The French Revolution Essay

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The French Revolution

The French Revolution is one of the major revolutions in European history. The revolution marks a turning point in French history and in world history in general. Forms of government, morals, ideologies, and social development were greatly affected by this event in all Europe and even in the United States.

The beginning of the French Revolution is generally dated from
June, 1789. However, the crisis in political and economic affairs in France in that period was so great that social unrest, rioting, and rebellion were common for two years before. The end of the revolutionary period was marked by the establishment of the Empire by Napolean in 1804.

The basic causes of the French Revolution
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The upper classes in France in 1789 were more jealous of their privileges then they had been at any time in the 100 years before.

When the French aided the Americans during the American Revolution, they only sent men and ships and guns but lent saubstantial financial aid as well. As a result, the budget of the French government was thrown out of balance. When economic depression in France made the every growing debt even greater, the state seemed on the verge of bankruptcy. It was necessary to vote new taxes.

The king's power was not as absoulute as he pretended it was, and no new taxes could be decreed unless the king's edicts were registered in the district courts, the parliaments. Their members were mostly members of the priviliged classes and were always ready to oppose the king's measures. Becuase of their continual refusal to register tax and reform edicts, it was necessary for the king, Louis XVI, to find some other way of legalizing his edicts

France had never had a parliament exactly like the British, but it had a similar institution called the States-General. Unlike the British institution it met very frequently. The last one had met in 1616. The
States-General was called, and it convened in May, 1789.

The States-General was composed of three houses, or estates, calles the first, second, and third estates. The first represented the clerfy; the second, the nobility; and the third, the

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