Revolution+In+France+InNo+Maurice+Chiu+Chapter+15-21

King Louis the 16th and Marie Antoinette.
====Web. 30 Aug 2010. .Web. 30 Aug 2010. . ====

Government Of France

 * ====France was governed by King Louis the Sixteenth.====
 * ====King Louis was an absolute monarch and he did not share his power with anyone else and thought he could do whatever he wanted.====
 * ====King Louis is married to Marie Antoinette.====
 * ====The couple used to be popular with the french public but over the years they lost popularity and the people especially hated Marie Antoinette.====

Marie Antoinette

 * ==== ﻿People disliked Marie Antoinette because she was foreign, as she was from Austria. ====
 * ====Another reason was because Marie spends a huge amount of money on clothes, jewelry and gambling.====
 * ====Marie owned a palace near the Versailles called the Petit Trianon. She spent a lot of money building villages, banrs, stables, dairy and other structures so its like a real village. Many people thought that it was pointless and silly.====

Abuse Of Power

 * ====﻿Many people disliked the king because he had too much power.====
 * ====King Louis would write sealed letters that was a royal warrant ordering people t be either mprisonned or exiled for as long as the king wants. This was very controversial amongst the public.====
 * ====Another fact about the sealed letters was that the King's ministers could use them as well.====
 * ====During the reign of Louis around 140,000 sealed letters were issued and they were mainly people who disagreed with the government.====
 * ====King Louis was labelled a despot as time went by.====

Financial Problem

 * ====﻿King Louis's government was actually deeply in debt because they spent more than they get from taxes.====
 * ====In 1786 the government minister, Calonne, who was in charge of the finance, told Louis that the government was close to financial collapse.====

Attempt At Reform

 * ====In order to avoid bankruptcy, Calonne drew up a plan to reform tax system and the biggest change is that there is a tax on land which all landowners have to pay.====
 * ====﻿Nobles and Clergies could actually refuse to pay taxes and not approve the tax reform because they own the Paris law courts.====
 * ====All the nobles and clergymen refused to register the taxes and insisted that a Estates General had the power to approve taxes.====
 * ====King Louis still tried to make effect of the new tax without their permission and he insisted he had the power to put taxes and he exiled the entire Parlement from Paris.====
 * ====Due to this incident people everywhere in France protested against the king and some of the protest were violent.====
 * ====After 6 months King Louis gave up and he ordered an election for an Estate General to be elected.====

The Estates General

 * ====﻿The Estates General met with the king whenever he wanted to see them.====
 * ====The Estates General had 250 people from each estate. But the third estate complained that the first two can easily ouut-vote theeir estate and demanded double the people in the third estate.====
 * ====The king reluctantly agreed to the third estates command but by then the government was already bankrupt.====
 * ====Since the government was bankrupt, a new finance minister, Jacques necker, advised the king to double the third estate.====

Food Crisis

 * ====While there was a finance problem facing the government, in the countryside there was mass hunger and a food crisis arising.====
 * ====The crisis was started by freak weather when a massive hailstorm destroyed cornfields, vegetable plots, orchards and vineyards in central France. After that there was a drought.====
 * ====After the drought the coldest winter came and river froze and stopped water mills from grinding flour and also blocked roads preventing food from reaching markets.====

==== Summary :King Louis and Marie Antoinette ruled France together and Louis was an absolute monarch. The couple were very popular but over the years people started disliking them, especially Marie Antoinette because of the amount of money she wastes and also the fact thats she is foreign and is from Austria. King Louis abuses his power with his sealed letter and had exiled or imprisoned many people over the years. The government was also becoming bankrupt and a tax system came up but the clergymen and the nobles did not approve it and king Louis exiled everyone in the Parlement to get the tax to be in work but this only led to protests by the people. Afterwards King Louis decided to make a Estates General but by the time it was perfected the government was already bankrupt. Not only was France bankrupt but the entire central France was in a food crisis.====

Question: Why did the third estate not like the voting system?