Causes of the French Revolution

1. Causes of the French Revolution

2. Cause #1 – Estates System

3. Growth of European Population • Between 1700-1790, European population grew from 120 million to 190 million • France went from 20 million to 26 million in the same period • In the whole 16th century their population had only increased by 1 million

4. Why such high population growth rates? • Agricultural Revolution • Relief from famines • Reduced death rate • New crops from the Americans (corn and potatoes) • End of bubonic plague • Last outbreak in 1720 • Despite improvements, disease was still rampant and famine and hunger could still be devastating

5. Economic Hardship • High prices for bread, falling wages and high unemployment darkened the 1770’s and 1780’s • Series of bad harvests (worst in 1775) • Harvests of 1787 and 1788 (key years in the French political drama) were very poor • 1770 Food Riot (Rheims) • 1775 Corn Riot (Beaumont-Sur-Oise) • 1778 Bread Riots (Grenoble/Toulouse) • 1784 Bread Riot (Bayeux) • 1785 Bread Riot (Rennes) • 1787 Food Riot (Paris)

6. Poverty, Discontent and Taxation • Peasants claimed that a “seigneurial reaction” was underway • Nobles attempting to maximize profits from their lands • Raised rents • Reasserted old rights over common lands forests, lakesand streams) • Nobles held rights of justice over their peasants • Many of the cahiers (list of grievances) drawn for the meeting of the Estates General noted grievances with the seigneurial regime

7. Poverty Redefined • Prior to 16th century, poor viewed as blessed children of God; assisting them was a Christian duty • 16th and 17th centuries charity to poor beggars seen as encouraging idleness leading to vice and crime • French authorities attempted to round up beggars and vagrants and incarcerate them as a deterrent

8. Cause #2 – American Revolution

9. Seven Years War (1756-1763) • Conflict between the five super powers: France, Prussia, Austria, Russia and Britiain

10. Beginning of the Revolutionary Era • British highly in debt from Seven Years War • Had to pay off debt somehow! • Sugar Act– Tax on molasses, sugar and wine • Currency Act – Could not print their own money • Quartering Act – Provide food and shelter to British military soldiers • Stamp Act – high taxation rate, created a lot of hostility and tension (forced to pay for legal documents, licenses etc.)

11. Building an Empire • Britain envisioned a single empire with Parliament as the supreme authority • Americans has their own assemblies and believed that Parliament had no right to interfere in their internal affairs • On July 4, 1776, the Second Continental Congress approved a declaration of independence written by Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)

12. War of Independence • War with Britain was a gamble • Britain was a strong European military power • Army formed by the Second Continental Congress was filled with undisciplined amateurs whose terms of service were short compared to the veteran troops of the British • Internal divisions in the colonies, pitting family members and neighbours against each other

13. What does this mean for France? Statue of Liberty represents Libertas, the Roman Goddess of freedom, who bears a torch and a tabula ansata(a tablet evoking the law)

14. Cause #3 – Financial Difficulties Cause #4 – Poor Leadership/Weak Monarch • Read handout on “The Financial Crisis” and summarize information under two headings • Financial Difficulties • Poor Leadership/Weak Monarch