Why French governments were unstable, 1790-1795

History · AS: France, 1774-1814. The idea in plain words, the rules to remember, the mistake to avoid and a worked example, written and checked by Mega Lecture.

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The idea

Between 1790 and 1795 France moved from a constitutional monarchy to a republic, then to the Terror, then to a more moderate republic. No government lasted because the country was deeply divided and under great pressure.

The king did not accept the Revolution, as the flight to Varennes showed. The Church reforms split Catholics. Political clubs such as the Feuillants, Girondins and Jacobins disagreed about how far the Revolution should go, and the Paris sans-culottes pushed for more radical action.

War from April 1792 made everything worse. Fear of invasion and of traitors, together with inflation and food shortages, led to the fall of the monarchy and to the Terror.

Rules to remember

1790: Civil Constitution of the Clergy. The oath of loyalty divided priests and turned many Catholics against the Revolution.
June 1791: flight to Varennes. July 1791: Feuillants formed, moderates who wanted to keep a constitutional monarchy.
20 April 1792: war declared on Austria, pushed by the Girondins. July 1792: Brunswick Manifesto threatened Paris.
10 August 1792: attack on the Tuileries. September 1792: September Massacres and the Republic declared. 21 January 1793: Louis XVI executed.
1793: rising in the Vendée against conscription. The Committee of Public Safety directed the Terror.
August 1793: levée en masse (mass conscription). September 1793: General Maximum fixed prices and wages.
Assignats: paper money backed by Church land, printed in excess, so it lost value. July 1794 (Thermidor): Robespierre fell.

Common mistake

Do not mix up the Girondins and the Jacobins. The Girondins led the call for war in 1792; the Jacobins of the Mountain, with Robespierre, ran the Terror in 1793 to 1794.

Worked example

Why did the war that began in April 1792 help to bring down the monarchy in August 1792?

The war went badly at first, so people looked for traitors at home.
The king and queen were suspected of wanting the enemy to win, especially after Varennes.
The Brunswick Manifesto threatened Paris if the royal family was harmed, which seemed to prove the king was linked to the enemy.
Angry sans-culottes and National Guards attacked the Tuileries on 10 August 1792.

Answer: Military defeat and fear of royal treason turned Paris against the king, and the monarchy was overthrown.

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