The French Revolution 1789-1795

by Bertha Meriton Gardiner

Ministry of Necker.

If, however, England was slow to move, reforms once made rested on a sure foundation. Such was not the case with those made in the name of absolute princes on the Continent. After Turgot’s dismissal, fifty out of seventy of the guilds which he had abolished were revived, and the peasants were compelled by blows to resume their labours on the roads. Necker, a Genevese banker, was Turgot’s successor (October 1776). He was not a statesman, like Turgot, with definite aims in view, but he was an able financier and a humane man, holding the philanthropic sentiments of the day, and eager to relieve the condition of the masses. A war with England increased the difficulties of the government. In 1778 Louis, reluctantly following public opinion, assisted the English colonies in America in their struggle for independence. There were only three means of meeting the expenses of the war: increased taxation, economy, and loans. The first was impossible; the second only possible to a limited extent; and Necker, therefore, was compelled to borrow. The loans that he opened were quickly filled up, because men of the middle class, who were the chief lenders, believed that their interests were safe while he directed the finances. But the public debt was greatly increased, and the prospect of the future, with reforms uneffected in the system of taxation, rendered them more dark. Although Necker did not attempt to introduce radical measures such as had excited opposition against Turgot, his abolition of sinecures and other administrative changes gave offence to the same classes. The Parliament of Paris, whose lead was followed by the twelve provincial Parliaments, formed the chief organ of resistance. These Parliaments or law-courts were, in fact, powerful legal corporations to which many hundred persons were attached. The judges belonged to the nobility of office, and were independent of the government, since they held their offices in right of purchase, and might not be dispossessed without proof of misconduct. They exercised, besides judicial, a certain political function, since edicts of the King’s council did not have the force of law until they had been registered by the Parliaments. This right of registration in the time of Louis XIV. had been a mere form. If the Parliament of Paris hesitated to carry out his wishes, he held a so-called bed of justice when he came to the court in person, and on his command registration was compulsory. But now that the royal authority had fallen into contempt, the Parliaments offered prolonged resistance, and before the Government could obtain registration of its edicts, intimidation and even the use of military force were resorted to. Necker, when he sought to effect reform, necessarily became involved in quarrels with the Parliaments, and, finding that the King gave but a half-hearted support, he resigned office (1781).

Desire for political liberty.

Louis could relieve himself from momentary inconvenience by abandoning a Minister of whom he was weary, but had no power to stay the course of events. Those who had lent money to the government deeply resented Necker’s fall, because they believed him able to secure regular payment of the interest on the national debt. Desire for social change was accompanied by desire for political change also. Rousseau had said that the people was sovereign, and as the incompetency of the crown to carry out the national will became with each successive ministry more manifest, ideas long since vaguely floating in men’s minds gathered strength and consistency. The cause of the American colonies was taken up with immense enthusiasm. The Declaration of Independence (July 4, 1776), which, in accordance with the principles laid down in the ‘Social Contract,’ asserted that all men were created equal and endowed with the natural right of overthrowing an unjust government, was hailed as the enunciation of an universal truth, of which Frenchmen as well as the colonists might reap the benefit. Meanwhile government in France grew yearly more utterly weak and helpless. The war with England ended in 1783, but financial embarrassments increased. ♦Calonne.♦ Calonne, who became Controller-General the same year, pursued Necker’s system of borrowing without his justification, and retained office by abstaining from acts calculated to offend the privileged classes. The demands of the Queen and the Court were complied with, and abuses destroyed by Necker again called into existence. ‘If it is possible, madam,’ said the obsequious Minister, on an occasion when the Queen pressed him for money, ‘it shall be done; if it is impossible, it shall be done.’ But such squandering of the revenue could not last for ever. Calonne’s credit broke down, and he was driven as a last resource to propose the reform of the entire system of administration and taxation. By publicity he hoped to overcome resistance. He called together an extraordinary council or assembly of notables, nominated by the King (February 1787), and laid his propositions before them, thinking that in the existing state of opinion they would not venture to refuse support. But this assembly, composed almost entirely of privileged persons, proved recalcitrant. The majority were against the reforms proposed, while the few who approved them were determined that they should be made by an assembly representative of the nation.

Brienne.

Calonne gave place (1787) to Brienne, Archbishop of Toulouse, the candidate of the Queen; but the new Minister had no choice except to take up the plans of his predecessor, and the government became involved in incessant strife with the Parliaments. The Parliaments concealed their aversion to the principle of equality of taxation, by denying the right of the King to impose new taxes without the consent of the nation, and by demanding the meeting of the States-General. The government, on its side, sought popularity by coupling edicts for raising loans and taxes with reforming measures. But it could obtain no support. The shifting policy which it had so long pursued, the attempts at reform, made, abandoned, and then made again, had destroyed confidence alike in its power and its good-will. Hence, although the Parliaments defended the privileges of nobles and clergy, their resistance was applauded, because it offered the surest means of forcing the King’s hand, and leaving him no alternative but to summon the nation to his aid. Along with equality, the word ‘liberty’ was on every man’s lips. The very nobles, who had so long opposed administrative and economical change, had themselves become vehement advocates of political change. More afraid of the crown than of the classes beneath them, and blind to the complete isolation of their own order, they looked forward to being at once leaders of a political revolution and guardians of their own interests. In fact, the privileged orders had no choice but either to submit at discretion to the King, or to join in the popular cry for the meeting of the States-General. Arbitrary attempts made by Brienne to free the crown of dependence on the Parliaments failed, in the face of resistance offered by all classes, and brought the country to the verge of actual insurrection. Disaffection was rife in the army. Peasants and artisans, excited by expectation of better days, were more ready than before to rise in insurrection against local authorities, and were less easily quelled. State bankruptcy impended. There was a deficit in the revenue of more than 2,000,000l., and money was wanting with which to pay the interest of the national debt. Under such circumstances Louis reluctantly yielded to the demand made on every side. He declared his intention of summoning the States-General and in order to regain confidence restored to the head of the finances his former and still popular minister, Necker (Aug. 1788).

Necker recalled to office.

Necker’s return to office was greeted with a burst of applause from one end of France to the other. His financial ability was relied on to stave off bankruptcy, and it was known that he had always opposed the court, and that he now desired the meeting of the States-General. But his popularity was due to those causes alone; not to any proof that he had given or could give of his fitness to direct the royal policy. As he failed to comprehend the real causes of the impending revolution, he would be unable to moderate its violence.

Pamphlets and cahiers.

The hopes and desires of every class found expression first in pamphlets, and subsequently in the cahiers or petitions of grievances drawn up by electoral assemblies to be laid before the States. The importance and necessity of reform was generally admitted, except where special interests or class prejudices made men averse to change. Thus nobles combated the conservative tendencies of ecclesiastics, ecclesiastics the conservative tendencies of nobles. Induced by pressure of public opinion the nobles mostly declared their willingness to admit the principle of equality of taxation. But agreement went no further. Between the two privileged orders and the body of the nation a gulf was fixed, of bridging which no hope existed. That which the nobles had in view by the meeting of the States was the establishment of constitutional monarchy, based on aristocratical institutions and insuring political and social predominance to their own order. The aim of the middle and working classes was absolutely to destroy every distinction which gave to nobles and ecclesiastics a position apart in the State. The members of the upper orders were not only to bear their fair share of taxation, but to submit to the same law, and to stand in all respects on exactly the same level as the mass of their fellow-citizens. A pamphlet written by the Abbé Siéyès, which gave clear articulation to the thought in men’s minds, acquired for its author European celebrity. What, he asked, is the Third Estate?—Everything. What hitherto has it been in the State?—Nothing. He then proceeded to argue that the Third Estate, in other words the people of France with the exception of the nobles, formed a complete nation by themselves; that by them all useful work was done; and that the nobility was merely an excrescence, preventing the growth and development of national life. The Third Estate is, he said, a nation fettered and oppressed. What would it be without the nobility?—A free and flourishing nation.