead that France’s body politic is ill and that England needs to fight back to defend itself from such sickness. The figures in this drawing represent all the major leaders of Europe, including Louis XVI, Catherine of Russia, William Pitt, King George III of Britain, and the Pope, while symbols represent the Prussian and Habsburg monarchies.

War!Nat’l Convention declares war on GB, Sp, Holland; already at war with Prus & Aus, who consistently defeat French armies

The Levee en Masse (1793)

CPS established massive draft

800,000 -in less than a year!

MUCH larger than any other Euro army

Demonstrated creativity of CPS

Set foundation for future successes of French army

Turning point in history of warfare- now TOTAL war

ENTIRE society & econ mobilized for war effort

An army based on merit, not birth!

Religious Terror:De-Christianization by the National Convention (1793-

1794) The Catholic Church was linked

withreal or potential counter-revolution.

Religion was associated with theAncien Régime and superstitiouspractices.

De-Christinaization VERY popular among the sans-culottes.

Religion had no place in arational, secular republic!

The De-Christianization ProgramThe adoption of a new Republican Calendar:

e abolished Sundays & religious holidays.

e months named after seasonal & agricultural features.

e 7-day weeks replaced by 10-day decades.

e the yearly calendar was dated from the creation of the Republic: Year I [Sept. 22, 1792]

The Convention symbolically divorced time from the Church!!

The New Republican Calendar

New Name Meaning Time Period

Vendemaire Vintage September 22 – October 21

Brumaire Fog October 22 – November 20

Frimaire Frost November 21 – December 20

Nivose Snow December 21 – January 19

Pluviose Rain January 20 – February 18

Ventose Wind February 19 – March 20

Germinal Budding March 21 – April 19

Floreal Flowers April 20 – May 19

Prairial Meadow May 20 – June 18

Messidor Harvest June 19 – July 18

Thermidor Heat July 19 – August 17

Fructidor Fruit August 18 – September 21The Gregorian System returned in 1806.

A New Republican Calendar YearI 1792 – 1793

II 1793 – 1794

III 1794 – 1795

IV 1795 – 1796

V 1796 – 1797

VI 1797 – 1798

VII 1798 – 1799

VIII 1799 – 1800

IX 1800 – 1801

X 1801 – 1802

XI 1802 – 1803

XII 1803 – 1804

XIII 1804 – 1805

XIV 1805

The De-Christianization Program

2. The public exercise of religion wasbanned.

3. Civil Constitution of the Clergy * Subordinated the Catholic Church in France to the French government * Priests had to take an oath of loyalty to the government

Those who did called “jurors” or “jurying priests”

Those who did NOT- “non-jurors” or “refractory”

4. The Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris was turned into the “Temple of Reason.”

The “Temple of Reason”

Come, holy Liberty, inhabit this temple,

Become the goddess of the French people.

The Festival of Supreme Being

A new secular holiday

The government required all clergy to swear an oath of loyalty to the Civil Constitution of the Clergy. Only seven bishops and about half the clergy agreed: the rest, mainly in western France, refused; these became known as "non-jurors" or "refractory priests". While there was a higher rate of rejection in urban areas, most of these refractory priests (like most of the population) lived in the countryside, and the Civil Constitution generated considerable resentment among religious peasants.

Backlash to theDe-Christianization Program

It alienated most of the population(especially in the rural areas).

Robespierre never supported it. he persuaded the Convention to

reaffirm the principle of religioustoleration.

War of Resistance to the Revolution:

The Vendee Revolt, 1793

Why was there a Revoltin the Vendee?

1. The draft of French troops- Vendee required to send MANY for the war effort.

2. Rural peasantry still highly taxed.3. Resentment of the Civil Constitution

the Clergy.4. Peasants had failed to benefit from

the sale of church lands.

TARGETS:Local government officials

Representatives on mission

Jurying priests

Siege of Lyon

"An Example of Heroic Courage" The Heroine of Milhier

In this rendition of an incident from the Vendée rebellion, an ordinary woman is shown standing up to the rebels. It comes from a series of heroic images of the Revolution and shows that women could be heroines for the Republic

Political Propaganda

The Contrast:“French Liberty / British Slavery”

The Radical’s

Arms:

No God!No Religion!

No King!No

Constitution!From an English periodical of 1819, this antirevolutionary print portrays the sans–culottes as drunkards anxious to destroy by fire, gallows, and guillotine rather than to work for their own good. The image satirizes the idea of sans–culotte simplicity by arranging the two figures and the guillotine as an aristocratic coat of arms

French Victory at Fleurus

June 26, 1794. France defeated Austria. Invalidated the argument that continuation of

the Reign of Terror was necessary because of the military threat to France's very existence.