French Revolution Vocab

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1.Abdicate: to give up a high office
2.Ancient regime: In 1789, France, like the rest of Europe, still clung to an outdated social system that had emerged in the Middle Ages. Under this ancient regime, or old order, everyone in France belonged to one of three classes: the First estate, made up of the clergy; the Second Estate, made up of the nobility; or the Third Estate, the vast majority of the population.
3.Bankruptcy: legal proceeding in which a debtor declares his or her inability to pay consumer or business debts as they become due. Debtors may seek a discharge from continuing personal liability for unsecured debts or they may attempt to reorganize financially by seeking an extended period of time in which to pay all or a proportion of their indebtedness.
4.Bastille July 14, 1789:: On July 14, Paris seized the spotlight from the national assembly meeting in Versailles. The streets buzzed with rumors that royal troops were going to occupy the capital. More than 800 Parisians assembled outside the Bastille, a grim medieval fortress used as a prison for political and other prisoners. Its heavy cannons, high towers, and thick walls symbolized the monarchâ€™s power. The crowd was demanding weapons and gunpowder believed to be stored there. The commander of the Bastille refused to open the gates and opened fire on the crowd. In the battle that followed, many people were killed. Finally, the enraged mob broke through the defenses. They killed the commander and five guards and released a handful of prisoners, but found no weapons. The storming of the Bastille quickly became a symbol of the French Revolution. Supporters saw it as a blow to tyranny, a step toward freedom.
5.Blockade: the shutting off of a port to keep people or supplies from moving in or out.
6.Bourgeoisie: the middle class. At the top of the Third Estate sat the bourgeoisie, or middle class. The bourgeoisie included the prosperous bankers, merchants, and manufacturers who propped up the French economy. It also included the officials who staffed the royal bureaucracy, as well as lawyers, doctors, journalists, professors, and skilled artisans. Wealthy bourgeois families could buy political office and even titles.
7. Constitution 1791: The National Assembly completed its main task by producing a constitution. The Constitution of 1791 set up a limited monarchy in place of the absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries. A new Legislative Assembly had the power to make laws, collect taxes, and decide on issues of war and peace. Lawmakers would be elected by tax-paying male citizens. Only about 50,000 men in a population of more than 27 million could qualify as candidates to run for the Assembly.
To make government more efficient, the constitution replaced the old provinces with 83 departments of roughly equal size. It abolished the old provincial courts and reformed laws. The middle-class framers of the constitution protected private property and supported free trade. They compensated nobles for land seized by the peasants, abolished guilds, and forbade city workers to organize labor unions.
To moderate reformers, the constitution of 1791 seemed to complete the revolution. Reflecting Enlightenment goals, it ended Church interference in government and ensured equality before the law for all citizens. At the same time, it put power in the hands of men with the means and leisure to serve in government.
8.Committee for Public Safety: To deal with the threats of France, the Convention created the Committee of Public Safety. The 12-member committee had almost absolute power as it battled to save the revolution. It prepared France for all-out war, ordering all citizens to join the war effort. Spurred by revolutionary fervor, French recruits marched off to defend the republic. Young officers developed effective new tactics to win battles with masses of ill-trained but patriotic forces. Soon, French armies overran the Netherlands and later invaded Italy. As home, they crushed peasant revolts. European monarchs shuddered as the revolutionaries carried â€œfreedom feverâ€ into conquered lands.
9.Cahiers: In preparation for the meeting with the Estates General at Versailles (in May 1789), Louis had all three estates prepare cahiers, or notebooks, listing their grievances. Many cahiers called for reforms such as fairer taxes, freedom of the press, or regular meetings of the Estates General. In one town, shoemakers denounced regulations that made leather so expensive they could not afford to make shoes. Some peasants demanded the right to kill animals that were destroying their crops. Servant girls in the city of Toulouse demanded the right to leave service when they wanted and that â€œafter a girl has served her master for many years, she receive some reward for her service.â€ The cahiers testified to boiling class resentments. One called tax collectors â€œbloodsuckers of the nation who drink the tears of unfortunate from goblets of gold.â€ Another condemned the courts of nobles as â€œvampiresâ€ pumping blood from people. Another complained that â€œ20 million must live on half the wealth of France while the clergy devour the other half.â€
10.Dalton: A crucial breakthrough came in the early 1800s when the English Quaker schoolteacher John Dalton developed modern atomic theory. The ancient Greeks had speculated that all matter was made of tiny particles called atoms. Dalton showed how different kinds of atoms combine to make all chemical substances
11.Declaration for Rights of man: In late August, as a first step toward writing a constitution, the National Assembly issued the Declaration of the Rights of man and the Citizen. The document was modeled in part on the American Declaration of Independence. All men, it announced, were â€œborn and remain free and equal in rights.â€ They enjoyed natural rights to â€œliberty, property, security, and resistance to oppression.â€ Like Locke and the philosophes, it insisted that governments exist to protect the natural rights of citizens.
The Declaration further proclaimed that all male citizens were equal before the law. Each French man had an equal right to hold public office â€œwith no distinction other than that of their virtues and talents. â€œ In addition, the Declaration asserted freedom of religion and called for taxes to be levied according to ability to pay. Its principles were captured in the enduring slogan of the French Revolution, â€œLiberty, Equality, Fraternity.â€
Uncertain and hesitant, Louis XVI was slow to accept the reforms of the National Assembly. Parisians grew suspicious as more royal troops arrived. Nobles continued to enjoy gala banquets while people were starving. By autumn, anger again turned to action.
12.Deficit spending: situation in which a government spends more money than it takes in. Hand in hand with social unrest went a mushrooming financial crisis. The crisis was caused in part by years of deficit spending, where a government spends more money than it takes in. Louis XIV had left France deeply in debt. Wars like the Seven Yearsâ€™ War and the American Revolution strained the treasury even further. Costs generally had risen in the 1700s, and the lavish court soaked up millions. To bridge the gap between income and expenses, the government borrowed more and more money. By 1789, half its tax income went just to pay interest on this enormous debt. To solve the financial crisis, the government would have to increase taxes, reduce expenses, or both. However, the nobles and clergy fiercely resisted any attempt to end their exemption from taxes.
13.émigrés: 13.émigrés
14.Estates-General:: national representative body in France before 1789. Its basic function was to give consent to royal taxation. Its members were divided into three classes, or estates: the clergy, the nobility (both small minorities), and the third estate, which represented the great majority of the people. The Estates-General, first convened by King Philip IV in 1302, was most powerful in the 14th and early 15th centuries. Under Charles VII the monarchy began to develop independent sources of revenue and relied less on the Estates-General. After 1614 the body did not meet until 1789, when Louis XVI summoned it to deal with the financial crisis that gripped France on the eve of the French Revolution. In June 1789 the third estate, joined by some of the clergy and nobility, began the Revolution by defying the king and declaring itself a National Assembly.
15.Famine: severe shortage of food, generally affecting a widespread area and large numbers of people. Natural causes include droughts, floods, earthquakes, insect plagues, and plant disease. Human causes include wars, civil disturbances, sieges, and deliberate crop destruction. Widespread, chronic hunger and malnutrition may result from severe poverty, inefficient food distribution, or population increases disproportionate to the food-producing or procuring capacity of people in a region.
First Estate: The clergy: in the Middle Ages, the Church had exerted great influence throughout Christian Europe. In 1789, the French clergy still enjoyed enormous wealth and privilege. They owned about 10% of the land, collected tithes, and paid no direct taxes to the state. High Church leaders such as bishops and abbots were usually nobles who lived very well. Parish priests often came from humble origins and might be as poor as their peasant congregations. The First Estate did provide social services. Nuns, monks, and priests ran schools, hospitals, and orphanages. But during the Enlightenment, philosophes targeted the Church for reform. They pointed to the idleness of some clergy, Church interference in politics, and its intolerance of dissent. In response, many clergy condemned the Enlightenment for undermining religion and moral order.
17.Girondin: moderate Republican faction active in the French Revolution from 1791 to 1793. Called Girondins because many of their prominent members represented the department of Gironde, they were also named Brissotins, after Jacques Pierre Brissot, one of their leaders. The group first emerged in the Legislative Assembly elected in October 1791. It was originally identified with the Jacobins, but the two groups split on the issue of war with Austria, which the Girondins favored, believing it would unite France behind the Revolution. Led by Brissot and Jean Marie Roland de La Platière, they persuaded the assembly to vote for war in April 1792. After that their influence declined. Opponents of the economic controls and radical democracy favored by the Paris-based Jacobins, they tried unsuccessfully to win armed support in the provinces in October 1793. When Brissot and 30 of his followers were guillotined by the Jacobins on October 31, the power of the Girondins was destroyed.
18.Jacobin: The sans-culottes found support among radical leaders in the Legislative Assembly, especially the Jacobins. A revolutionary political club, the Jacobins were mostly middle-class lawyers or intellectuals. They used pamphleteers and sympathetic newspaper editors to advance the republican cause.
19.Louis XVI: Louis XVI (1754-1793), king of France (1774-1792), who lost his throne in the French Revolution and was later beheaded by the revolutionary regime.
Louis was born at Versailles on August 23, 1754, the grandson of Louis XV. The deaths of his two elder brothers and of his father, only son of Louis XV, made the young prince the Dauphin of France in 1765. In 1770 he married Marie-Antoinette, youngest daughter of Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria. On Louis's accession, France was impoverished and burdened with debts, and heavy taxation had resulted in widespread misery among the French people. Immediately after he was crowned, aided by such capable statesmen as Finance Minister Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, baron de l'Aulne, Interior Minister Chrétien Guillaume de Lamoignon de Malesherbes, and Foreign Minister Charles Gravier, comte de Vergennes, Louis remitted some of the most oppressive taxes and instituted financial and judicial reforms. Greater reforms were prevented, however, by the opposition of the upper classes and the court. So strong was this opposition that in 1776 Turgot was forced to resign and was replaced by financier Jacques Necker.
After Louis granted financial aid (1778-1781) to the American colonies revolting against Great Britain in the New World, Necker proposed drastic taxes on the nobility. He was forced to resign in 1781, and statesman Charles Alexandre de Calonne, appointed finance minister in 1783, borrowed money for the court until 1786, when the borrowing limit was reached. The anger of the French people against taxes and the lavish spending of the court resulted in 1788 in the recall of Necker, who, however, could not prevent the bankruptcy of the government. In 1788 Louis was forced to call for a meeting of the representative governmental body called the Estates-General, the first gathering of that assembly in 175 years. Once in session, the Estates-General assumed the powers of government. On July 14, 1789, the Parisian populace razed the Bastille, and a short time later imprisoned the king and royal family in the palace of the Tuileries. In 1791 the royal family attempted to escape to Austria, but they were caught and brought back to Paris. Louis swore obedience to the new French constitution in 1791, but continued secretly to work against the revolution and to plot intrigues with France's enemies. In 1792, when the National Convention, the assembly of elected French deputies, declared France a republic, the king was tried as a traitor and condemned to death. Louis XVI was guillotined on January 21, 1793, in the Place de la Révolution (now Place de la Concorde) in Paris.
Historians consider Louis XVI a victim of circumstances rather than a despot similar to the former French kings Louis XIV and Louis XV. He was weak and incapable as king and not overly intelligent. He preferred to spend his time at hobbies, such as hunting and making locks, rather than at his duties of state, and he permitted his wife to influence him unduly.
20.Louis XV: Louis the XV ruled from 1715 to 1774. He pursued pleasure before serious business and ran up more debts.
21.Louis XIV: In 1643, five-year-old Louis XIV inherited the French throne. While still a teenager, he took over the government himself. Like his great-grandfather, Philip II of Spain, Louis believed in divine right. He took the sun as the symbol of his power and became known as the Sun King. To increase royal power, Louis expanded the bureaucracy and appointed wealthy middle-class men to collect taxes. This helped tie the middle class to the monarch. He poured vast resources into wars to gain more land and dominate Europe. Louisâ€™ European rivals, however, joined together to fight him. They hoped to maintain the balance of power, or the distribution of military and economic power that would prevent any one nation from dominating Europe. Louis XIV ruled France with absolute authority for 72 years. During that time, French culture, manners, and customs became the standard for European taste. Louis built the immense palace of Versailles, which housed at least 10,000 people. He spared no expense to make Versailles the most magnificent building in Europe.
22.Marie Antoinette: Marie-Antoinette (1755-1793), queen consort (1774-1792) of Louis XVI of France; her unpopularity helped discredit the monarchy in the period before the French Revolution. Born in Vienna on November 2, 1755, Marie-Antoinette was one of the daughters of Holy Roman Emperor Francis I and Empress Maria Theresa. Her marriage (1770) to Louis, the heir to the French throne, was intended to cement an alliance between France and her parents' dynasty, the Habsburgs of Austria. She and her husband had a daughter and two sons after he succeeded to the throne in 1774. Disliked by the French as a foreigner, she made herself more unpopular by her devotion to the interests of Austria, the bad reputations of some of her friends, and her extravagance, which was mistakenly blamed for the financial problems of the French government. Especially damaging was her supposed connection with the so-called Diamond Necklace affair, a scandal involving the fraudulent purchase of some jewels (1785). After the outbreak of the Revolution in 1789, Marie-Antoinette sided with the intransigents at court who opposed compromise with the moderate revolutionaries, and began appealing for help to her brother, Holy Roman Emperor Leopold II. Marie and Louis tried to escape from Paris with their surviving son in 1791, but they were captured and brought back prisoners. In 1792 the monarchy was overthrown, and after the execution of the king and separation from her son, she was sent before the revolutionary tribunal the following year. Sentenced to death for treason, she was guillotined in Paris on October 16, 1793.
23. National Assembly: The delegates of the Third Estate said they represented the people of France. They transformed themselves into the national Assembly. They then invited members of the other estates to help them shape a constitution. A few days later, the national Assembly found itself locked out of its meeting place. The delegates believed that the king intended to send them home. They took the famous Tennis Court Oath, and vowed not to disband until they had drawn up a constitution for France.
24. National Constitution: in politics, fundamental system of law, written or unwritten, of a sovereign state, established or accepted as a guide for governing the state. A constitution fixes the limits and defines the relations of the legislative, judicial, and executive powers of the state, thus setting up the basis for government. It also provides guarantees of certain rights to the people.
25. Nationalism: feeling of pride in and devotion to oneâ€™s country. Revolution and war gave people a strong sense of national identity. In earlier times, people had felt loyalty to local authorities. As monarchs centralized power, loyalty shifted to the king or queen. Now, the government rallied sons and daughters of the revolution to defend the nation itself.
26. Necker: The heirs of Louis XIV were not the right men to solve the financial crisis in France. Louis XV, who ruled form 1715 to 1774, pursued pleasure before serious business and ran up more debts. His grandson, Louis XVI, was well-meaning but weak and indecisive. He wisely chose Jacques Necker, a financial wizard, as an adviser. Necker urged the king to reduce court spending, reform government, and improve internal trade by abolishing tariffs that made trade costly. When Necker proposed taxing the First and Second estates, the nobles and high clergy forced the king to dismiss the would-be reformer.
27. New Republic: form of state based on the concept that sovereignty resides in the people, who delegate the power to rule in their behalf to elected representatives and officials. In practice, however, this concept has been variously stretched, distorted, and corrupted, making any precise definition of the term republic difficult. It is important, to begin with, to distinguish between a republic and a democracy. In the theoretical republican state, where the government expresses the will of the people who have chosen it, republic and democracy may be identical (there are also democratic monarchies). Historical republics, however, have never conformed to a theoretical model, and in the 20th century the term republic is freely used by dictatorships, one-party states, and democracies alike. Republic has, in fact, come to signify any form of state headed by a president or some similarly titled figure, and not a monarch.
28. Plebiscite: ballot in which voters have a direct say on an issue.
29. Radicals: members of a movement that advocates extreme change of political and social institutions. In France, before the Revolution of 1848, a radical was a supporter of universal manhood suffrage. After 1869 the French statesman Georges Clemenceau led a radical faction away from moderate republicanism, and in 1881 his party called for sweeping reforms; in 1901 the Radical-Socialist Party was formed. Today, the term radical most frequently is used to indicate extreme liberalism. Reactionary is the term given to an adherent of extreme conservatism. The labels, left and right, respectively, have been attached to these viewpoints. Communism is an example of radical, leftist extremism, and fascism exemplifies the extreme rightist views.
30. Reactionaries: a person with attitudes or behavior guided by an adverse reaction to social and political change. In politics and religion, reactionary movements represent a backlash to some profound upheaval within a society.
17. Girondin: moderate Republican faction active in the French Revolution from 1791 to 1793. Called Girondins because many of their prominent members represented the department of Gironde, they were also named Brissotins, after Jacques Pierre Brissot, one of their leaders. The group first emerged in the Legislative Assembly elected in October 1791. It was originally identified with the Jacobins, but the two groups split on the issue of war with Austria, which the Girondins favored, believing it would unite France behind the Revolution. Led by Brissot and Jean Marie Roland de La Platière, they persuaded the assembly to vote for war in April 1792. After that their influence declined. Opponents of the economic controls and radical democracy favored by the Paris-based Jacobins, they tried unsuccessfully to win armed support in the provinces in October 1793. When Brissot and 30 of his followers were guillotined by the Jacobins on October 31, the power of the Girondins was destroyed.
18. Jacobin: The sans-culottes found support among radical leaders in the Legislative Assembly, especially the Jacobins. A revolutionary political club, the Jacobins were mostly middle-class lawyers or intellectuals. They used pamphleteers and sympathetic newspaper editors to advance the republican cause.
19. Louis XVI: Louis XVI (1754-1793), king of France (1774-1792), who lost his throne in the French Revolution and was later beheaded by the revolutionary regime.
Louis was born at Versailles on August 23, 1754, the grandson of Louis XV. The deaths of his two elder brothers and of his father, only son of Louis XV, made the young prince the Dauphin of France in 1765. In 1770 he married Marie-Antoinette, youngest daughter of Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria. On Louis's accession, France was impoverished and burdened with debts, and heavy taxation had resulted in widespread misery among the French people. Immediately after he was crowned, aided by such capable statesmen as Finance Minister Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, baron de l'Aulne, Interior Minister Chrétien Guillaume de Lamoignon de Malesherbes, and Foreign Minister Charles Gravier, comte de Vergennes, Louis remitted some of the most oppressive taxes and instituted financial and judicial reforms. Greater reforms were prevented, however, by the opposition of the upper classes and the court. So strong was this opposition that in 1776 Turgot was forced to resign and was replaced by financier Jacques Necker.
After Louis granted financial aid (1778-1781) to the American colonies revolting against Great Britain in the New World, Necker proposed drastic taxes on the nobility. He was forced to resign in 1781, and statesman Charles Alexandre de Calonne, appointed finance minister in 1783, borrowed money for the court until 1786, when the borrowing limit was reached. The anger of the French people against taxes and the lavish spending of the court resulted in 1788 in the recall of Necker, who, however, could not prevent the bankruptcy of the government. In 1788 Louis was forced to call for a meeting of the representative governmental body called the Estates-General, the first gathering of that assembly in 175 years. Once in session, the Estates-General assumed the powers of government. On July 14, 1789, the Parisian populace razed the Bastille, and a short time later imprisoned the king and royal family in the palace of the Tuileries. In 1791 the royal family attempted to escape to Austria, but they were caught and brought back to Paris. Louis swore obedience to the new French constitution in 1791, but continued secretly to work against the revolution and to plot intrigues with France's enemies. In 1792, when the National Convention, the assembly of elected French deputies, declared France a republic, the king was tried as a traitor and condemned to death. Louis XVI was guillotined on January 21, 1793, in the Place de la Révolution (now Place de la Concorde) in Paris.
Historians consider Louis XVI a victim of circumstances rather than a despot similar to the former French kings Louis XIV and Louis XV. He was weak and incapable as king and not overly intelligent. He preferred to spend his time at hobbies, such as hunting and making locks, rather than at his duties of state, and he permitted his wife to influence him unduly.
20. Louis XV: Louis the XV ruled from 1715 to 1774. He pursued pleasure before serious business and ran up more debts.: 20. Louis XV: Louis the XV ruled from 1715 to 1774. He pursued pleasure before serious business and ran up more debts.
21. Louis XIV: In 1643, five-year-old Louis XIV inherited the French throne. While still a teenager, he took over the government himself. Like his great-grandfather, Philip II of Spain, Louis believed in divine right. He took the sun as the symbol of his: 21. Louis XIV: In 1643, five-year-old Louis XIV inherited the French throne. While still a teenager, he took over the government himself. Like his great-grandfather, Philip II of Spain, Louis believed in divine right. He took the sun as the symbol of his power and became known as the Sun King. To increase royal power, Louis expanded the bureaucracy and appointed wealthy middle-class men to collect taxes. This helped tie the middle class to the monarch. He poured vast resources into wars to gain more land and dominate Europe. Louisâ€™ European rivals, however, joined together to fight him. They hoped to maintain the balance of power, or the distribution of military and economic power that would prevent any one nation from dominating Europe. Louis XIV ruled France with absolute authority for 72 years. During that time, French culture, manners, and customs became the standard for European taste. Louis built the immense palace of Versailles, which housed at least 10,000 people. He spared no expense to make Versailles the most magnificent building in Europe.
22. Marie Antoinette: Marie-Antoinette (1755-1793), queen consort (1774-1792) of Louis XVI of France; her unpopularity helped discredit the monarchy in the period before the French Revolution. Born in Vienna on November 2, 1755, Marie-Antoinette was one: 22. Marie Antoinette: Marie-Antoinette (1755-1793), queen consort (1774-1792) of Louis XVI of France; her unpopularity helped discredit the monarchy in the period before the French Revolution. Born in Vienna on November 2, 1755, Marie-Antoinette was one of the daughters of Holy Roman Emperor Francis I and Empress Maria Theresa. Her marriage (1770) to Louis, the heir to the French throne, was intended to cement an alliance between France and her parents' dynasty, the Habsburgs of Austria. She and her husband had a daughter and two sons after he succeeded to the throne in 1774. Disliked by the French as a foreigner, she made herself more unpopular by her devotion to the interests of Austria, the bad reputations of some of her friends, and her extravagance, which was mistakenly blamed for the financial problems of the French government. Especially damaging was her supposed connection with the so-called Diamond Necklace affair, a scandal involving the fraudulent purchase of some jewels (1785). After the outbreak of the Revolution in 1789, Marie-Antoinette sided with the intransigents at court who opposed compromise with the moderate revolutionaries, and began appealing for help to her brother, Holy Roman Emperor Leopold II. Marie and Louis tried to escape from Paris with their surviving son in 1791, but they were captured and brought back prisoners. In 1792 the monarchy was overthrown, and after the execution of the king and separation from her son, she was sent before the revolutionary tribunal the following year. Sentenced to death for treason, she was guillotined in Paris on October 16, 1793.
23. National Assembly: The delegates of the Third Estate said they represented the people of France. They transformed themselves into the national Assembly. They then invited members of the other estates to help them shape a constitution. A few days late: 23. National Assembly: The delegates of the Third Estate said they represented the people of France. They transformed themselves into the national Assembly. They then invited members of the other estates to help them shape a constitution. A few days later, the national Assembly found itself locked out of its meeting place. The delegates believed that the king intended to send them home. They took the famous Tennis Court Oath, and vowed not to disband until they had drawn up a constitution for France.
24. National Constitution: in politics, fundamental system of law, written or unwritten, of a sovereign state, established or accepted as a guide for governing the state. A constitution fixes the limits and defines the relations of the legislative, judic: 24. National Constitution: in politics, fundamental system of law, written or unwritten, of a sovereign state, established or accepted as a guide for governing the state. A constitution fixes the limits and defines the relations of the legislative, judicial, and executive powers of the state, thus setting up the basis for government. It also provides guarantees of certain rights to the people.
25. Nationalism: feeling of pride in and devotion to oneâ€™s country. Revolution and war gave people a strong sense of national identity. In earlier times, people had felt loyalty to local authorities. As monarchs centralized power, loyalty shifted to th: 25. Nationalism: feeling of pride in and devotion to oneâ€™s country. Revolution and war gave people a strong sense of national identity. In earlier times, people had felt loyalty to local authorities. As monarchs centralized power, loyalty shifted to the king or queen. Now, the government rallied sons and daughters of the revolution to defend the nation itself.
26. Necker: The heirs of Louis XIV were not the right men to solve the financial crisis in France. Louis XV, who ruled form 1715 to 1774, pursued pleasure before serious business and ran up more debts. His grandson, Louis XVI, was well-meaning but weak a: 26. Necker: The heirs of Louis XIV were not the right men to solve the financial crisis in France. Louis XV, who ruled form 1715 to 1774, pursued pleasure before serious business and ran up more debts. His grandson, Louis XVI, was well-meaning but weak and indecisive. He wisely chose Jacques Necker, a financial wizard, as an adviser. Necker urged the king to reduce court spending, reform government, and improve internal trade by abolishing tariffs that made trade costly. When Necker proposed taxing the First and Second estates, the nobles and high clergy forced the king to dismiss the would-be reformer.
27. New Republic: form of state based on the concept that sovereignty resides in the people, who delegate the power to rule in their behalf to elected representatives and officials. In practice, however, this concept has been variously stretched, distort: 27. New Republic: form of state based on the concept that sovereignty resides in the people, who delegate the power to rule in their behalf to elected representatives and officials. In practice, however, this concept has been variously stretched, distorted, and corrupted, making any precise definition of the term republic difficult. It is important, to begin with, to distinguish between a republic and a democracy. In the theoretical republican state, where the government expresses the will of the people who have chosen it, republic and democracy may be identical (there are also democratic monarchies). Historical republics, however, have never conformed to a theoretical model, and in the 20th century the term republic is freely used by dictatorships, one-party states, and democracies alike. Republic has, in fact, come to signify any form of state headed by a president or some similarly titled figure, and not a monarch.
28. Plebiscite: ballot in which voters have a direct say on an issue.: 28. Plebiscite: ballot in which voters have a direct say on an issue.
29. Radicals: members of a movement that advocates extreme change of political and social institutions. In France, before the Revolution of 1848, a radical was a supporter of universal manhood suffrage. After 1869 the French statesman Georges Clemenceau: 29. Radicals: members of a movement that advocates extreme change of political and social institutions. In France, before the Revolution of 1848, a radical was a supporter of universal manhood suffrage. After 1869 the French statesman Georges Clemenceau led a radical faction away from moderate republicanism, and in 1881 his party called for sweeping reforms; in 1901 the Radical-Socialist Party was formed. Today, the term radical most frequently is used to indicate extreme liberalism. Reactionary is the term given to an adherent of extreme conservatism. The labels, left and right, respectively, have been attached to these viewpoints. Communism is an example of radical, leftist extremism, and fascism exemplifies the extreme rightist views.
30. Reactionaries: a person with attitudes or behavior guided by an adverse reaction to social and political change. In politics and religion, reactionary movements represent a backlash to some profound upheaval within a society.: 30. Reactionaries: a person with attitudes or behavior guided by an adverse reaction to social and political change. In politics and religion, reactionary movements represent a backlash to some profound upheaval within a society.
31. Robespierre: The government battled counterrevolutionaries under the guiding hand of Maximilien Robespierre. Robespierre, a shrewd lawyer and politician, quickly rose to the leadership of the Committee of Public Safety. Among the Jacobins, his selfle: 31. Robespierre: The government battled counterrevolutionaries under the guiding hand of Maximilien Robespierre. Robespierre, a shrewd lawyer and politician, quickly rose to the leadership of the Committee of Public Safety. Among the Jacobins, his selfless dedication to the revolution earned him the nickname â€œthe incorruptible.â€ Enemies called him a tyrant. Robespierre had embraced Rousseauâ€™s idea of the general will. He promoted religious toleration and sought to abolish slavery. Though cold and humorless, he was popular with the sans-culottes, who hated the old regime as much as he. He believed that France could achieve a â€œrepublic of virtueâ€ only through the use of terror. Robespierre was a chief architect of the Reign of Terror.
32. Reign of Terror: The Reign of Terror lasted from about July 1793 to July 1794. Revolutionary courts conducted hasty trials. Spectators greeted death sentences with cries of â€œHail the Republic!â€ or â€œPerish the traitors!â€ About 40,000 people di: 32. Reign of Terror: The Reign of Terror lasted from about July 1793 to July 1794. Revolutionary courts conducted hasty trials. Spectators greeted death sentences with cries of â€œHail the Republic!â€ or â€œPerish the traitors!â€ About 40,000 people died during the Terror. About 15% were nobles and clergy. Another 15% were middle-class citizens, often moderates who had supported the revolution in 1789. The rest were peasants and sans-culottes involved in riots or revolts against the Republic. Many were executed, including victims of mistaken identity or false accusations by their neighbors. Many more were packed into prisons, where deaths were common. The engine of the Terror was the guillotine, which quickly became a symbol of horror. Within a year, the Reign of Terror consumed its own. Weary of bloodshed and fearing for their own lives, the Convention turned on the Committee of Public Safety. Once the heads of Robespierre and other radicals fell, executions slowed down dramatically.
33. Sans-culotte: In Paris and other cities, working-class men and women, called sans-culottes pushed the revolution into more radical action. By 1791, many sans-culottes demanded a republic. They also wanted the government to guarantee them a living wag: 33. Sans-culotte: In Paris and other cities, working-class men and women, called sans-culottes pushed the revolution into more radical action. By 1791, many sans-culottes demanded a republic. They also wanted the government to guarantee them a living wage.
The sans-culottes found support among radical leaders in the Legislative Assembly, especially the Jacobins.
Second Estate: The Second Estate was made up of nobles. The Second Estate was the titled nobility of French society. In the Middle ages, noble knights had defended the land. In the 1600s, Richelieu and Louis XIV had crushed the noblesâ€™ military power b: Second Estate: The Second Estate was made up of nobles. The Second Estate was the titled nobility of French society. In the Middle ages, noble knights had defended the land. In the 1600s, Richelieu and Louis XIV had crushed the noblesâ€™ military power but given them other rights â€“ under strict royal control. Those rights included top jobs in government, the army, the courts, and the Church. At Versailles, ambitious nobles vied for royal appointments, while idle courtiers enjoyed endless entertainments. Many nobles lived far from the center of power. Through they owned land, they had little money income. As a result, they felt the pinch of trying to maintain their status in a period of rising prices. Many nobles hated absolutism and resented the royal bureaucracy that employed middle-class men in positions once reserved for the aristocracy. They feared losing their traditional privileges, especially their freedom from paying taxes.
35. Suffrage: the right to vote: 35. Suffrage: the right to vote
Third Estate: In 1789, the Third Estate was 98% of the entire population. It was a diverse group. At the top of the Third Estate sat the bourgeoisie, or middle class. The bourgeoisie included the prosperous bankers, merchants, and manufacturers who propp: Third Estate: In 1789, the Third Estate was 98% of the entire population. It was a diverse group. At the top of the Third Estate sat the bourgeoisie, or middle class. The bourgeoisie included the prosperous bankers, merchants, and manufacturers who propped up the French economy. It also included the officials who staffed the royal bureaucracy, as well as lawyers, doctors, journalists, professors, and skilled artisans. Wealthy bourgeois families could buy political office and even titles. The bulk of the Third Estate (9 out of 10 people in France) were rural peasants. Some were prosperous landowners who hired laborers to work for them. Others were tenant farmers or day laborers. Still others owed obligations to local nobles.
The poorest members of the Third Estate were city workers. They included apprentices, journeymen, and others who worked in industries such as printing or cloth making. Many women and men earned a living ass servants, stable hands, porters, construction workers, or street hawkers. A large number were unemployed. To survive, some turned to crime or begging.
37. Taxation: system of raising money to finance government. All governments require payments of moneyâ€”taxesâ€”from people. Governments use tax revenues to pay soldiers and police, to build dams and roads, to operate schools and hospitals, to provide f: 37. Taxation: system of raising money to finance government. All governments require payments of moneyâ€”taxesâ€”from people. Governments use tax revenues to pay soldiers and police, to build dams and roads, to operate schools and hospitals, to provide food to the poor and medical care to the elderly, and for hundreds of other purposes. Without taxes to fund its activities, government could not exist.
38. Tricolor: Lafayette headed the National Guard, a largely middle-class militia organized in response to the arrival of royal troops in Paris. The Guard was the first group to don the tricolor, a red, white, and blue badge, which was eventually adopted: 38. Tricolor: Lafayette headed the National Guard, a largely middle-class militia organized in response to the arrival of royal troops in Paris. The Guard was the first group to don the tricolor, a red, white, and blue badge, which was eventually adopted as the national flag of France.
39. Versailles: During that time, French culture, manners, and customs became the standard for European taste. Louis built the immense palace of Versailles, which housed at least 10,000 people. He spared no expense to make Versailles the most magnificent: 39. Versailles: During that time, French culture, manners, and customs became the standard for European taste. Louis built the immense palace of Versailles, which housed at least 10,000 people. He spared no expense to make Versailles the most magnificent building in Europe. He did this most conspicuously through his belligerent foreign policy and the grandiose court he built at Versailles, which he located away from the people and political pressures of Paris. Versailles and its lifestyle elevated the private person of the Sun King, as Louis was called. Thousands of courtiers focused attention on his every activity from morning to night. The nationâ€™s best and brightest intellectuals and artists were enlisted to enhance Louisâ€™s glory in historical writing, music, poetry, art, and architecture, all of which flourished under his reign. So brilliantly did Versailles shine that knowledge of French culture and language became common among elites across Europe. Louis also increased surveillance of and control over his subjects by building up the military, creating a Parisian police force, and tightening the system of book censorship. In 1789, on the Jeu de Paume (tennis) Court, the Estates-General of France took the famous oath that heralded the beginning of the French Revolution.
40. War Debt: the monarchy almost always spent more each year than it collected in taxes; consequently, it was forced to borrow, which it did increasingly during the 18th century. Debt grew in part because France participated in a series of costly warsâ€: 40. War Debt: the monarchy almost always spent more each year than it collected in taxes; consequently, it was forced to borrow, which it did increasingly during the 18th century. Debt grew in part because France participated in a series of costly warsâ€”the War of the Austrian Succession (1740-1748), the Seven Yearsâ€™ War (1756-1763), and the American Revolution (1775-1783). Large existing debts and a history of renouncing earlier ones meant that the country was forced to borrow at higher interest rates than some other countries, further adding to the already massive debt. By 1789 the state was forced to spend nearly half its yearly revenues paying the interest it owed.
41. Winter 1788: On the eve of the French Revolution, national debts and aristocratic unwillingness to sacrifice forced heavy tax increases on a populace already living at near-subsistence levels. Bickering between King Louis XVI and leading aristocrats: 41. Winter 1788: On the eve of the French Revolution, national debts and aristocratic unwillingness to sacrifice forced heavy tax increases on a populace already living at near-subsistence levels. Bickering between King Louis XVI and leading aristocrats revealed that the king could not effectively enforce his will through the military. In 1787 and 1788 excessive exports of already-scarce food caused near starvation among the poorer classes, and a bumper grape harvest depressed prices and further reduced the buying power of poor agricultural workers. Then came the winter of 1788-1789, probably the worst of the entire century. Inspired by political philosophers and the recent success of the American Revolution, many members of the middle and lower classes became increasingly hostile to the system that seemed to cause their suffering. On July 14, 1789, a large group of Parisian citizens attacked the Bastille, the large central prison that symbolized to the populace the worst aristocratic offenses. Power struggles for control of the countryâ€”both political and philosophicalâ€”dominated the next few years. In August 1792, when Darnay leaves England for France, the dominant political group passed a series of laws renouncing monarchy and proclaiming death for any returning aristocrats. During the months that followed, this political group used the infamous guillotine to behead aristocrats and others who opposed their policies. As Dickens shows, it became very dangerous even to voice opinions contrary to the prevailing ideas. During this period approximately 300,000 people were jailed, and about 17,000 of these were executed.

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