Sunday, September 10, 2017

How did mismanagement by French leaders contribute to both revolutions?

The Great French Revolution of 1789, much like the American revolution before it, has deep roots in what the people viewed as unfair taxation. France was in a great deal of debt as a result of the Seven Years' War and American Revolutionary War, and an attempt was made to ease this debt by imposing a large burden on the common people. The people were further driven against the nobility of the nation by years...

The Great French Revolution of 1789, much like the American revolution before it, has deep roots in what the people viewed as unfair taxation. France was in a great deal of debt as a result of the Seven Years' War and American Revolutionary War, and an attempt was made to ease this debt by imposing a large burden on the common people. The people were further driven against the nobility of the nation by years of poor food harvests which had created much hardship for the common people while the privileged classes remained well-fed. This situation was further exacerbated by the abolition of feudalism which had offered the lower classes some degree of protection and privilege. In response, various liberal assemblies began to arise and demand new guarantees of liberty from the government. The monarchy responded by attempting to thwart the growing liberal movement, only further driving the people to see themselves as being at odds with rulers who were no longer able to provide their subjects with an acceptable quality of life.


The Second French Revolution, also known as the July Revolution, occurred in July of 1830 and saw King Charles X dethroned and replaced by Louis Philippe I. While the coronation of Charles X was originally meet with great popular approval, he quickly lost the approval of the people as the result of two largely hated decrees. The first was the Anti-Sacrilege Act which imposed penalty of death on anyone who profaned the Eucharist, and the second was the paying of financial reparations to anyone who has stood as an enemy to the Napoleonic empire. The Chamber of Peers and Chamber of Deputies capitalized on the unpopularity of the monarch to their own ends, further driving a schism between the people and then King, culminating in March of 1830 when they passed a motion of no confidence in Charles X, who in turn dissolved parliament, delayed national elections, suspended freedoms of the press, and moved to exclude the commercial middle class from having voting rights. This infighting amongst the branches of the national government, and the harsh reactions of the King, produced an environment ripe for revolution.

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