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Table of contents
1 Up to 1848 in France
2 The spark
3 The Revolution of 1848 in France
4 The beginnings of counter-revolution
5 The end of the Revolutions in France

Up to 1848 in France

As 1848 began, liberals awaited the death of King Louis Philippe, expecting revolution after his death. As it happened, he died naturally in 1850 after the expected post-mortem revolution had burned itself out.

Louis Philippe wasn't notably worse than any other European ruler, and was probably better than many, but he was French, and France had a past history of revolutions, and the born-of-revolution United States wouldn't exist had not France helped in the American Revolutionary War.

As a quid pro quo for the return of the Bourbons after the Battle of Waterloo, the people had been given a charter of liberties, now dubiously maintained. But to foreigners, France was a bastion of liberty, and comparably so, was, with a restive press and trial by jury that had acquitted would-be assassins. But there were stresses.

Alexis de Tocqueville had observed, "We are sleeping on a volcano . . . A wind of revolution blows, the storm is on the horizon." Lacking the property qualifications to vote, the middle classes were about to erupt, tired of hearing Prime Minister Guizot say, "Get rich, then you can vote." Corruption stretched from the Prime Minister to small shopkeepers with dishonest weights.

England was of course the greatest industrial power, with France in second place. But England's middle classes had been bought off by the Reform Act of 1832, and while France's working class was perhaps slightly better off than England's, nominal laws against child labor were routinely flouted; unemployment threw skilled workers down to the proletariat level.

The year 1846 saw a financial crisis's and bad harvests. The year 1847 saw a depression. A poor railroad system hindered aid efforts; peasant rebellions were bloodily put down. Perhaps a third of Paris was on the dole. Dangerous writers proliferated such as Louis Blanc ("The right to work") and Pierre Joseph Proudhon ("Property is theft!", "God is evil"); secret societies sprung up.

The tinder was dry, awaiting a spark.

The spark

Knowledgeable of what was happening, forces of moderation were working for middle-class reform. Working class demands were ignored. Armed with sticks and then guns, rag-clad walking cadavers -- poor workers, never before seen in the daylight, walked the streets of Paris.

A banquet was planned for Paris's 12th arrondissement (the restive Left Bank), moved to the right bank with a price increase, first set for Sunday, February 20 1848, moved to the next Tuesday so the working people could not watch, surrounded by walls.

The planned crashing of this party was canceled. Law and order would prevail, though the students prepared for battle, with firearms. Still, nothing happened that Tuesday. But the government was sitting on a powder keg with a lit fuse.

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Guizot resigned. Let someone else deal with the mess, and the whole city knew by 3:00. That night a large crowd gathered at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. As so many things in history, a small (and possibly accidental) event set things off.

An officer ordered the crowd not to pass, but the front was pushed by the rear. The officer ordered his men to fix bayonets, probably wishing to avoid shooting. Stepping back to do this, a soldier fumbling with his musket discharged it (a probable accident, but much argued), and all hell broke loose. The soldiers fired.

Fifty two were killed outright. A funeral wagon traveled Paris, showing the bodies to the poor, a worker screaming "Vengeance!" Church bells clanged. Common people grabbed weapons. Barricades were built. Gunpowder was made; balls were cast.

Priscilla Robertson gives more details (references), as do doubtless many others. We shall be brief.

Paris was soon a barricaded city. Omnibuses were turned into barricades; thousands of trees were felled. Men made lead balls. Fires were set. Angry citizens began converging on the royal palace.

The King escaped to England. Compared to 1789, it wasn't that bloody. The tinder was alight, and the flames were spreading, and would cross the continent.

The Revolution of 1848 in France

The Provisional leading figure of the new Government was a popular poet named Lamartine. The provisional government was called the Second Republic.

It was roughly a month before the conservatives began to oppose the new government, first cautiously -- then more loudly -- using the tell-tale word order, which the messy new republic admittedly lacked. But much was happening. From February to December 1848, 479 newspapers were founded. Venereal disease increased for a few months. Karl Marx set up a Communist League that spring, only one of countless new organizations that blossomed under freedom of association. An early (and unsuccessful) group pushed for women's suffrage.

Lamartine was fundamentally cautious and not into dangerous schemes. A priority was to show the rest of Europe their would be no fresh Napoleons to march over them, and Lamartine set out to show France's peaceful intentions, issuing his Manifesto of Europe. They had enough internal concerns.

Such as economic matters. The year 1848 saw a 54% decline in the number of businesses in Paris, as most rich had left; there was a corresponding decline in the luxury trade and credit was unobtainable. Some thought they would now live for free anyway. National workshops of the "Right to Work" were set up, which had a somewhat conservative aim -- preventing further social disorder. In this they failed dismally.

The government set out to re-assure the bourgeois. New taxes were passed that hit square on the landed class, peasants, and small farmers. The tax was widely flouted, and the new government lost the support of rural France, hard-pressed peasants not wanting to prop up loafing city folk and their new "Right to Work," which ballooned the population of Paris with far more job seekers than there were jobs. They did build roads and re-plant the cut-down trees.

The National Workshops and the "Right to Work" later landed in the dustbin. Some enraged workers picked up guns, later leading to the "June Days Uprising." Before, workers and petit bourgeoisie had fought together, but now, lines were tighter.

Universal male suffrage was enacted on March 2, giving France nine millions new voters.

The beginnings of counter-revolution

But how would the capricious peasantry use its new rights? They mostly did what the church asked, and the church had felt none too kindly of being removed from the sphere of primary education. Elections were on Easter Sunday with an expected sermon. Inexperienced voters were swayed by their spiritual leaders, and the church advanced its interests.

The interests of the propertied classes likewise advanced. Conservative groups recovered from the previous February. Radical groups lost support. The coalition splintered. A people's banquet was planned in late May; its planners were promptly arrested. The Assembly declared that that National Workshops were to be dropped, and rumors of a worker rebellion later led to police action and over 1,400 killed (The June Days uprising). Many survivors were sent to the French colony of Algeria. To the propertied classes, the June Days uprising was something of a red scare. Others felt differently.

Karl Marx of course weighed in on the "June Days" event, seeing it as evidence of class splits, but his conclusions are arguable, and still being argued -- many of the participants were of the petit bourgeoisie, not the worker classes, outnumbering them about two to one. In contrast, some workers were represented disproportionate to their population in society. We will not here claim to resolve this hotly debated question; the interested reader is instructed to read deeper references.

The end of the Revolutions in France

Politics continued to tilt to the right, and the end of the Revolution in France. Louis Napoleon's family name of Napoleon rallied support, and after sweeping the elections (admittedly now with universal male suffrage) he returned to the old order, purging republicans and returning the "vile multitude" to its former place.

There was a coup in 1851 which was crushed. Cells of resistance surfaced, but were put down, and the Second Republic was over.

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