Thermidorian Reaction
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The Thermidorian Reaction was a revolt in the French Revolution against the excesses of the Reign of Terror,caused by the execution of Robespierre and several other leading members of the Committee of Public Safety. This revolt led to the end of this radical phase of the French Revolution.The name Thermidorian refers to 9 Thermidor Year II (July 27, 1794), the date according to the French Revolutionary Calendar when Robespierre and Saint-Just came under concerted attack in the National Convention.
Thermidorian Reaction also refers to the remaining period until the National Convention was superseded by the Directory; this is also sometimes called the era of the Thermidorian Convention. Prominent figures of Thermidor include Paul François Jean Nicolas Barras and Jean Lambert Tallien.
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[edit] 9 Thermidor
The Reaction began on July 27, 1794, which the French Revolutionary Calendar dates as 9 Thermidor. Robespierre and Saint-Just came under a concerted and organised attack from members of the Committee of Public Safety. Robespierre gambled and appealed to the deputies of the Right to support him. However, the deputies of the Right rejected his appeal and the Committee almost unanimously voted against him and his close allies. Robespierre and his allies had alienated even their traditional supporters by indiscriminate violence, and could offer no resistance when the National Convention ordered their arrest.
The following day, 10 Thermidor (July 28), the new authorities guillotined (without trial, nor even the light formality of a Revolutionary Tribunal) Robespierre, Saint-Just, Georges Couthon, and several other supporters, including members of the Paris Commune (the city government of Paris).
[edit] Background
9 Thermidor represents the final throes of the Reign of Terror. With Robespierre the sole remaining strong man of the Revolution (following the assassination of Jean-Paul Marat, and the executions of Georges Danton and Jacques Hébert), his apparently total grasp on power was, in fact, increasingly illusory, especially insofar as he seemed to have support from factions to his right. His only real political power at this time lay in the Jacobin Club, which had extended itself beyond the borders of Paris and into the country as a network of "Popular Societies". His tight personal control of the military and his distrust of military might and of banks, along with his opposition to corrupt individuals in government, made Robespierre the subject of a number of conspiracies. The conspiracies came together on 9 Thermidor (July 27) when members of the national bodies of the revolutionary government arrested Robespierre as well as the leaders of the Paris city government.
[edit] Conspiratorial groups
Not all of the conspiratorial groupings were ideological in motivation; many who conspired against Robespierre did so for strong practical and personal reasons, most notably self-preservation. The surviving Dantonists, such as Merlin de Thionville for example, wanted revenge for the death of Danton and, more importantly, to protect their own heads.
The Left were opposed to Robespierre on the grounds that he rejected Atheism and was not radical enough (egalitarianism).
The prime mover, however, for the events of 9 Thermidor was a Montagnard conspiracy, led by Jean Lambert Tallien and Bourdon de l'Oise, which was gradually coalescing, and was to come to pass at the time when the Montagnards had finally swayed the deputies of the Right over to their side. (Robespierre and Saint-Just were, themselves, Montagnards.)
[edit] Events
On 9 Thermidor, in the Hall of Liberty in Paris, Saint-Just was impugned by Tallien whilst he was reading a report to the Committee of Public Safety, and who then went on to denounce the tyranny of Robespierre. The attack was taken up by Billaud-Varenne. Robespierre leapt to Saint-Just's defence. Cries went up of 'Down with the tyrant! Arrest him!' Robespierre then made his appeal to the deputies of the Right, "Deputies of the Right, men of honour, men of virtue, give me the floor, since the assassins will not." However, the Right was decided, and a debate to arrest Robespierre and his followers ensued which led to the end of Robespierre's rule.
[edit] The death of Robespierre
Robespierre was declared an outlaw, and condemned without judicial process. The following day, 10 Thermidor, 28 July 1794, he was executed with 21 of his closest associates.
[edit] Consequences
Certainly, the events of 9 Thermidor were to prove a watershed in the revolutionary process. The Thermidorian regime that followed was, at the very least, less rigid, ending the Reign of Terror and allowing for more individual liberty, especially in areas of religion. At the same time, its economic policies paved the way for rampant inflation. Ultimately, power devolved to the hands of the Directory, an executive of five men who assumed power in France in year III of the French Revolution.
The Thermidorian regime excluded the remaining Montagnards from power, even those who had joined in conspiring against Robespierre and Saint-Just. The White Terror resulted in numerous imprisonments and several hundred executions, almost exclusively of people on the political left. These numbers, while significant, were considerably smaller than those associated with the previous Reign of Terror.
[edit] End of the Reaction
The Thermidorian Convention continued until October 26, 1795 (4 Brumaire Year IV), when the National Convention was succeeded by the French Directory.
For historians of revolutionary movements, the term Thermidor has come to mean the phase in some revolutions when power slips from the hands of the original revolutionary leadership and a radical regime is replaced by a calmer, more conservative regime, sometimes to the point where the political pendulum may swing back towards something resembling a pre-revolutionary state. Leon Trotsky, in his book The Revolution Betrayed, refers to the rise of Stalin and the accompanying post-revolutionary bureaucracy as the Soviet Thermidor.
[edit] Other "Thermidorian Reactions"
Throughout history, following the pattern outlined in Crane Brinton's work, The Anatomy of Revolution, many revolutions have undergone equivalents of the Thermidorian Reaction. Some examples of this are:
- English Civil War: The restoration of the English monarchy in 1660 can be seen as a repudiation of Cromwell's Commonwealth and the point at which moderates once again regained control of the English Revolution.
- Russian Revolution: Perhaps the most protracted revolution in history, Russia would not complete the Brinton cycle until 1991. Russia overthrew its old order in 1917, experiencing its Honeymoon period with the brief Provisional Government before passing into a Terror that lasted at least to the end of Stalin's rule in 1953. Stalin's successors, though not genocidal as he was, still exercised overt oppression on their people. Mikhail Gorbachev's ascension to power in 1985, his freeing of the Soviet satellites in 1989, and the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991, brought Russia full circle.
[edit] Sources
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- Pierre-Toussaint Durand de Maillane, L'Histoire de la Convention Nationale. Paris: Baudouin (1825)
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