His 102French Revolution.htm

Chapter 19:  The French Revolution and Napoleon

 

I.                    Background to the French Revolution

A.     Social Structure revisited

B.     Other Problems facing the French Monarchy

1.      Economic problems

2.      Ideas of the philosophes

3.      Finances

 

II.                 The French Revolution

A.     From Estates General to a National Assembly

1.      The problem over voting

2.      the National Assembly & Tennis Court Oath

3.      The common people intervene

a.       Bastille

b.      The Great Fear

B.     The Destruction of the Old Regime

1.      The Declaration of the Right of Man

2.      The Women’s March to Versailles in protest

3.      Reform of the Catholic Church

4.      A New Constitution

5.      Opposition from Within and Abroad

a.       The sans-culottes

C.     The Radical Revolution

1.      Proclamation of a Republic

2.      Domestic Crisis and the Execution of Louis XVI

3.      Foreign Crisis and a Nation in Arms

4.      The Committee of Public Safety & Reign of Terror

5.      The “Republic of Virtue”

6.      Dechristianization and a New Calendar

7.      Equality and Slavery

8.      Decline of the Committee of Public Safety

D.     The Thermidorean Reaction and the Directory

 

III.               The Age of Napoleon

A.     The Rise of Napoleon

1.      His education

2.      Military victory at Toulon; in Italy; losses in Egypt

3.      His rise to office of consul

4.      His rise to emperor

B.     Napoleon’s Domestic Policies

1.      His alliance (Concordat) with the Catholic Church

2.      Napoleon’s Code of Law

3.      The New Bureaucracy and its Growth

4.      Napoleon’s despotism

C.     Napoleon’s Empire

1.      Napoleon’s Grand Empire

a.       France; Dependent States; Allied States

b.      Obedience and Liberties

c.       Europe’s Reaction and British Nationalism

d.      The Growth of Nationalism

e.       The Beginning of the End:  the Russian Fiasco

f.        Elba; Waterloo; and St. Helena

 

Reading Guide:

 

  1. What led to the meeting of the Estates General in 1789?

 

  1. What were the major actions of the National Assembly?

 

  1. How did the new constitution change France?

 

  1. What role did the common play in the Revolution?

 

  1. Why was the Declaration of the Rights of Man an important document?  How did it affect women?

 

  1. Why did foreign nations oppose the revolutionary developments in France?

 

  1. Why did the Revolution turn radical?  Who were the main players?

 

  1. What role did the Committee of Public Safety and the Reign of Terror play in the radical revolution?

 

  1. What was the Republic of Virtue all about?

 

  1. How did the radical revolution affect organized religion?

 

  1. Why was their a reaction against the radical revolution?

 

  1. What accounted for Napoleon’s rise to power?

 

  1. How did Napoleon change France?

 

  1. What did Napoleon try to accomplish internationally?

 

  1. What role did England play in Napoleon’s story?

 

  1. Was Napoleon’s decision to invade Russia a bad one?

 

  1. What happen to Napoleon after his Russian invasion?

 

  1. Was Napoleon a preserver or destroyer of the French Revolution?

 

 

 

Assignment:

 

A good way to understand a topic is to compare and contrast it (similarities and differences) with another.  In this assignment you are to compare and contrast the French Revolution and the 17th century English revolution.  To properly deal with this question, you probably need to break it down into three components.  First, review the English Revolution in chapter 15 and think about the activists.  Who were they?  As far as this chapter on France, examine the newspaper account of the fall of the Bastille (p. 540) as well as gather information from the following paintings and drawings:  (Tennis Court Oath, p. 539; Women’s March to Versilles, p. 541)  Second, examine the fates of the rulers.  At what point in the revolution was Charles I executed?  Louis XVI?  Look at the painting of Louis XVI’s execution (p. 545).  What elements of the image of his execution are particularly striking in terms of who was participating?  Third, using the description of the English Revolution on pages 434-436 and the French Revolution on pages 546-550, ascertain the actions of the majority populations of each country.  From this evidence you should be able to get a good sense of how these two revolutions differed.  Can you develop your own theory of political revolution based on these two similar but different revolutions?