2. The French Revolution Liberty, Equality, Fraternity 1789 - 1815

3. King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette Married at the age of 15 and 14 King Clumsy and awkward Queen Austrian, viewed as outsider. Married 1770 king/queen 1774 Revolution began 1789

4. Palace of Versailles Extravagant Palace with

5. The Old Regime There were three Social Classes called estates. First Estate – Church Second Estate – Nobility Third Estate – Common Class

6. Political Cartoons of the Old Regime

7. First Estate  The Catholic Church (Archbishops, bishops) – rich!  The Church owned 10% of France Paid no taxes. Priest were poor.

8. Second Estate/Nobles  Less than 2% of population.  owned 20% of the land.  held high offices in the Army, government, and the courts.  Pay no taxes –

9. French Nobility

10. Third Estate Had three sub-groups  Bourgeoisie upper class  educated/ lawyers, merchants  The city-dwelling lower class.  Peasants *No political power

11. The Third Estate Bourgeoisie Educated Read and were knowledgeable of Enlightenment ideas Lower upper class

12. The Third Estate  Lower Class city-dwellers butchers, brewers, weavers, cooks and servants. Very poor, uneducated, and ate three pounds of bread a day and nothing else. In 1788, the price of bread doubled due to poor harvests

13. The Third Estate Last group in the third estate was the peasants. Made up 90% of France’s 26 million people. Paid almost 50% in taxes and feudal dues.

14. Reasons for the Revolution – 1.Unpopular/weak King 2.National debt 3.Unfair tax structure.

15. Reasons for the Revolution -Debt The National Debt of France. Equivalent to $8 billion Unfair tax structure Support for American Revolution in 1776 cost France a lot of money. The gov. was approaching bankruptcy.

16. Meeting of the Estates General Louis XVI called a meeting of the Estates General.  The meeting had not been used since 1614.  The Nobles were asked to assemble the Estates General.  To avoid bankruptcy the king would have to begin taxing the nobles.  The nobles refused

17. The Estates General Meeting of estates General in 1789. Was held to solve problems with France In this case the two upper estates could always outvote the third estate even though the 610 members of the third estate outnumber the first and second estate combined (591).

18. Estates General May 1789

19. The Estates General The Three Estates met at Versailles in May of 1789.  First and second estate held the power  Votes were held by order rather than population  First and second outvoted the third

20. Estates General  King Louis XVI sided with the clergy and the nobles.  old rules/old regime  So the representatives of the third estate became angry and left the meeting organizing in to what they called the National Assembly.