The French Revolution Essay -- essays research papers

The French RevolutionThe years before the French Revolution (which started in 1789 AD.) wereones of vast, unexpected change and confusion. One of the changes was thedecline of the power of the distinguisheds, which had a tough impact on the loyalty ofsome of the nobles to King Louis XVI. Another change was the increasing powerof the newly established middle class, which would result in the monarchy becoming obsolete. The angry and easily manipulated peasants, who were used bythe bourgeoisie for their own benefit were another significant change, andfin ally the decline of the traditional monarchy, that for so long had ruled,were all factors to the main point that the French Revolution was caused by a policy-making base, with social disorder and economic instability contri notwithstandinging tothe upheaval. All of the sub-factors relate with one-another, but are separatein their own ways.For centuries, the French noble was well set in society. He foundprosperity and security in the rare regime, and all he had to do was pay homageto the king, and provide the king with his services. This all came to a gradualstop, however beginning with the loss of the nobles power everywhere their own landat the hands of Louis XIV.1 This was the foundation of the revolte nobiliairein the fact that it formed a basis of mistrust, and anger for the monarch.2 Inthat time the feudal schema was still being practiced, so social status wasbased on the amount of land you could attain. With no land, the nobles sawthemselves to be as common as the common folk. Even in their arrogance they sawthat they were losing power. The next blow to the pride of the nobles came fromLouis XV, who passed a bill to let wealthy commoners purchase prominent floater inpolitical and social positions. This event shows how corrupt and money hungrythe government had become, by letting anyone get high up in the political chainjust by feeding the gluttonous king. The next king, Louis XVI saw that themajority of France (75%) was peasants and serfs. Consequently, to try to ensuretheir happiness (and prevent the Revolution), he had the Estates-General abate the feudal system, in which they held no ranking.4 This made thenobility extremely unhappy. With no feudal system, they no longer were muchhigher up politicly than the commoners. The next noble atrocity came with LouisXVI making the nobles pay taxes. Ever since... ...hat the monarch was untouchable. Seeing ashow Louis was to get his head chopped off, that resolution may not gull been agood idea. To make things even more equal and just, the commoners had one of thethree votes his Estates-General. This meant fair representation, but it alsomeant that the nobles were upset with their decline of power and the commoners treasured more of their new-found power. All of these ideas seem to be good ones,but ones that would, and did harm his position. One evidently bad move was tointemperately tax everyone. The peasants were already heavily tax ed, so they were thenbrought to famine, the nobles were never taxed before and consequentlydisgruntled and the middle class just did not like it. If Louis XVI were alivetoday he would probably be a good politician-too bad the people were not readyfor him in 1789.Historians have argued for centuries over what started the FrenchRevolution some submit economics, some say politics some say the change of socialstructure. The only logical answer, then is that it was a little (or a lot) ofall three, resulting in the decline of nobility, the rise of the middle class,the anger of the peasants and the fall of monarchy.