French Revolution

Directions: Use 3-5 minutes to double check this subject’s Power School for your class grade and work listings verifying that all work is caught up. Read and heed embedded messages. Next, research your part of the following topics and figure out answers to the questions. Write your questions and detailed answers on lined paper or your notebook paper. These questions and related answers are required to be handed in, once the class discussion is completed. You are expected to use the time completely, be through and become knowledgeable. Write down any puzzles you have related to the material on your paper and bring them up during the class discussion. Warning: If you are found to be using your research time for other things, it will hurt your learning and grade. If you think or claim to be done, you are not! Once your assigned part is ready, then help others on your team or study the test resources from Mr. Spitzer’s web page for the upcoming test. No games, non-topic talk or other activities allowed during research time. The class will research as much as time allows before team sharing and whole class discussion. Since there is always more to learn, Mr. Spitzer encourages you to look into this topic more on your own time. Your class work grade includes: 1. Entire use of time while researching. 2. Answer questions & pay attention during team sharing. 3. Paying attention & participate during class discussion. 4. Turning in your readable questions & notes. Team members who do not do their share, provide hasty sloppy answers, disrupt others and use time ineffectivelyin the four grade aspects will be removed from the team and required to write out and turn in all answers on their own for the grade.

Topics to Research

Questions to be able to discuss

  1. What nation served as an Enlightenment ideal of better government put into practice inspiration to France? Why did the French people seek to change their nation in the 1780s and 1790s? As part of your answer, discuss the make up of the First Estate, the Second Estate and the Third Estate including the resentments among these social classes.
  2. How did the excessive spending by French kings and the unfairness of the taxes cause France financial problems? Explain each aspect of both financial ruin causes. How did the French spending to help the American Revolution cause huge public debt and bring on crisis?
  3. Why did Louis XVI summon the Estates-General for the first time since 1614? What was the voting dispute and during the Estates General and how did Louis XVI add chaos related to delegate election? What steps created the National Assembly from the Estates-General?
  4. How was the creation of the National Assembly an act of revolution? How did the 1789 harvest and unemployment economic troubles escalate and cause crisis? Why did Louis XVI move 20,000 soldiers into Paris and what did he do with the troops? How did the crowd in Paris respond to this intimidation?
  5. What was the Bastille and how was it being used in 1789? Why and when did the crowds storm the Bastille? Describe the attack on the Bastille immediate cause, the assault violence and the aftermath. How did Louis XVI respond? What happened after this all over France within the next several weeks?
  1. What were the chief reforms made by the National Assembly? Explain the disbanding the feudal system, the ideals contained in the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, and the revolutionary nature of the new government set up by France’s first constitution.
  2. When was the new constitution completed and went into effect? What was Louis XVI’s reaction to the new constitution? How did the ideals of liberty, equality, and natural rights alarm the monarchs of Europe? What did Louis XVI try to do in June 1791 and how did citizens react to this? Why did France go to war with Austria, Prussia and much of the rest of Europe, in 1792? How well did the French army fight? What happened to the royal family, the monarchy and National Assembly during August 1792?
  3. Describe the September 1792 provisional government under the National Constitutional Convention. How was it a republic? What were the charges levied again Louis XVI and the outcome of his trial? How many royalists did the Convention government execute in September 1792 and by what means? When was Louis XVI executed and by what means?
  4. What conditions in France led to the Reign of Terror? Who did the Convention vote arrest, in June 1793, and then send to the guillotine. What was the make up of the Committee of Public Safety and who became the real head of the government in France? What were the goals of Maximilien de Robespiere? Describe his government and the Terror from August 1793-July 1794. What happened to former queen Marie Antoinette?
  5. Describe the mobilization of France for war under the Committee government? Describe how France created the first modern citizen army and supplied it? Who were the officers in charge of the enlarged army and how well did the army fight the war in 1794?
  6. Why did the Committee of Public Safety lose its public support and consume it own leaders? How did the remaining moderate Convention government members end the Terror of the Committee? What happened to Robespiere?
  7. What was the make up of the next French government of the Directory? Describe this government and the loss of rights to the French people. How did the Directory hold onto power from 1795-1799? Why was the Directory increasingly unsuccessful and keeping support of the people?

Critical Thinking

  1. Emmanuel Sieyes, a liberal priest and leader of the Third Estate wrote, “the Third [Estate] … includes everything that belongs to the nation; and everything not of the Third cannot be regarded as of the nation. What is the Third? Everything.” What values do Emmanuel Sieyes assertions imply? Do you agree or disagree with his statements or values? Explain.
  2. How did the king’s need for funds lead to the French Revolution? How was this similar to the Puritan Revolution/English Civil War cause? Could the current huge government debt cause a like threat to the modern U.S.? Explain.
  3. What conditions, both domestic and international, led to the Reign of Terror? Was MaximilienRobespiere evil? Justify your answer?
  4. To what extent were the principles of “liberty, equality, and fraternity” fulfilled during the French Revolution of 1789-1799? Support with examples.
  5. Make an argument as to which governmental arrangement—monarchial rule, the National Assembly’s constitutional monarchy, the National Convention’s republic, or the Directory—was best suited to revolutionary France.