Opposition to Louis Philippe

1. Opposition to Louis Philippe www.educationforum.co.uk

2. How Secure was LP in 1830? • Not very! • LP neither appealed to old elites or to the new working class – he had a very narrow base of support • His first 2 years were very troubled marked by riots and disturbances • Especially in Lyons where silk weavers rioted in 31 and 34 demanding a minimum wage • LP crushed the silk weavers with the National Guard

3. Industrialisation • Industrial revolution came relatively lately to France but by 1830 problems of factory conditions, low pay, long hours population growth, poor living conditions were creating a discontented urban working class • A new ideology started to emerge in response to these conditions which directly criticised capitalism – the ideology of socialism

4. French Socialists • Saint Simon – the pioneer socialist who died in 1825 – came up with the slogan ‘from each according to his abilities to each according to his needs’ as an alternative to capitalism • Charles Fourier – proposed workers cooperatives sharing profits as an alternative to capitalist production • PJ Proudhon – famously declared ‘property is theft’ calling for common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange • Louis Blanc “The Organisation of Labour” 1840 in which he declared everyone had a ‘right’ to work and that this right should be guaranteed by the state by setting up ‘socialist workshops’

5. Working Class Agitation • Socialist ideas (especially those of Blanc) clearly evident in disturbances in Paris 1832, 34 and 39 and in Lille, Clermont and Toulouse in 1840, and in the wave of strikes which hit France 1844-46 • On every occasion LP’s response was to repress with troops, National Guard and law (trade unions made illegal)

6. Bonapartism • Whilst the Bonapartist party remained small during LP’s reign there was a discernible rise in support for the ‘Napoleonic legend’ – especially when it was compared to LP’s rather tame and subservient foreign policy • As the memory of military defeats faded Napoleon was increasingly seen by many as a man who brought law and order, glory, prosperity, efficiency, modernity and a great empire

7. Louis Napoleon • The heir to the Bonaparte legacy – initially a rather ridiculous figure • Exiled to Britain in the 1830’s where he wrote 2 books outlining his ideas ‘Reveries Politiques’ and ‘Manuel d’Artillerie’ • In 1836 he made his first rather comical attempt to seize power where attempting to enter France at Strasbourg he made a terrible speech and was arrested and deported • In 1840 he made a second attempt at a Coup D'état by hiring a Thames paddle steamer and crossing the Channel with 50 supporters who were roundly crushed by the National Guard in Boulogne – Louis Napoleon himself tried to escape in a small boat which started to sink and had to be rescued from drowning • He was duly arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment at Ham near the Somme in northern France • Whilst he was imprison who wrote ‘L’Extinction de Pauperisme’ which won him support from socialists and their followers • Louis Napoleon escaped Ham in 1846 and returned to England where he created a series of scandals with a series of ballet girls • In 1848 he was a special constable during the Chartist demonstration at Kennington Common and there was no indication that here was a man who would be very soon president of France and then Emperor of France