Analysis & For Further Reading

Jacques Griezmann is an example of one of the key players in the initiation of the French Revolution as well as the implementation of the social and political changes that it brought about. Those pushing for the revolution were not starving peasants, but rather, members of the high bourgeoisie dissatisfied with social structure of the Old Regime. These lawyers, merchants, and other men of industry constituted a wealthy class that, despite their affluence, were barred from holding many offices due to the reservation of those positions for nobles. A lawyer in 18th century France would have been a highly respected person and may have lived like a near-noble, but would have been barred from higher judicial offices if they were not of noble birth. The economic burden of heavy taxation imposed on the middle classes and commonors, but not the tax exempt nobleman, due to France's involvement in the Seven Year Wars excacerbated political concerns. This character exemplifies the sentiments held by the high bourgeoisie that pushed them to assert the autonomy of the Third Estate. While the Grievance Petitions from before the outbreak of the war called for equality of men under law, the requests were much more focused on allowing more elite members of the Third Estate to obtain offices previously reserved for nobles, eliminate noble privilege, and ensure economic freedom. Though the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen exuded the notion of popular sovereignty, it only ensured a citizen’s right to representation. This relates back to the understanding that the main force behind the Revolution was the upper middle classes who considered themselves more fit to rule France than the nobles. Peasant concerns were included in the Grievances, and thus incorporated into the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen, but mostly so that Bourgeoisie had the support of the masses. In that this character represents the early intentions of the Revolution, his memoire also shows how the radicalization that occurred in the later years diverged from the goals of the original leaders. The democratic republican government Robespierre called for in the Principles of Political Morality was certainly not what the National Assembly had in mind when they first took the oath to write a new Constitution for France. Overall, the French Revolution that culminated up to the point of the Reign of Terror (1793–1794) achieved genuine political and social change to an extent that the initial movement of 1789, as a whole, did not intend.

At the end of the memoir, Jacques also reflects upon some important technologies–and lack there of–in France in the period of 1740-1794. France's heavy debt from war and the political turmoil of Revolution both played a role in preventing France from undergoing the massive Industrial Revolution that occurred in Great Britain during Jacques's lifetime. On the other hand, one technological development that was a directly associated with the Revolution was that of the guillotine. Though guillotine-like contraptions of different names had been around since the middle ages, the guillotine was adopted in late 1789 as a more humane method of execution and was the technology used to kill thousands of "enemies" of the republic during the Reign of Terror. Another technological development Jacques mentions was scientist Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier's method of refining saltpetre, or potassium nitrate, into gunpowder. Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier is regarded as the father of modern chemistry and made many contributions to science before being execute in the Reign of Terror on May 8th, 1794.

For Further Reading

Bell, David A. “The ‘Public Sphere,’ the State, and the World of Law in Eighteenth-Century France.” French Historical Studies 17, no. 4 (1992): 912–34.

Bouwsma, William J. “Lawyers and Early Modern Culture.” Oxford University Press 78, no. 2 (1973): 303–27.

Breen, Michael P. “Law, Society, and the State in Early Modern France.” The Journal of Modern History 83, no. 2 (2011): 346–86.

Brophy, James M., Joshua Cole, John Robertson, Thomas Max Safely, and Carol Symes. “Gouge, Olympe de. ‘Declaration of the Rights of Woman.’” In Perspectives from the Past: Primary Western Civilizations: From the Age of Exploration through Contemporary Times, 4th ed. Vol. 2. New York/London: W.W. Norton & Company, 2009.

Cullen, L.M. “History, Economic Crises, and Revolution: Understanding Eighteenth-Century France.” The Economic History Review 46, no. 4 (1993): 635–57.

Kishlansky, Mark, ed. “Sieyes, Abbe de, ‘What Is the Third Estate? (1789).’” In Sources of the West: Readings in Western Civilization. New York: Pearson Longman, 2008.

Kreis, Steven. “The Oath of the Tennis Court (June 20, 1789).” The History Guide: Lectures on Modern European Intellectual History, 2004. http://www.historyguide.org/intellect/tennis_oath.html.

Le, Tang Thi Thanh Trai. “The French Legal Profession: A Prisoner of Its Glorious Past?” Scholarly Works Paper 422 (1992): 63–104.

Lualdi, Katherine J. “Defending Terror: Maximilien Robespierre, Report on the Principles of Political Morality (1794).” In Soures of The Making of the West, Volume II: Since 1500: Peoples and Cultures, Vol. 2. Macmillan, 2012.

“The French Revolution in ARC.” Academic Archival Collection. Archives & Research Collections, n.d. https://arc.library.carleton.ca/exhibits/french-revolution-arc.

“The National Convention: September 21, 1792.” Hanover Historical Texts Project, n.d. http://history.hanover.edu/texts/abolfeud.html.

“Patronage, Politics, and the ‘Rule of Law’ in Early Modern France.” Proceedings of the Western Society for French History 33 (2005): 95–113.

Riley, James C. “The Seven Years War.” In The Seven Years War and the Old Regime in France: The Economic and Financial Toll, 72–103. Princeton University Press, 1986.

Scott, William. “The Pursuit of ‘Interests’ in the French Revolution: A Preliminary Survey.” French Historical Studies 19, no. 3 (1996): 811–51.

Seé, Henri. Economic and Social Conditions in France During the Eighteenth Century. Translated by Edwin H. Zeydel. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1927.

Swanson, John C., and Michael S. Melancon. Modern Europe: Sources and Perspectives from History. New York: Longman, 2003.

“Third Estate of Dourdan. ‘From Grievance Petitions.’” In Perspectives from the Past: Primary Western Civilizations: From the Age of Exploration through Contemporary Times, 4th ed. Vol. 2. New York/London: W.W. Norton & Company, 2009.

Tocqueville, Alexis de. The Old Regime and the Revolution. Translated by John Bonner. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1856. http://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/2419.

Turgot, Anne-Robert-Jacques. “Reflections on the Formation and Distribution of Wealth.” E. Spragg, 1774.