The French Government

1. The French Government Hemal Parikh And Ravi Patel

2. The Monarchy • The Monarchy was the first government in France. It was before the revolution. • the fall of Rome marked the beginning of 13 centuries of monarchy, with several successive dynasties right through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. • Clovis I was the first king of France. Charlemagne is famous because he is often said to have "invented school". • François I was a great Renaissance king, an art lover. Louis XIV, known as the "Sun King "

3. The National Assembly • Étienne Charles Loménie de Brienne succeeded Calonne. His attempts to procure money were stopped by the Parliament of Paris and King Louis XVI was forced to agree to the calling of the States-General. Elections were ordered in 1788, and on May 5, 1789, for the first time since 1614, the States-General met at Versailles. The chief purpose of the king and of Necker, who had been recalled, was to obtain the assembly's consent to a general fiscal reform. • Each of the three estates—clergy, nobility, and the third estate, or commons—presented its particular complaint to the crown. The question soon arose whether the estates should meet separately and vote by order or meet jointly and vote by head • As Louis XVI gambled , the deputies of the third estate defiantly proclaimed themselves the National Assembly; on their invitation, many members of the lower clergy and a few nobles joined them. When the king had their meeting place closed, they went to an indoor tennis court and there took an oath not to disband until a constitution had been drawn up. On June 27 the king took on and legalized the National Assembly. At the same time, however, he surrounded Versailles with troops and let himself be persuaded by a court faction, which included the queen, Marie Antoinette, to dismiss Necker.

4. The National Convention • assembly that governed France from September 20, 1792, until October 26, 1795, during the most critical period of the French Revolution. The National Convention was elected to provide a new constitution for the country after the overthrow of the monarchy. The Convention numbered 749 deputies, including businessmen, tradesmen, and many professional men. • The struggles between two opposing Revolutionary factions, the Montagnards and the Girondins, dominated the first phase of the Convention (September 1792 to May 1793). The Montagnards favored granting the poorer classes more political power, while the Girondins favored a bourgeois republic and wanted to reduce the power of Paris over the course of the Revolution. Discredited by a series of defeats in the war they promoted against the anti-Revolutionary European coalition, the Girondins were purged from the Convention by the popular insurrection of May 31 to June 2, 1793. • The Montagnards controlled the Convention during its second phase (June 1793 to July 1794). Because of the war and an internal rebellion, a revolutionary government with dictatorial powers (exercised by the Committee of Public Safety) was set up. As a result, the democratic constitution approved by the Convention on June 24, 1793, was not put into effect, and the Convention lost its legislative initiative; its role was reduced to approving the Committee’s suggestions.

5. The Directory • directory, French the government of France in the difficult years between the dictatorship and the consulate. it was composed of two legislative houses, a council of five hundred and a council of ancients, and an executive of five directors. it was dominated by moderates and sought to stabilize the country by overcoming the economic and financial problems at home and ending the war abroad. in 1796 it introduced measures to combat inflation and the currency crisis, but popular distress increased and opposition grew as the Jacobins reassembled. a sin, led by François Babeuf, was successfully crushed but it persuaded the directory to seek support from the royalists. in the elections the next year, supported by napoleon, it decided to resort to force.

6. The Consulate with Napoleon as Chief Consul, and the Emperor • Early Successes During the turmoil of the revolution, Napoleon rose quickly in the army. In December 1793, he drove British forces out of the French port of Toulon (too lohn). He then went on to win several dazzling victories against the Austrians, capturing most of northern Italy and forcing the Hapsburg emperor to make peace. Hoping to disrupt British trade with India, he led a colorful expedition to Egypt in 1798. The Egyptian campaign proved to be a disaster, but Napoleon managed to hide stories of the worst losses from his admirers in France.Success fueled his ambition. By 1799, he moved from victorious general to political leader. That year, he helped overthrow the weak Directory and set up a three-man governing board known as the Consulate. Another constitution was drawn up, but Napoleon soon took the title First Consul. In 1802, he had himself named consul for life.TimelineA Self-made Emperor Two years later, Napoleon had acquired enough power to assume the title Emperor of the French. He invited the pope to preside over his coronation in Paris. During the ceremony, however, Napoleon took the crown from the pope's hands and placed it on his own head. By this action, Napoleon meant to show that he owed his throne to no one but himself.TimelineAt each step on his rise to power, Napoleon had held a plebiscite (plehbihsīt), or ballot in which voters say yes or no. Each time, the French strongly supported him. To understand why, we must look at his policies.

7. RAVI PATEL HEMAL PARIKH