To What Extent Was King Louis XVI Responsible For The French Revolution?

The first and most obvious cause to the French Revolution was the royal family themselves. During the period before the revolution the royal family was known for their extravagance, for throwing parties when their people were starving and couldn’t afford bread. Another contributing to the rebellion and revolution were the Class System called the Privileged Estates. France was severely in debt at that time, banks couldn’t give people who needed money because they didn’t have any to give, even with the high taxes.

Prior to Napoleon's reign as emperor, France had been through the rein of terror and the French Revolution. King Louis the Sixteenth and his wife Marie Antoinette had put France in major debt and took no responsibility for it. He was killed by the guillotine. Robespierre took control after his death and caused more problems for France and killed anyone who was not passionate enough about his ruling. He too was killed by the guillotine.

Poor military, mistrust in the government, and the overwhelming size lead to the fall of the Roman Empire. Poor military decisions contributed to the downfall of the Roman Empire. In C 450 CE, the Roman military leaders made a poor decision by letting the military decide on taking away armor (Document 3). This caused more soldiers to be killed in battle because they didn’t have the proper protection.

Louis XIV treated the people of France unfairly and he didn’t seem to care about their well-being. Louis XIV suppressed the Catholic church, and Nobles. He made the Nobles wait on him. Louis XIV weakened the power of the nobles and excluded them from his councils. This supports my thesis that Louis XIV was the best example of an absolute ruler because this shows he truly only cared about himself and he made sure that he had all of the power, by weakening the power of all of the nobles.

Domat wrote “On Social Order and Absolute Monarchy” to defend the king’s powers, and to give a better understanding of the hierarchy type system so ordinary people would accept it. Jean Domat’s life goal was explaining absolutism. Since he was not a king and seen as a regular person, people at his time can get a better understanding of the system when someone like him explains it. He explained that the king was given his power through God and is responsible to no one but God. At first this may not have caught the attention of the people, but when Domat tells that disobeying their king is the same as disobeying God it is the

He was a great leader and has a good strategy when it comes to war. The American Revolution and the French Revolution have similar and different causes to their revolution. A cause of the American revolution was taxation without representation. Taxation without representation was when the government taxed the colonies without

Napoleon began his rule in 1796 near the end of the French Revolution – a time period in which thousands of French citizens were executed by the government. When he rose to power, French citizens believed that Napoleon was the person who was finally going to pull their country out of political turmoil. According to Jackson Spielvogel, “In a sense, Napoleon brought the Revolution to an end, but he was also its child… he never ceased to remind the French that they owed to him the preservation of all that was beneficial in the revolutionary program.”

Hence, since the king sent a militia to protect the kingdom, vassals no longer needed to be loyal to the nobility. Therefore, nobility was no longer a threat to King Louis XIV power because they lacked the support of vassals after the collapse of feudal services. Furthermore, in The Duke of Saint- Simon on the Reign of Louis XIV, Wiesner describes Louis XIV’s move to the Palace of Versailles. The move was a tactical ploy on Louis’ part because the large palace allowed him to have his main followers live in the palace, where he could spy on and observe their movement, which in turn allowed him to assess potential threats to his reign.

In 1789 the French Revolution began with King Louis XVI being the king of France. Before the revolution began there were many problems within the country of France. There was a brutal winter which made the lands bad which caused a shortage of crops like wheat. Bread was a staple food in most homes and when the flour got expensive so did the bread. The cost of bread rose so high that it equalled a month’s earning.

In 1923, Germany does not want to pay for repairs. This leads to the occupation of the Ruhr (large German industrial region), by the French and thus the collapse of the German currency. It follows a crisis that led to the ruin of investors (bank accounts are worthless ...). To resolve this crisis, the Allied Powers (France, the United States, Russia and England.) Decreases the amount of repairs and US banks place large sums in Germany.

The Federalists wanted Great Britain as our main ally because of their stability. They distrusted how the French people would act during wartime as a result of the French Revolution. On the other hand, the Democratic-Republican party wanted to ally France because they supported their fight for freedom and previously had positive relations with the French government. In the end, the United States government headed by George Washington maintained neutral relations with both

During the French and Indian War this reluctance caused King George and the Parliament to question the loyalty of some colonies and led the British government to commit even more strongly to keeping a strong British hand in colonial business. Colonies and England When the French and Indian War, and its European counterpart, the Seven Years War, officially came to a close with the Treaty of Paris in 1763, North America was divided territorially between the British and Spanish. The treaty had distributed people among two sides and neither side wanted to be controlled and always wanted to be independence on their own. In Britain, it was widely assumed that the professional troops sent to the colonies deserved full credit for British victory in the war. Colonial debts to Britain grew rapidly, and many began to suspect that the British intentionally plotted to enslave the colonists economically.

He collected taxes without the consent of the estates general in order establish many things, fund a series of wars, build a bigger and stronger military and to build his palace, the Palace of Versailles, when it was built he insisted that the nobles spend more time there (Doc 2). This eventually led the nobles into debt because they spent most of their time and money at the Palace of Versailles. The nobles being in debt meant that they lost status and power, which ultimately fed the basis for the French Revolution. Document 3 states; “The aftermath of the revocation was disastrous for France. Many of those who abjured [gave up] their Protestant religion repented of their weakness.

Poverty in Europe from 1450 to 1700 was a huge issue that stuck around for centuries. The wars that took place during this time always seemed to negatively affect the poor the most. The poor, consisting of the majority of the European population, was never taken into consideration during these wars which is ironic considering these wars were caused in the name of religion. This situation, combined with weak leadership and in many countries a heavy taxation system, such as those found in England under the leadership of James I and his son Charles I, or under the leadership of absolute monarchs like Louis XIV, prevented the poor from rising in social status. The way people regarded “the poor” in Europe from 1450-1700 differed significantly based

The European wars also made France lose money because their numbers were falling and they needed it. Napoleon the leader of the French abandoned his dream of a French empire when the Haitians revolted. It also made him desperate for money, making him sell the Louisiana territory according to the text. The loss