French First Republic

French Republic République française
1792–1804
Flag (1794–1804) Coat of arms
Motto: Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité ou la Mort ("Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, or Death")
Anthem: Chant de guerre pour l'Armée du Rhin[1] ("War Song for the Army of the Rhine") Menu 0:00
The French Republic in 1801
Capital	Paris
Common languages	French (official) Occitan, German, Dutch, Breton, Basque
Religion	Constitutional Church (until 15 July 1801) Cult of Reason (October 1793 – March 1794) Cult of the Supreme Being (7 May 1794 – 28 July 1794) Decadary Cult (4 August 1798 – 9 November 1799) Roman Catholicism, Calvinism, Lutheranism, and Judaism (15 July 1801 – 18 May 1804)
Government	1792–1795 Authoritarian directorial revolutionary republic 1795–1799 Oligarchical directorial republic 1799–1804: Autocratic republic under a Bonapartist military dictatorship
President of the National Convention
• 1792	Jérôme Pétion de Villeneuve (first)
• 1795	Jean Joseph Victor Génissieu (last)
President of the Directory
• 1795–1799	By rotation: 3 months duration
First Consul
• 1799–1804	Napoléon Bonaparte
Legislature	Parliament
• Upper house	Council of Ancients (1795–1799)
• Lower house	National Convention (1792–1795) Council of Five Hundred (1795–1799)
Historical era	French Revolutionary Wars Napoleonic Wars
• Proclamation of the abolition of the monarchy	21 September 1792
• Reign of Terror	10 March 1793 – 27 July 1794
• Thermidorean Reaction	27 July 1794
• Constitution of the Year III approved	6 September 1795
• Coup of 18 Fructidor	4 September 1797
• Coup of 30 Prairial VII	18 June 1799
• Coup of 18 Brumaire	9 November 1799
• Constitution of the Year VIII	24 December 1799
• French Revolutionary Wars ends	27 March 1802
• Napoleonic Wars begins	18 May 1803
• Napoleon Bonaparte is proclaimed emperor by the Senate	18 May 1804
Currency	livre (to 1794), franc, assignat
Preceded by Succeeded by Kingdom of France Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia Swiss Confederacy Austrian Netherlands Comtat Venaissin Principality of Monaco Duchy of Savoy Kingdom of France Early modern France First French Empire

In the history of France, the First Republic (French: Première République), officially the French Republic (République française), was founded on 21 September 1792 during the French Revolution. The First Republic lasted until the declaration of the First Empire on 18 May 1804 under Napoleon, although the form of the government changed several times. This period was characterized by the fall of the monarchy, the establishment of the National Convention and the Reign of Terror, the Thermidorian Reaction and the founding of the Directory, and, finally, the creation of the Consulate and Napoleon's rise to power.

End of the monarchy in France[]

Under the Legislative Assembly, which was in power before the proclamation of the First Republic, France was engaged in war with Prussia and Austria. In July 1792, the Duke of Brunswick, commanding general of the Austro–Prussian Army, issued his Brunswick Manifesto, in which he threatened the destruction of Paris should any harm come to the King Louis XVI of France. The foreign threat exacerbated France's political turmoil amid the French Revolution and deepened the passion and sense of urgency among the various factions. In the violence of 10 August 1792, citizens stormed the Tuileries Palace, killing six hundred of the King's Swiss guards and insisting on the removal of the king.^[2] A renewed fear of anti-revolutionary action prompted further violence, and in the first week of September 1792, mobs of Parisians broke into the city's prisons, killing over half of the prisoners. This included nobles, clergymen, and political prisoners, but also numerous common criminals, such as prostitutes and petty thieves, many murdered in their cells—raped, stabbed, and slashed to death. This became known as the September Massacres.^[3]

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National Convention[]

As a result of the spike in public violence and the political instability of the constitutional monarchy, a party of six members of France's Legislative Assembly was assigned the task of overseeing elections. The resulting Convention was founded with the dual purpose of abolishing the monarchy and drafting a new constitution. The convention's first act was to establish the French First Republic and officially strip the king of all political powers. Louis XVI, by then a private citizen bearing his family name of Capet, was subsequently put on trial for crimes of high treason starting in December 1792. On 16 January 1793 he was convicted, and on 21 January, he was executed by guillotine.^[4]

Throughout the winter of 1792 and spring of 1793, Paris was plagued by food riots and mass hunger. The new Convention did little to remedy the problem until late spring of 1793, occupied instead with matters of war. Finally, on 6 April 1793, the Convention created the Committee of Public Safety, and was given a monumental task: "To deal with the radical movements of the Enragés, food shortages and riots, the revolt in the Vendée and in Brittany, recent defeats of its armies, and the desertion of its commanding general."^[5] Most notably, the Committee of Public Safety instated a policy of terror, and the guillotine began to fall on perceived enemies of the republic at an ever-increasing rate, beginning the period known today as the Reign of Terror.^[6]

Despite growing discontent with the National Convention as a ruling body, in June the Convention drafted the Constitution of 1793, which was ratified by popular vote in early August. However, the Committee of Public Safety was seen as an "emergency" government, and the rights guaranteed by the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen and the new constitution were suspended under its control.

Directory[]

After the arrest and execution of Robespierre on 28 July 1794, the Jacobin club was closed, and the surviving Girondins were reinstated. A year later, the National Convention adopted the Constitution of the Year III. They reestablished freedom of worship, began releasing large numbers of prisoners, and most importantly, initiated elections for a new legislative body. On 3 November 1795, the Directory was established. Under this system, France was led by a bicameral Parliament, consisting of an upper chamber called the Council of Elders (with 250 members) and a lower chamber called the Council of Five Hundred (with, accordingly, 500 members), and a collective Executive of five members called the Directory (from which the historical period gets its name). Due to internal instability, caused by hyperinflation of the paper monies called Assignats,^[7] and French military disasters in 1798 and 1799, the Directory lasted only four years, until overthrown in 1799.^{[citation needed]}

Consulate[]

The period known as the French Consulate began with the coup of 18 Brumaire in 1799. Members of the Directory itself planned the coup, indicating clearly the failing power of the Directory. Napoleon Bonaparte was a co-conspirator in the coup, and became head of the government as the First Consul. He would later proclaim himself Emperor of the French, ending the First French Republic and ushering in the French First Empire.^[8]

Leading heads of the Republic[]

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The constitution of the republic did not provide for a formal head of state or a head of government. It could be discussed whether the head of state would have been the president of the National Assembly under international law. However, this changed every two weeks and was therefore not formative. The following list is based on the actual positions of power within the executive:

Political factions

  Bonapartist
  Independent
  Girondins
  The Mountain
  The Plain
  Thermidorians

No.	Portrait	Name (birth and death)	Term of office		Political party	Ref.
		Georges Danton (1759–1794)	21 September 1792	9 October 1792	Cordeliers (The Mountain)
		Jean-Marie Roland de la Platière (1734–1793)	9 October 1792	23 January 1793	Girondins
		Étienne Clavière (1735–1793)	23 January 1793	2 June 1793	Girondins
		Georges Danton (1759–1794)	2 June 1793	10 July 1793	Cordeliers (The Mountain)
			10 July 1793	27 July 1793
		Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794)	27 July 1793	27 July 1794	Jacobins (The Mountain)
		Lazare Carnot (1753–1823)	27 July 1794	6 October 1794	The Plain
		Jean-Jacques-Régis de Cambacérès (1753–1824)	6 October 1794	8 November 1794	The Plain
		Lazare Carnot (1753–1823)	8 November 1794	3 March 1795	The Plain
		Jean-Jacques-Régis de Cambacérès (1753–1824)	3 March 1795	2 November 1795	The Plain
		Lazare Carnot (1753–1823)	2 November 1795	4 September 1797	Independent
		Paul Barras (1755–1829)	4 September 1797	18 June 1799	Thermidorians
		Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès (1748–1836)	18 June 1799	9 November 1799	Independent
		Napoleon Bonaparte (1769–1821)	9 November 1799	18 May 1804	Bonapartist
On 18 May 1804, Napoleon Bonaparte is proclaimed Emperor of the French by the Conservative Senate.

See also[]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to French First Republic.

• French Republican Calendar
• French Revolutionary Wars
• French Second Republic
• French Third Republic
• French Fourth Republic
• French Fifth Republic

References[]

Coordinates: 48°52′00″N 2°19′59″E / 48.86667°N 2.33306°E / 48.86667; 2.33306