Radicalization of the Revolution

* Louis XVI’s attempted escape

- seeing the liberal attack on the Church, Louis XVI becomes angry

- constitutional limitations irk

- fear of the Paris mob

- Louis XVI flees in his carriage in June of 1791

-> perhaps trying to raise foreign support for his reinstatement at full power

-> his escape is interpreted that way, as treason

-> caught at the border by a postmaster who recognizes him from his picture on money

* Constitutional Monarchy

- Sept. 1791, Louis XVI approves the new constitution

- Legislative Assembly takes over now that Constitution is written

- France split into factions

-> Émigrés (nobles who had fled France) lead the external opposition, lobby foreign

governments for war

-> Conservatives (right-wing) want a reasonably powerful king and a constitutional

monarchy

-> Centrist (Feuillants and Girondins) wanted a weak king and some populist changes to

government and economy, willing to make compromises

-> Radicals (left-wing, Jacobins) wanted land reform, popular democracy, and an end to the

monarchy

-> Sans-culottes (those without knee breeches, the Paris Mob) wanted bread, jobs, and more

popular power in government

* Dangers to the nation

- early 1792, Austrian king presses hard for reinstatement of Louis XVI’s full powers

-> France responds by declaring war on Austria

- spring/summer 1792, Austrians and Prussians advance into France with their armies

-> Revolutionary government desperately trying to reconstitute an army

=> successfully it turns out

- Sept. 2-6, prison massacres

-> keep prisoners from being released by foreign armies

-> free up guards to fight

- Sept. 20, French victory at Valmy staves off destruction for a while

- Dec 11, 1792, Louis XVI (Capet) placed on trial

-> beheaded Jan 21, 1793

- early 1792 war with England and Holland

- Feb. 24, First draft of a citizen army (300,000 called)

- March 7, war with Spain

- March 9/10 riots against the centrist Girondin government

- March 18, serious French military defeat

- April 5, Committee of Public Safety established

-> State of Emergency government begins