The French Revolution was a period in the history of France covering 1789 to 1799, in which republicans overthrew the Bourbon monarchy and the Catholic Church in France perforce underwent radical restructuring. This article covers the one-year period from 1 October 1791 to September 1792, during which France was governed by the Legislative Assembly, operating under the French Constitution of 1791, between the periods of the National Constituent Assembly and of the National Convention.
Legislative Assembly The National Constituent Assembly dissolved itself on 1 October 1791. Upon Maximilien Robespierre's motion it had decreed that none of its members should be capable of sitting in the next legislature; this is known as the Self-denying Ordinance. Its legacy, the Constitution of 1791, attempted to institute a liberal constitutional monarchy. This had been envisioned as an arrangement not to be tampered with for a generation but, in the event, it did not last a year. In the attempt to govern, the Assembly failed altogether. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, "It left behind an empty treasury, an undisciplined army and navy, and a people debauched by safe and successful riot."
In the elections of 1791, despite a limited electoral franchise, the party which desired to carry the French Revolution further had a success disproportionate to its numbers, a triumph for the Jacobin Club and by its affiliated societies throughout France. The Legislative Assembly first met on 1 October 1791. It consisted of 745 members. Few were nobles, very few were clergymen, and the great body came from the middle class. The members were generally young, and since none had sat in the previous Assembly, they largely lacked national political experience.
The right consisted of about 165 "Feuillants". Among them were some able men, such as Mathieu Dumas, Ramond, Vaublanc, Beugnot and Bigot de Préamenau, but they were guided chiefly by persons outside the House, because incapable of re-election: Barnave, Adrien Duport, and the brothers Alexander and Charles Lameth. The left consisted of about 330 Jacobins, a term which still included the emergent party afterwards known as the Girondins or Girondists, so termed because several of their leaders came from the region of the Gironde in southern France. Among the extreme left—those who would retain the name of Jacobins—sat Cambon, Couthon, Antoine-Christophe Merlin ("Merlin de Thionville"), François Chabot, and Claude Bazire.
The Girondins could claim the most brilliant orators: Pierre Victurnien Vergniaud, Marguerite-Élie Guadet, Armand Gensonné, and Maximin Isnard (the last being from Provence). Jacques Pierre Brissot ("Brissot de Warville"), a restless pamphleteer and editor of the newspaper Patriote, exerted such great influence over the party that it has sometimes gone by his name ("Brissotins"). Also aligned with the Girondins were Condorcet, secretary of the Assembly and Pétion, barred from the Legislative Assembly because he had been in the Constitutional Assembly, but who soon became mayor of Paris. This strong representation of the left in the Assembly was supplemented by the political clubs and the disorderly revolutionary elements in Paris and throughout France. The remainder of the Assembly, about 350 deputies,Matthews, 2004 did not belong to any definite party but voted most often with the left.
Ministers to the king The king's ministers, named by him and excluded from the Assembly, were mostly persons of little mark. Montmorin gave up the portfolio of foreign affairs on 31 October 1791 and was succeeded by De Lessart, the previous minister of finance. Bon-Claude Cahier de Gerville was minister of the interior; Louis Hardouin Tarbé, minister of finance; and Bertrand de Molleville, minister of marine. But the only minister who influenced the course of affairs was the comte de Narbonne, minister of war.
Overtly, the king (despite his earlier attempt to escape Paris during the flight to Varennes) had embraced the newly codified constitution. It seems unlikely that he could have been satisfied with losing his previous absolute power, but he may well have been sincerely trying to make the best of what, from his point of view, was a bad situation. Marie Antoinette surely wished to shake off the impotence and humiliation of the Crown, and for this end she still clung to the hope of foreign succour and corresponded with Vienna.
Politics of the left The left had three objects of enmity. First among these was the royal couple, King Louis XVI, Queen Marie Antoinette and the royal family. The left as a whole wished to replace the monarchy with a republic, although this was not initially the public position of most of them. Second came the émigrés—seen as a threat from abroad—and, third, the nonjuring clergy.
Those émigrés who had assembled in arms on the territories of the electors of Mainz and Treves (Trier) and in the Austrian Netherlands had put themselves in the position of public enemies. Their chiefs were the king's brothers, who affected to consider Louis as a captive and his acts as therefore invalid. The Count of Provence gave himself the airs of a regent and surrounded himself with a ministry. The only actual danger posed by the émigrés was symbolic: that they were only a few thousand strong; that they had no competent leader and no money; and that although they had earlier been of some diplomatic significance, they were increasingly unwelcome to the rulers whose hospitality they abused. However, Mignet claims that the threat was more substantive and their numbers growing and that "the ambassadors of the emigrants were received, while those of the French government were dismissed, ill received, or even thrown into prison, as in the case of M. Duveryer."
The nonjuring clergy—those who refused to take an oath under the Civil Constitution of the Clergy—although harassed by the local authorities, kept the respect and confidence of most Catholics. According to Montague (1911), "No acts of disloyalty were proved against them, and commissioners of the National Assembly reported to its successor that their flocks only desired to be let alone. But the anti-clerical bias of the Legislative Assembly was too strong for such a policy." Mignet, however, quotes the marquis de Ferrières, "Priests, and especially bishops employed all the resources of fanaticism to excite the people, in town and country, against the civil constitution of the clergy", and points out that Bishops ordered the priests no longer to perform divine service in the same church with the constitutional priests. It was increasingly unlikely that two rival Churches could co-exist. Insurrection along religious lines broke out in Calvados, Gévaudan, and the Vendée (see Revolt in the Vendée).
The king exercises his veto From the first, relations between the king and the Legislative Assembly were less than friendly. The king refused to meet the Assembly's initial delegation in person; the Assembly voted to deprive the ceremony of the king's visit to their hall of almost all customary pomp (although the vote was rescinded the following day, and the king's address was generally well received).
On 9 November 1791 the Assembly decreed that the émigrés assembled on the frontiers should be liable to the penalties of death and confiscation if they remained so assembled on 1 January following. (The legislation was clearly directed against those who had taken up arms or engaged in diplomacy: it was reasonably indulgent towards those who simply felt safer abroad.) Louis did not love his brothers, and he detested their policy, which without rendering him any service made his liberty and even his life precarious; yet, loath to condemn them to death, he vetoed the decree. He did, however, sign a decree of 30 October, stating that his eldest brother Louis-Stanislaus-Xavier was required to return to France in two months, or at the expiration of that period he would be considered to have forfeited his rights as regent.
On 29 November 1791 the Assembly decreed that every non-juring clergyman must take within eight days the civic oath, substantially the same as the oath previously administered, on pain of losing his pension and, if any troubles broke out, of being deported. This decree Louis vetoed as a matter of conscience. In either case his resistance only served to give a weapon to his enemies in the Assembly. But foreign affairs were at this time the most critical.
A new administration in Paris Following the same policy under which the members of the Constituent Assembly had barred themselves from the Legislative Assembly, in October, Lafayette resigned the command of the National Guard, and Bailly retired from the mayoralty of Paris. Most of those who wished to continue a constitutional monarchy (against the increasingly republican legislature) wished Lafayette to succeed Bailly as mayor. However, afraid of Lafayette as a rival to the king, the court actually favored and assisted the Girondist Pétion in the election. In the election of 4 November, Pétion received 9,708 votes in a total of 10,632 and became the new mayor.
War approaches The armed bodies of émigrés on the territory of the Holy Roman Empire afforded matter of complaint to France. The persistence of the French in offering only money as compensation to the German princes who had claims in Alsace afforded matter of complaint to the Empire. Foreign statesmen noticed with alarm the effect of the French Revolution upon opinion in their own countries, and they resented the endeavours of French revolutionaries to make converts there.
Of these statesmen, the emperor Leopold II was the most intelligent. He had skillfully extricated himself from the embarrassments at home and abroad left by his predecessor Joseph II. He had family ties to Louis XVI, and he was obliged, as chief of the Holy Roman Empire, to protect the border princes. On the other hand, he understood the weakness of the Habsburg monarchy. He knew that the Austrian Netherlands, where he had with difficulty restored his authority, were full of friends of the Revolution and that a French army would be welcomed by many Belgians. He despised the weakness and the folly of the émigrés and excluded them from his councils. He earnestly desired to avoid a war which might endanger his sister Marie Antoinette or her husband.
In August 1791 Leopold had met Frederick William II of Prussia at Pillnitz Castle near Dresden, and the two monarchs had joined in stating in the Declaration of Pillnitz that they considered the restoration of order and of monarchy in France an object of interest to all sovereigns. They further declared that they would be ready to act for this purpose in concert with the other powers. Montague (1911) argued that this declaration appeared to have been drawn from Leopold by pressure of circumstances. Leopold well knew that concerted action of the powers was impossible, as Great Britain had firmly resolved not to meddle with French affairs. After Louis had accepted the constitution, Leopold virtually withdrew his declaration. Nevertheless, it remained a grave error of judgment and contributed to the approaching war.