I saw Les Misérables last night and Im exhausted by French history as well as astounded and appreciative that our Founders did such a good job with our Constitution that we only suffered a single civil war. We have much for which to be grateful! I found myself wondering a lot about French history and where and how the Paris Uprising fit in. In short, France was a monarchy until the late 1700s when starving Frenchmen toppled King Louis and cake eater Marie Antoinette to establish a Republic based on principles of Democracy and the Rights of Man. That lasted a whole year until Robespierre and the Committee on Public Safety took complete control of the government and the Reign of Terror followed in which some 40,000 enemies of the revolution were executed. After two years the Committee was overthrown by the Directory, another dictatorial committee that continued to repress the people. That lasted four years until Napoleon took power. Napoleon ruled until 1815 when he was finally defeated at Waterloo, and a French constitutional monarchy was established. Finally we get to the era of Les Misérables. France is still in turmoil, people are once again starving and dying of disease in massive numbers and republicans seeking the restoration of the Republic ultimately attempted a coup in 1832, the year of the Paris Uprising and the setting for Les Mis. That uprising was crushed by the government in only a day and the monarchy lasted until it was finally overthrown in 1848 and a President was elected who was none other than a cousin of Bonaparte Napoleon -- Louis Napoleon. Four years later Louis declared himself Emperor and ruled until 1871 when he had to surrender to Prussia after France declared war on them hem in 1870. Yet another republic was formed, the Third Republic, which lasted until 1940 when Hitlers armies occupied France. This was followed by two more republics. The history of France, in short, is monarchy followed by a brief democratic republic which quickly became dictatorship by committee, followed by Napoleons dictatorship, followed by monarchy, followed by another short lived republic, followed by another dictatorship (Napoleon III), and then the 3rd Republic which lasted until 1940, and, finally, the 4th Republic at the end of WWII and the 5th Republic established by DeGaulle in 1958.
Posted on: Sun, 19 Oct 2014 17:41:53 +0000
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