French+Revolution+p.15-21+Bernard+Yue+08.30.10

=__THE AWESOME THING__=

[[image:French_revolution_CHART.png width="880" height="387"]]
This is a flowchart I created for my 'AWESOME' thing. It is awesome because simply changing the color of the box will take 5 minutes each to make the exactly the same. It can show easily how much the government spent compared to its income. In the graph, the income only took up little space, while the spending took up half the page. This can also easily show why the government almost suffered from bankruptcy. 'Interest payments on debts' alone was already more than half of the whole income of the government. This chart was created with bubbl.us, a website that i do not recommend for artistic. As seen above, only the color can be changed. Fonts and text color cannot be changed. Pictures cannot be added. Line thickness cannot be changed. This tool might only be used for a very serious business.

bubbl.us

__The Government in France__ __Marie Antoinette__ __Use and abuse of power__ __ Financial Problems: __ __ The royal debt __ __An Attempt at reform__
 * __p.15-21 NOTES-French Revolution__**
 * governed by King Louis the Sixteenth ( Louis XVI )
 * absolute monarch
 * no need to share power with anyone else
 * unlike King George III of Britain
 * governed from 1000-room palace - Versailles, 18km outside Paris
 * Louis' wife = Marie Antoinette - Austrian archduchess
 * married in 1770, she = 14, he = 15
 * lost populrty thrghtout yrs
 * espclly MARIE ANTOINETTE
 * Disliked reasons:
 * she = foreign, ppl called her Austrian woman, made to sound like BITCH
 * //Austrichienne// = Autrian, //chienne// = bitch
 * she spent huge amounts of money - clothes, jwllry, gambling
 * favorites at court
 * ppl thought she was unfaithful to Louis
 * 1774, Louis gave her small palace - Petit Trianon
 * she spent huge sums of money creating beautiful gardens around it
 * built village IN garden (hamlet), of 8 thatched cottages, with barn, stables, and dairy
 * made to look run down, to look like real one...
 * fields - sheep, goat, cow
 * foster-brother did not criticize her
 * ppl thought king had TOO much power
 * 'sealed letters' (lettres de cachet):
 * royal warrant ordering the imprisonment or exile of person named on it
 * written on single sheet of paper, signed by king, folded, sealed with wax
 * most hated aspect of king's power
 * hated how king's ministers could use them too
 * person whose name appeared = stay in prison/exile til king says so
 * during Louis XVI reign, 14,000 S.L.s issued --> ppl who disagree w/ gov.
 * some sent into exile in distant parts of Frnce.
 * S.L.s = ONE way which kings impose his authority
 * people called Louis 'despot'
 * 18th century way of saying dictator or tyrant
 * Louis' urgent problem = gov. deeply in debt
 * over 100 yrs
 * spent more each yr than received in tax
 * 1768, gov. ministser Calonne told Louis: gov. close to financial collapse
 * either increase taxes, reduce spending, or borrow money
 * resolution to bankruptcy = raise taxes
 * biggest change = tax on land, landowners pay
 * introducing new system was not easy cuz nobles and clergy WERE exempt from most taxes - they could refuse to register in Paris law courts, or Parlement, which the controlled
 * Calonne invited 150 lead nobles +clergymen to discuss & approve new tax
 * they refused and claimed them not having power to approve new tax
 * only Estates General (national parliament elected by all 3 estates) had power
 * Louis tried introducing new tax without approval
 * nobles refused, and also said only Estates General had power
 * Louis exiled the entire Parlement from Paris (apparently he insisted he ALONE had the power)
 * violent protestants, 4 died in a 'Day of Tiles' when mob of protesters pelted soldiers with tiles torn from city's rftops
 * went on for 6 months
 * August 1788, Louis gave in and orders elections to be held for an Estates General
 * meeting = 1 May 1789

France was governed by King Louis the Sixteenth (XVI), which was an absolute monarch. He did not need to share his power with anyone else cause his system worked that way. He had a beautiful known as Versailles, a palace 18km outside of Paris. He had a wife called Marie Antoinette. Apparently, citizens did not like her OR her husband, but the wife was more extreme. People hated her because she was a foreign lady, often called 'BITCH' by the citizens. People also hated for other reasons like spending huge amounts of money on useless things like a 'fake' village in a garden of hers. She was also one of the reasons why the royal government unpopular, but she wasn't the ONLY reason. The king had something called 'sealed letters,' which were warrant orderings and the name of the person on the 'sealed letter' would suffer imprisonment or exile AS LONG as the kings wants. Louis finally was called 'despot,' similar to a dictator or tyrant in the modern world. He deserved it.
 * __SUMMARY__**

The government almost suffered in bankruptcy because they spent way too much, compared to what they earned. As a solution, they increased tax, where nobody agreed to. Nobles and clergymen refused and demanded an Estates General for the power to approve new taxes. Conflict went on for 6 months, and four people unfortunately died. Soon Louis gave up and held an election for an Estates General. = =

=A question:= Why didn't the government just spent less money to avoid bankruptcy?