title: French Revolution

text: In the September Massacres, between 1,100 and 1,600 prisoners held in Parisian jails were summarily executed, the vast majority of whom were common criminals. A response to the capture of Longwy and Verdun by Prussia, the perpetrators were largely National Guard members and "fédérés" on their way to the front. Responsibility is disputed, but even moderates expressed sympathy for the action, which soon spread to the provinces; the killings reflected widespread concern over social disorder


title: French Revolution

text: On 20 September, the French army won a stunning victory over the Prussians at Valmy. Emboldened by this, on 22 September the Convention replaced the monarchy with the French First Republic and introduced a new calendar, with 1792 becoming "Year One". The next few months were taken up with the trial of "Citoyen Louis Capet", formerly Louis XVI. While the convention was evenly divided on the question of his guilt, members were increasingly influenced by radicals centred in the Jacobin clubs and Paris Commune. The Brunswick Manifesto made it easy to portray Louis as a threat to the Revolution, apparently confirmed when extracts from his personal correspondence were published showed him conspiring with Royalist exiles serving in the Prussian and Austrian armies.


title: French Revolution

text: On 17 January 1793, the Assembly condemned Louis to death for "conspiracy against public liberty and general safety", by 361 to 288; another 72 members voted to execute him subject to a variety of delaying conditions. The sentence was carried out on 21 January on the "Place de la Révolution", now the Place de la Concorde. Horrified conservatives across Europe called for the destruction of revolutionary France; in February the Convention anticipated this by declaring war on Britain and the Dutch Republic; these countries were later joined by Spain, Portugal, Naples and the Tuscany in the War of the First Coalition.


title: French Revolution

text: The Girondins hoped war would unite the people behind the government and provide an excuse for rising prices and food shortages, but found themselves the target of popular anger. Many left for the provinces. The first conscription measure or "levée en masse" on 24 February sparked riots in Paris and other regional centres. Already unsettled by changes imposed on the church, in March the traditionally conservative and royalist Vendée rose in revolt. On 18th, Dumouriez was defeated at Neerwinden and defected to the Austrians. Uprisings followed in Bordeaux, Lyon, Toulon, Marseilles and Caen. The Republic seemed on the verge of collapse.


title: French Revolution

text: The crisis led to the creation on 6 April 1793 of the Committee of Public Safety, an executive committee accountable to the convention. The Girondins made a fatal political error by indicting Marat before the Revolutionary Tribunal for allegedly directing the September massacres; he was quickly acquitted, further isolating the Girondins from the "sans-culottes". When Jacques Hébert called for a popular revolt against the "henchmen of Louis Capet" on 24 May, he was arrested by the Commission of Twelve, a Girondin-dominated tribunal set up to expose 'plots'. In response to protests by the Commune, the Commission warned "if by your incessant rebellions something befalls the representatives of the nation...Paris will be obliterated".


title: French Revolution

text: Growing discontent allowed the clubs to mobilise against the Girondins. Backed by the Commune and elements of the National Guard, on 31 May they attempted to seize power in a coup. Although the coup failed, on 2 June the convention was surrounded by a crowd of up to 80,000, demanding cheap bread, unemployment pay and political reforms, including restriction of the vote to the "sans-culottes", and the right to remove deputies at will. Ten members of the commission and another twenty-nine members of the Girondin faction were arrested, and on 10 June, the Montagnards took over the Committee of Public Safety.


title: French Revolution

text: Meanwhile, a committee led by Robespierre's close ally Saint-Just was tasked with preparing a new Constitution. Completed in only eight days, it was ratified by the convention on 24 June, and contained radical reforms, including universal male suffrage and abolition of slavery in French colonies. However, normal legal processes were suspended following the assassination of Marat on 13 July by the Girondist Charlotte Corday, which the Committee of Public Safety used as an excuse to take control. The 1793 Constitution was suspended indefinitely in October.


title: French Revolution

text: Key areas of focus for the new government included creating a new state ideology, economic regulation and winning the war. They were helped by divisions among their internal opponents; while areas like the Vendée and Brittany wanted to restore the monarchy, most supported the Republic but opposed the regime in Paris. On 17 August, the Convention voted a second "levée en masse"; despite initial problems in equipping and supplying such large numbers, by mid-October Republican forces had re-taken Lyon, Marseilles and Bordeaux, while defeating Coalition armies at Hondschoote and Wattignies. The new class of military leaders included a young colonel named Napoleon Bonaparte, who was appointed commander of artillery at the Siege of Toulon thanks to his friendship with Augustin Robespierre. His success in that role resulted in promotion to the Army of Italy in April 1794, and the beginning of his rise to military and political power.


title: French Revolution

text: The Reign of Terror began as a way to harness revolutionary fervour, but quickly degenerated into the settlement of personal grievances. At the end of July, the Convention set price controls over a wide range of goods, with the death penalty for hoarders, and on 9 September 'revolutionary groups' were established to enforce them. On 17th, the Law of Suspects ordered the arrest of suspected "enemies of freedom", initiating what became known as the "Terror". According to archival records, from September 1793 to July 1794 some 16,600 people were executed on charges of counter-revolutionary activity; another 40,000 may have been summarily executed or died awaiting trial.


title: French Revolution

text: Fixed prices, death for 'hoarders' or 'profiteers', and confiscation of grain stocks by groups of armed workers meant that by early September, Paris was suffering acute food shortages. However, France's biggest challenge was servicing the huge public debt inherited from the former regime, which continued to expand due to the war. Initially the debt was financed by sales of confiscated property, but this was hugely inefficient; since few would buy assets that might be repossessed, fiscal stability could only be achieved by continuing the war until French counter-revolutionaries had been defeated. As internal and external threats to the Republic increased, the position worsened; dealing with this by printing "assignats" led to inflation and higher prices.


title: French Revolution

text: On 10 October, the Convention recognised the Committee of Public Safety as the supreme Revolutionary Government, and suspended the Constitution until peace was achieved. In mid-October, Marie Antoinette was found guilty of a long list of crimes and guillotined; two weeks later, the Girondist leaders arrested in June were also executed, along with Philippe Égalité. Terror was not confined to Paris; over 2,000 were killed after the recapture of Lyons.


title: French Revolution

text: At Cholet on 17 October, the Republican army won a decisive victory over the Vendée rebels, and the survivors escaped into Brittany. Another defeat at Le Mans on 23 December ended the rebellion as a major threat, although the insurgency continued until 1796. The extent of the brutal repression that followed has been debated by French historians since the mid-19th century. Between November 1793 to February 1794, over 4,000 were drowned in the Loire at Nantes under the supervision of Jean-Baptiste Carrier. Historian Reynald Secher claims that as many as 117,000 died between 1793 and 1796. Although those numbers have been challenged, François Furet concluded it "not only revealed massacre and destruction on an unprecedented scale, but a zeal so violent that it has bestowed as its legacy much of the region's identity."


title: French Revolution

text: At the height of the Terror, the slightest hint of counter-revolutionary thought could place one under suspicion, and even its supporters were not immune. Under the pressure of events, splits appeared within the "Montagnard" faction, with violent disagreements between radical "Hébertists" and moderates led by Danton. Robespierre saw their dispute as de-stabilising the regime, and, as a deist, he objected to the anti-religious policies advocated by the atheist Hébert, who was arrested and executed on 24 March with 19 of his colleagues, including Carrier. To retain the loyalty of the remaining Hébertists, Danton was arrested and executed on 5 April with Camille Desmoulins, after a show trial that arguably did more damage to Robespierre than any other act in this period.


title: French Revolution

text: The Law of 22 Prairial (10 June) denied "enemies of the people" the right to defend themselves. Those arrested in the provinces were now sent to Paris for judgement; from March to July, executions in Paris increased from five to twenty-six a day. Many Jacobins ridiculed the festival of the Cult of the Supreme Being on 8 June, a lavish and expensive ceremony led by Robespierre, who was also accused of circulating claims he was a second Messiah. Relaxation of price controls and rampant inflation caused increasing unrest among the "sans-culottes", but the improved military situation reduced fears the Republic was in danger. Many feared their own survival depended on Robespierre's removal; during a meeting on 29 June, three members of the Committee of Public Safety called him a dictator in his face.


title: French Revolution

text: Robespierre responded by not attending sessions, allowing his opponents to build a coalition against him. In a speech made to the convention on 26 July, he claimed certain members were conspiring against the Republic, an almost certain death sentence if confirmed. When he refused to give names, the session broke up in confusion. That evening he made the same speech at the Jacobins club, where it was greeted with huge applause and demands for execution of the 'traitors'. It was clear if his opponents did not act, he would; in the Convention next day, Robespierre and his allies were shouted down. His voice failed when he tried to speak, a deputy crying "The blood of Danton chokes him!"


title: French Revolution

text: After the Convention authorised his arrest, he and his supporters took refuge in the Hotel de Ville, which was defended by elements of the National Guard. Other units loyal to the Convention stormed the building that evening and detained Robespierre, who severely injured himself attempting suicide. He was executed on 28 July with 19 colleagues, including Saint-Just and Georges Couthon, followed by 83 members of the Commune. The Law of 22 Prairial was repealed, any surviving Girondists reinstated as deputies, and the Jacobin Club was closed and banned.


title: French Revolution

text: There are various interpretations of the Terror and the violence with which it was conducted; Marxist historian Albert Soboul saw it as essential to defend the Revolution from external and internal threats. François Furet argues the intense ideological commitment of the revolutionaries and their utopian goals required the extermination of any opposition. A middle position suggests violence was not inevitable but the product of a series of complex internal events, exacerbated by war.


title: French Revolution

text: The bloodshed did not end with the death of Robespierre; Southern France saw a wave of revenge killings, directed against alleged Jacobins, Republican officials and Protestants. Although the victors of Thermidor asserted control over the Commune by executing their leaders, some of those closely involved in the "Terror" retained their positions. They included Paul Barras, later chief executive of the French Directory, and Joseph Fouché, director of the killings in Lyon who served as Minister of Police under the Directory, the Consulate and Empire. Despite his links to Augustin Robespierre, military success in Italy meant Napoleon Bonaparte escaped censure.


title: French Revolution

text: The December 1794 Treaty of La Jaunaye ended the Chouannerie in western France by allowing freedom of worship and the return of non-juring priests. This was accompanied by military success; in January 1795, French forces helped the Dutch Patriots set up the Batavian Republic, securing their northern border. The war with Prussia was concluded in favour of France by the Peace of Basel in April 1795, while Spain made peace shortly thereafter.


title: French Revolution

text: However, the Republic still faced a crisis at home. Food shortages arising from a poor 1794 harvest were exacerbated in Northern France by the need to supply the army in Flanders, while the winter was the worst since 1709. By April 1795, people were starving and the "assignat" was worth only 8% of its face value; in desperation, the Parisian poor rose again. They were quickly dispersed and the main impact was another round of arrests, while Jacobin prisoners in Lyon were summarily executed.


title: French Revolution

text: A committee drafted a new constitution, approved by plebiscite on 23 September 1795 and put into place on 27th. Largely designed by Pierre Daunou and Boissy d'Anglas, it established a bicameral legislature, intended to slow down the legislative process, ending the wild swings of policy under the previous unicameral systems. The Council of 500 was responsible for drafting legislation, which was reviewed and approved by the Council of Ancients, an upper house containing 250 men over the age of 40. Executive power was in the hands of five Directors, selected by the Council of Ancients from a list provided by the lower house, with a five-year mandate.


title: French Revolution

text: Deputies were chosen by indirect election, a total franchise of around 5 million voting in primaries for 30,000 electors, or 0.6% of the population. Since they were also subject to stringent property qualification, it guaranteed the return of conservative or moderate deputies. In addition, rather than dissolving the previous legislature as in 1791 and 1792, the so-called 'law of two-thirds' ruled only 150 new deputies would be elected each year. The remaining 600 "Conventionnels" kept their seats, a move intended to ensure stability.


title: French Revolution

text: The Directory has a poor reputation amongst historians; for Jacobin sympathisers, it represented the betrayal of the Revolution, while Bonapartists emphasised its corruption to portray Napoleon in a better light. Although these criticisms were certainly valid, it also faced internal unrest, a stagnating economy and an expensive war, while hampered by the impracticality of the constitution. Since the Council of 500 controlled legislation and finance, they could paralyse government at will, and as the Directors had no power to call new elections, the only way to break a deadlock was to rule by decree or use force. As a result, the Directory was characterised by "chronic violence, ambivalent forms of justice, and repeated recourse to heavy-handed repression."


title: French Revolution

text: Retention of the "Conventionnels" ensured the Thermidorians held a majority in the legislature and three of the five Directors, but they faced an increasing challenge from the right. On 5 October, Convention troops led by Napoleon put down a royalist rising in Paris; when the first elections were held two weeks later, over 100 of the 150 new deputies were royalists of some sort. The power of the Parisian "san culottes" had been broken by the suppression of the May 1795 revolt; relieved of pressure from below, the Jacobins became natural supporters of the Directory against those seeking to restore the monarchy.


title: French Revolution

text: Removal of price controls and a collapse in the value of the "assignat" led to inflation and soaring food prices. By April 1796, over 500,000 Parisians were reportedly in need of relief, resulting in the May insurrection known as the Conspiracy of the Equals. Led by the revolutionary François-Noël Babeuf, their demands included the implementation of the 1793 Constitution and a more equitable distribution of wealth. Despite limited support from sections of the military, it was easily crushed, with Babeuf and other leaders executed. Nevertheless, by 1799 the economy had been stabilised and important reforms made allowing steady expansion of French industry; many remained in place for much of the 19th century.


title: French Revolution

text: Prior to 1797, three of the five Directors were firmly Republican; Barras, Révellière-Lépeaux and Jean-François Rewbell, as were around 40% of the legislature. The same percentage were broadly centrist or unaffiliated, along with two Directors, Étienne-François Letourneur and Lazare Carnot. Although only 20% were committed Royalists, many centrists supported the restoration of the exiled Louis XVIII of France in the belief this would end the War of the First Coalition with Britain and Austria. The elections of May 1797 resulted in significant gains for the right, with Royalists Jean-Charles Pichegru elected President of the Council of 500, and Barthélemy appointed a Director.


title: French Revolution

text: With Royalists apparently on the verge of power, the Republicans staged a coup on 4 September. Using troops from Bonaparte's Army of Italy under Pierre Augereau, the Council of 500 was forced to approve the arrest of Barthélemy, Pichegru and Carnot. The election results were cancelled, sixty-three leading royalists deported to French Guiana and new laws passed against émigrés, Royalists and ultra-Jacobins. Although the power of the monarchists had been destroyed, it opened the way for direct conflict between Barras and his opponents on the left.


title: French Revolution

text: Despite general war weariness, fighting continued and the 1798 elections saw a resurgence in Jacobin strength. The invasion of Egypt in July 1798 confirmed European fears of French expansionism, and the War of the Second Coalition began in November. Without a majority in the legislature, the Directors relied on the army to enforcing decrees and extract revenue from conquered territories. This made generals like Bonaparte and Joubert essential political players, while both the army and the Directory became notorious for their corruption.


title: French Revolution

text: It has been suggested the Directory did not collapse for economic or military reasons, but because by 1799, many 'preferred the uncertainties of authoritarian rule to the continuing ambiguities of parliamentary politics'. The architect of its end was Sieyès, who when asked what he had done during the Terror allegedly answered "I survived". Nominated to the Directory, his first action was removing Barras, using a coalition that included Talleyrand and former Jacobin Lucien Bonaparte, Napoleon's brother and president of the Council of 500. On 9 November 1799, the Coup of 18 Brumaire replaced the five Directors with the French Consulate, which consisted of three members, Bonaparte, Sieyès, and Roger Ducos; most historians consider this the end point of the French Revolution.


title: French Revolution

text: Some historians, such as F. Furet, in "Interpreting the French Revolution", and M. Linton, in "Choosing Terror", have evoked a Jacobin ideology without however defining it. Topics related to this ideology, such as slavery and imperialism, are ignored in these two works.


title: French Revolution

text: The kingdom of France was an empire, and the existence of this empire was never questioned by the revolutionaries, who even maintained slavery for a long time. It was not until February 1794 that they passed a decree to put an end to it. By then, slavery had already been abolished in the most important of the colonies, Saint-Domingue, following the great slave revolt that began in August 1791.


title: French Revolution

text: With the revolution, the king had ceased to be the "sovereign" of the empire. The new "sovereign" was now the "people." The revolutionaries, however, had recognized the existence of only one people, the French people, while there were several nations in the empire. Recognizing other peoples would have meant having to recognize their own sovereignty and thus their right to independence. Despite their propaganda for freedom, revolutionaries never recognized this right, or even the right to autonomy.


title: French Revolution

text: In the trial of the Girondins, one of the main charges against them was their supposed federalism, considered by the Jacobins as a crime.


title: French Revolution

text: Hostile to the federalist system, the right to autonomy and the right to independence for the peoples of the empire, the Jacobins conceived power only concentrated in Paris. On 25 September 1792, Lasource, of Brissot's party, told the convention: "I fear the despotism of Paris, and I do not want those who dispose there of the opinion of the men they mislead to dominate the national convention and the whole France."


title: French Revolution

text: Tocqueville emphasized, in "L'Ancien Régime et la Révolution", the "immense central power" created by the revolutionaries, and which Mirabeau had early rejoiced. Tallien, in August 1794, to explain the appearance of the regime of terror, said that it presumed a power that was at once "arbitrary", "absolute" and "endless": "The system of terror presupposes not only [...] arbitrary and absolute power, but also endless power..."


title: French Revolution

text: Recognizing only the French nation, the revolutionaries sought to destroy the identity of other nations. At the beginning of the revolution, they abolished the provinces, each of which had its own identity and which, for some of them, represented nations, establishing in their place the division into departments, which will be extended to the new conquests made during the revolutionary and Napoleonic eras.


title: French Revolution

text: The revolutionaries had, at first, tolerated languages and dialects other than French. In 1794, under the impetus of Grégoire, by a decree of 2 Thermidor Year II, the Jacobins instituted a policy aimed at the destruction of any language or dialect other than French. The title of Grégoire's report presented to the convention announced its program: "Report on the necessity and means of annihilating the patois and universalizing the use of the French language".


title: French Revolution

text: These characteristics of Jacobin ideology, which contrast with the revolutionary discourse on freedom and equality, have been highlighted by critical historians in the tradition of Tocqueville, notably by Hoel, in "Jacobin Ideology". They remain little addressed by most historians. In "La Révolution française et la fin des colonies", Y. Bénot noted, in a chapter entitled ‘Dans le miroir truqué des historiens’ (‘In the rigged mirror of historians’), the general silence of most of the historiography on matters related to slavery and colonialism.


title: French Revolution

text: The Revolution initiated a series of conflicts that began in 1792 and ended only with Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo in 1815. In its early stages, this seemed unlikely; the 1791 Constitution specifically disavowed "war for the purpose of conquest", and although traditional tensions between France and Austria re-emerged in the 1780s, Emperor Joseph cautiously welcomed the reforms. Austria was at war with the Ottomans, as were the Russians, while both were negotiating with Prussia over partitioning Poland. Most importantly, Britain preferred peace, and as Emperor Leopold stated after the Declaration of Pillnitz, "without England, there is no case".


title: French Revolution

text: In late 1791, factions within the Assembly came to see war as a way to unite the country and secure the Revolution by eliminating hostile forces on its borders and establishing its "natural frontiers". France declared war on Austria in April 1792 and issued the first conscription orders, with recruits serving for twelve months. By the time peace finally came in 1815, the conflict had involved every major European power as well as the United States, redrawn the map of Europe and expanded into the Americas, the Middle East, and the Indian Ocean.


title: French Revolution

text: From 1701 to 1801, the population of Europe grew from 118 to 187 million; combined with new mass production techniques, this allowed belligerents to support large armies, requiring the mobilisation of national resources. It was a different kind of war, fought by nations rather than kings, intended to destroy their opponents' ability to resist, but also to implement deep-ranging social change. While all wars are political to some degree, this period was remarkable for the emphasis placed on reshaping boundaries and the creation of entirely new European states.


title: French Revolution

text: In April 1792, French armies invaded the Austrian Netherlands but suffered a series of setbacks before victory over an Austrian-Prussian army at Valmy in September. After defeating a second Austrian army at Jemappes on 6 November, they occupied the Netherlands, areas of the Rhineland, Nice and Savoy. Emboldened by this success, in February 1793 France declared war on the Dutch Republic, Spain and Britain, beginning the War of the First Coalition. However, the expiration of the 12-month term for the 1792 recruits forced the French to relinquish their conquests. In August, new conscription measures were passed and by May 1794 the French army had between 750,000 and 800,000 men. Despite high rates of desertion, this was large enough to manage multiple internal and external threats; for comparison, the combined Prussian-Austrian army was less than 90,000.


title: French Revolution

text: By February 1795, France had annexed the Austrian Netherlands, established their frontier on the left bank of the Rhine and replaced the Dutch Republic with the Batavian Republic, a satellite state. These victories led to the collapse of the anti-French coalition; Prussia made peace in April 1795, followed soon after by Spain, leaving Britain and Austria as the only major powers still in the war. In October 1797, a series of defeats by Bonaparte in Italy led Austria to agree to the Treaty of Campo Formio, in which they formally ceded the Netherlands and recognised the Cisalpine Republic.


title: French Revolution

text: Fighting continued for two reasons; first, French state finances had come to rely on indemnities levied on their defeated opponents. Second, armies were primarily loyal to their generals, for whom the wealth achieved by victory and the status it conferred became objectives in themselves. Leading soldiers like Hoche, Pichegru and Carnot wielded significant political influence and often set policy; Campo Formio was approved by Bonaparte, not the Directory, which strongly objected to terms it considered too lenient.


title: French Revolution

text: Despite these concerns, the Directory never developed a realistic peace programme, fearing the destabilising effects of peace and the consequent demobilisation of hundreds of thousands of young men. As long as the generals and their armies stayed away from Paris, they were happy to allow them to continue fighting, a key factor behind sanctioning Bonaparte's invasion of Egypt. This resulted in aggressive and opportunistic policies, leading to the War of the Second Coalition in November 1798.


title: French Revolution

text: Although the French Revolution had a dramatic impact in numerous areas of Europe, the French colonies felt a particular influence. As the Martinican author Aimé Césaire put it, "there was in each French colony a specific revolution, that occurred on the occasion of the French Revolution, in tune with it."


title: French Revolution

text: The Revolution in Saint-Domingue was the most notable example of slave uprisings in French colonies. In the 1780s, Saint-Domingue was France's wealthiest possession, producing more sugar than all the British West Indies islands combined.


title: French Revolution

text: The revolutionaries remained imperialists who maintained the system of slavery until it was dismantled in Saint-Domingue, following the slave revolt that began in August 1791. Sonthonax and Polverel were the two civil commissioners who officially proclaimed the abolition of slavery in 1793. The National Convention did not vote to abolish slavery until February 1794 after three deputies from Saint-Domingue arrived in France to explain why slavery had been abolished in the colony.


title: French Revolution

text: However, the 1794 decree was only implemented in Saint-Domingue, Guadeloupe and Guyane, and was a dead letter in Senegal, Mauritius, Réunion and Martinique, the last of which had been captured by the British, and as such remained unaffected by French law.


title: French Revolution

text: The revolutionaries did not recognize the right to independence, nor autonomy, to the peoples of the French empire. Toussaint Louverture, who emerged during the struggle against the French army as a military leader, nevertheless managed to obtain autonomy by the fact, which was a prelude and condition for future independence.


title: French Revolution

text: Newspapers and pamphlets played a central role in stimulating and defining the Revolution. Prior to 1789, there have been a small number of heavily censored newspapers that needed a royal licence to operate, but the Estates-General created an enormous demand for news, and over 130 newspapers appeared by the end of the year. Among the most significant were Marat's "L'Ami du peuple" and Elysée Loustallot's "". Over the next decade, more than 2,000 newspapers were founded, 500 in Paris alone. Most lasted only a matter of weeks but they became the main communication medium, combined with the very large pamphlet literature.


title: French Revolution

text: Newspapers were read aloud in taverns and clubs, and circulated hand to hand. There was a widespread assumption that writing was a vocation, not a business, and the role of the press was the advancement of civic republicanism. By 1793 the radicals were most active but initially the royalists flooded the country with their publication the "" (Friends of the King) until they were suppressed.


title: French Revolution

text: To illustrate the differences between the new Republic and the old regime, the leaders needed to implement a new set of symbols to be celebrated instead of the old religious and monarchical symbols. To this end, symbols were borrowed from historic cultures and redefined, while those of the old regime were either destroyed or reattributed acceptable characteristics. These revised symbols were used to instil in the public a new sense of tradition and reverence for the Enlightenment and the Republic.


title: French Revolution

text: "La Marseillaise" () became the national anthem of France. The song was written and composed in 1792 by Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle, and was originally titled ""Chant de guerre pour l'Armée du Rhin"". The French National Convention adopted it as the First Republic's anthem in 1795. It acquired its nickname after being sung in Paris by volunteers from Marseille marching on the capital.


title: French Revolution

text: The song is the first example of the "European march" anthemic style, while the evocative melody and lyrics led to its widespread use as a song of revolution and incorporation into many pieces of classical and popular music. De Lisle was instructed to 'produce a hymn which conveys to the soul of the people the enthusiasm which it (the music) suggests.'


title: French Revolution

text: The guillotine remains "the principal symbol of the Terror in the French Revolution." Invented by a physician during the Revolution as a quicker, more efficient and more distinctive form of execution, the guillotine became a part of popular culture and historic memory. It was celebrated on the left as the people's avenger, for example in the revolutionary song "La guillotine permanente", and cursed as the symbol of the Terror by the right.


title: French Revolution

text: Its operation became a popular entertainment that attracted great crowds of spectators. Vendors sold programmes listing the names of those scheduled to die. Many people came day after day and vied for the best locations from which to observe the proceedings; knitting women (tricoteuses) formed a cadre of hardcore regulars, inciting the crowd. Parents often brought their children. By the end of the Terror, the crowds had thinned drastically. Repetition had staled even this most grisly of entertainments, and audiences grew bored.


title: French Revolution

text: Cockades were widely worn by revolutionaries beginning in 1789. They now pinned the blue-and-red cockade of Paris onto the white cockade of the "Ancien Régime". Camille Desmoulins asked his followers to wear green cockades on 12 July 1789. The Paris militia, formed on 13 July, adopted a blue and red cockade. Blue and red are the traditional colours of Paris, and they are used on the city's coat of arms. Cockades with various colour schemes were used during the storming of the Bastille on 14 July.


title: French Revolution

text: The Liberty cap, also known as the Phrygian cap, or pileus, is a brimless, felt cap that is conical in shape with the tip pulled forward. It reflects Roman republicanism and liberty, alluding to the Roman ritual of manumission, in which a freed slave receives the bonnet as a symbol of his newfound liberty.


title: French Revolution

text: The role of women in the Revolution has long been a topic of debate. Deprived of political rights under the "Ancien Régime", the 1791 Constitution classed them as "passive" citizens, leading to demands for social and political equality for women and an end to male domination. They expressed these demands using pamphlets and clubs such as the "Cercle Social", whose largely male members viewed themselves as contemporary feminists. However, in October 1793, the Assembly banned all women's clubs and the movement was crushed; this was driven by the emphasis on masculinity in a wartime situation, antagonism towards feminine "interference" in state affairs due to Marie Antoinette, and traditional male supremacy. A decade later the Napoleonic Code confirmed and perpetuated women's second-class status.


title: French Revolution

text: At the beginning of the Revolution, women took advantage of events to force their way into the political sphere, swore oaths of loyalty, "solemn declarations of patriotic allegiance, [and] affirmations of the political responsibilities of citizenship." Activists included Girondists like Olympe de Gouges, author of the Declaration of the Rights of Woman and of the Female Citizen, and Charlotte Corday, the killer of Marat. Others like Théroigne de Méricourt, Pauline Léon and the Society of Revolutionary Republican Women supported the Jacobins, staged demonstrations in the National Assembly and took part in the October 1789 March to Versailles. Despite this, the constitutions of 1791 and 1793 denied them political rights and democratic citizenship.


title: French Revolution

text: On 20 June 1792 a number of armed women took part in a procession that "passed through the halls of the Legislative Assembly, into the Tuileries Garden, and then through the King's residence." Women also assumed a special role in the funeral of Marat, following his murder on 13 July 1793 by Corday; as part of the funeral procession, they carried the bathtub in which he died, as well as a shirt stained with his blood. On 20 May 1793 women were in the forefront of a crowd demanding "bread and the Constitution of 1793"; when they went unnoticed, they began "sacking shops, seizing grain and kidnapping officials."


title: French Revolution

text: The Society of Revolutionary Republican Women, a militant group on the far left, demanded a law in 1793 that would compel all women to wear the tricolour cockade to demonstrate their loyalty to the Republic. They also demanded vigorous price controls to keep bread – the major food of the poor people – from becoming too expensive. After the Convention passed the law in September 1793, the Revolutionary Republican Women demanded vigorous enforcement, but were countered by market women, former servants, and religious women who adamantly opposed price controls (which would drive them out of business) and resented attacks on the aristocracy and on religion. Fist fights broke out in the streets between the two factions of women.


title: French Revolution

text: Meanwhile, the men who controlled the Jacobins rejected the Revolutionary Republican Women as dangerous rabble-rousers. At this point the Jacobins controlled the government; they dissolved the Society of Revolutionary Republican Women, and decreed that all women's clubs and associations were illegal. They sternly reminded women to stay home and tend to their families by leaving public affairs to the men. Organised women were permanently shut out of the French Revolution after 30 October 1793.


title: French Revolution

text: Olympe de Gouges wrote a number of plays, short stories, and novels. Her publications emphasised that women and men are different, but this shouldn't prevent equality under the law. In her Declaration of the Rights of Woman and of the Female Citizen she insisted that women deserved rights, especially in areas concerning them directly, such as divorce and recognition of illegitimate children.


title: French Revolution

text: Madame Roland (a.k.a. Manon or Marie Roland) was another important female activist. Her political focus was not specifically on women or their liberation. She focused on other aspects of the government, but was a feminist by virtue of the fact that she was a woman working to influence the world. Her personal letters to leaders of the Revolution influenced policy; in addition, she often hosted political gatherings of the Brissotins, a political group which allowed women to join. As she was led to the scaffold, Madame Roland shouted "O liberty! What crimes are committed in thy name!" Many activists were punished for their actions, while some were executed for "conspiring against the unity and the indivisibility of the Republic".


title: French Revolution

text: Counter-revolutionary women resisted what they saw as the increasing intrusion of the state into their lives. One major consequence was the dechristianisation of France, a movement strongly rejected by many devout people; especially for women living in rural areas, the closing of the churches meant a loss of normality. This sparked a counter-revolutionary movement led by women; while supporting other political and social changes, they opposed the dissolution of the Catholic Church and revolutionary cults like the Cult of the Supreme Being. Olwen Hufton argues some wanted to protect the Church from heretical changes enforced by revolutionaries, viewing themselves as "defenders of faith".


title: French Revolution

text: Economically, many peasant women refused to sell their goods for assignats because this form of currency was unstable and was backed by the sale of confiscated Church property. By far the most important issue to counter-revolutionary women was the passage and the enforcement of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy in 1790. In response to this measure, women in many areas began circulating anti-oath pamphlets and refused to attend masses held by priests who had sworn oaths of loyalty to the Republic. These women continued to adhere to traditional practices such as Christian burials and naming their children after saints in spite of revolutionary decrees to the contrary.


title: French Revolution

text: The Revolution abolished many economic constraints imposed by the "Ancien Régime", including church tithes and feudal dues although tenants often paid higher rents and taxes. All church lands were nationalised, along with those owned by Royalist exiles, which were used to back paper currency known as assignats, and the feudal guild system eliminated. It also abolished the highly inefficient system of tax farming, whereby private individuals would collect taxes for a hefty fee. The government seized the foundations that had been set up (starting in the 13th century) to provide an annual stream of revenue for hospitals, poor relief, and education. The state sold the lands but typically local authorities did not replace the funding and so most of the nation's charitable and school systems were massively disrupted


title: French Revolution

text: Between 1790 and 1796, industrial and agricultural output dropped, foreign trade plunged, and prices soared, forcing the government to finance expenditure by issuing ever increasing quantities "assignats". When this resulted in escalating inflation, the response was to impose price controls and persecute private speculators and traders, creating a Black market. Between 1789 and 1793, the annual deficit increased from 10% to 64% of gross national product, while annual inflation reached 3,500% after a poor harvest in 1794 and the removal of price controls. The assignats were withdrawn in 1796 but inflation continued until the introduction of the gold-based "Franc germinal" in 1803.


title: French Revolution

text: The French Revolution had a major impact on European and Western history, by ending feudalism and creating the path for future advances in broadly defined individual freedoms. Its impact on French nationalism was profound, while also stimulating nationalist movements throughout Europe. Modern historians argue the concept of the nation state was a direct consequence of the Revolution.


title: French Revolution

text: The impact of the Revolution on French society was enormous and led to numerous changes, some of which were widely accepted, while others continue to be debated. Under Louis XIV, political power was centralised at Versailles and controlled by the monarch, whose power derived from immense personal wealth, control over the army and appointment of clergy, provincial governors, lawyers and judges. In less than a year, the king was reduced to a figurehead, the nobility deprived of titles and estates and the church of its monasteries and property. Clergy, judges and magistrates were controlled by the state, and the army sidelined, with military power placed held by the revolutionary National Guard. The central elements of 1789 were the slogan "Liberty, Equality and Fraternity" and "The Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen", which Lefebvre calls "the incarnation of the Revolution as a whole."


title: French Revolution

text: The long-term impact on France was profound, shaping politics, society, religion and ideas, and polarising politics for more than a century. Historian François Aulard writes:


title: French Revolution

text: "From the social point of view, the Revolution consisted in the suppression of what was called the feudal system, in the emancipation of the individual, in greater division of landed property, the abolition of the privileges of noble birth, the establishment of equality, the simplification of life... The French Revolution differed from other revolutions in being not merely national, for it aimed at benefiting all humanity."


title: French Revolution

text: One of the most heated controversies during the Revolution was the status of the Catholic Church. In 1788, it held a dominant position within society; to be French meant to be a Catholic. By 1799, much of its property and institutions had been confiscated and its senior leaders dead or in exile. Its cultural influence was also under attack, with efforts made to strip civil life of religious elements such as Sundays, holy days, saints, prayers, rituals and ceremonies. Ultimately these attempts not only failed but aroused a furious reaction among the pious; opposition to these changes was a key factor behind the revolt in the Vendée.


title: French Revolution

text: Over the centuries, charitable foundations had been set up to fund hospitals, poor relief, and schools; when these were confiscated and sold off, the funding was not replaced, causing massive disruption to these support systems. Under the "Ancien Régime", medical assistance for the rural poor was often provided by nuns, acting as nurses but also physicians, surgeons, and apothecaries; the Revolution abolished most of these orders without replacing organised nursing support. Demand remained strong and after 1800 nuns resumed their work in hospitals and on rural estates. They were tolerated by officials because they had widespread support and were a link between elite male physicians and distrustful peasants who needed help.


title: French Revolution

text: The church was a primary target during the Terror, due to its association with "counter-revolutionary" elements, resulting in the persecution of priests and destruction of churches and religious images throughout France. An effort was made to replace the Catholic Church altogether with the Cult of Reason, and with civic festivals replacing religious ones, leading to attacks by locals on state officials. These policies were promoted by the atheist Hébert and opposed by the deist Robespierre, who denounced the campaign and replaced the Cult of Reason with the Cult of the Supreme Being.


title: French Revolution

text: The Concordat of 1801 established the rules for a relationship between the Catholic Church and French State that lasted until it was abrogated by the French Third Republic on 11 December 1905. The Concordat was a compromise that restored some of the Church's traditional roles but not its power, lands or monasteries; the clergy became public officials controlled by Paris, not Rome, while Protestants and Jews gained equal rights. However, debate continues into the present over the role of religion in the public sphere and related issues such as church-controlled schools. Recent arguments over the use of Muslim religious symbols in schools, such as wearing headscarves, have been explicitly linked to the conflict over Catholic rituals and symbols during the Revolution.


title: French Revolution

text: Two thirds of France was employed in agriculture, which was transformed by the Revolution. With the breakup of large estates controlled by the Church and the nobility and worked by hired hands, rural France became more a land of small independent farms. Harvest taxes were ended, such as the tithe and seigneurial dues, much to the relief of the peasants. Primogeniture was ended both for nobles and peasants, thereby weakening the family patriarch, and led to a fall in the born rate since all children had a share in the family property. Cobban argues the Revolution bequeathed to the nation "a ruling class of landowners."


title: French Revolution

text: In the cities, entrepreneurship on a small scale flourished, as restrictive monopolies, privileges, barriers, rules, taxes and guilds gave way. However, the British blockade virtually ended overseas and colonial trade, hurting the cities and their supply chains. Overall, the Revolution did not greatly change the French business system, and probably helped freeze in place the horizons of the small business owner. The typical businessman owned a small store, mill or shop, with family help and a few paid employees; large-scale industry was less common than in other industrialising nations.


title: French Revolution

text: Economic historians dispute the impact on income per capita caused by the emigration of more than 100,000 individuals during the Revolution, the vast majority of whom were supporters of the old regime. One suggestion is the resulting fragmentation of agricultural holdings had a significant negative impact in the early years of 19th century, then became positive in the second half of the century because it facilitated the rise in human capital investments. Others argue the redistribution of land had an immediate positive impact on agricultural productivity, before the scale of these gains gradually declined over the course of the 19th century.


title: French Revolution

text: The Revolution meant an end to arbitrary royal rule and held out the promise of rule by law under a constitutional order, but it did not rule out a monarch. Napoleon as emperor set up a constitutional system (although he remained in full control), and the restored Bourbons were forced to go along with one. After the abdication of Napoleon III in 1871, the monarchists probably had a voting majority, but they were so factionalised they could not agree on who should be king, and instead the French Third Republic was launched with a deep commitment to upholding the ideals of the Revolution. The conservative Catholic enemies of the Revolution came to power in Vichy France (1940–44), and tried with little success to undo its heritage, but they kept it a republic. Vichy denied the principle of equality and tried to replace the Revolutionary watchwords "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" with "Work, Family, and Fatherland." However, there were no efforts by the Bourbons, Vichy or anyone else to restore the privileges that had been stripped away from the nobility in 1789. France permanently became a society of equals under the law.


title: French Revolution

text: The Jacobin cause was picked up by Marxists in the mid-19th century and became an element of communist thought around the world. In the Soviet Union, "Gracchus" Babeuf was regarded as a hero.


title: French Revolution

text: Economic historians Dan Bogart, Mauricio Drelichman, Oscar Gelderblom, and Jean-Laurent Rosenthal described codified law as the French Revolution's "most significant export." They wrote, "While restoration returned most of their power to the absolute monarchs who had been deposed by Napoleon, only the most recalcitrant ones, such as Ferdinand VII of Spain, went to the trouble of completely reversing the legal innovations brought on by the French." They also note that the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars caused England, Spain, Prussia and the Dutch Republic to centralize their fiscal systems to an unprecedented extent in order to finance the military campaigns of the Napoleonic Wars.


title: French Revolution

text: According to Daron Acemoglu, Davide Cantoni, Simon Johnson, and James A. Robinson the French Revolution had long-term effects in Europe. They suggest that "areas that were occupied by the French and that underwent radical institutional reform experienced more rapid urbanization and economic growth, especially after 1850. There is no evidence of a negative effect of French invasion."


title: French Revolution

text: A 2016 study in the "European Economic Review" found that the areas of Germany that were occupied by France in the 19th century and in which the Code Napoleon was applied have higher levels of trust and cooperation today.


title: French Revolution

text: On 16 July 1789, two days after the Storming of the Bastille, John Frederick Sackville, serving as ambassador to France, reported to Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Francis Osborne, 5th Duke of Leeds, "Thus, my Lord, the greatest revolution that we know anything of has been effected with, comparatively speaking – if the magnitude of the event is considered – the loss of very few lives. From this moment we may consider France as a free country, the King a very limited monarch, and the nobility as reduced to a level with the rest of the nation." Yet in Britain the majority, especially among the aristocracy, strongly opposed the French Revolution. Britain led and funded the series of coalitions that fought France from 1793 to 1815, and then restored the Bourbons.


title: French Revolution

text: Philosophically and politically, Britain was in debate over the rights and wrongs of revolution, in the abstract and in practicalities. The Revolution Controversy was a "pamphlet war" set off by the publication of "A Discourse on the Love of Our Country", a speech given by Richard Price to the Revolution Society on 4 November 1789, supporting the French Revolution (as he had the American Revolution), and saying that patriotism actually centers around loving the people and principles of a nation, not its ruling class. Edmund Burke responded in November 1790 with his own pamphlet, "Reflections on the Revolution in France", attacking the French Revolution as a threat to the aristocracy of all countries. William Coxe opposed Price's premise that one's country is principles and people, not the State itself.


title: French Revolution

text: Conversely, two seminal political pieces of political history were written in Price's favour, supporting the general right of the French people to replace their State. One of the first of these "pamphlets" into print was "A Vindication of the Rights of Men" by Mary Wollstonecraft (better known for her later treatise, sometimes described as the first feminist text, "A Vindication of the Rights of Woman"); Wollstonecraft's title was echoed by Thomas Paine's "Rights of Man", published a few months later. In 1792 Christopher Wyvill published "Defence of Dr. Price and the Reformers of England", a plea for reform and moderation.


title: French Revolution

text: This exchange of ideas has been described as "one of the great political debates in British history". Even in France, there was a varying degree of agreement during this debate, English participants generally opposing the violent means that the Revolution bent itself to for its ends.


title: French Revolution

text: In Ireland, the effect was to transform what had been an attempt by Protestant settlers to gain some autonomy into a mass movement led by the Society of United Irishmen involving Catholics and Protestants. It stimulated the demand for further reform throughout Ireland, especially in Ulster. The upshot was a revolt in 1798, led by Wolfe Tone, that was crushed by Britain.


title: French Revolution

text: German reaction to the Revolution swung from favourable to antagonistic. At first it brought liberal and democratic ideas, the end of guilds, serfdom and the Jewish ghetto. It brought economic freedoms and agrarian and legal reform. Above all the antagonism helped stimulate and shape German nationalism.


title: French Revolution

text: The French invaded Switzerland and turned it into the "Helvetic Republic" (1798–1803), a French puppet state. French interference with localism and traditions was deeply resented in Switzerland, although some reforms took hold and survived in the later period of restoration.


title: French Revolution

text: The region of modern-day Belgium was divided between two polities: the Austrian Netherlands and Prince-Bishopric of Liège. Both territories experienced revolutions in 1789. In the Austrian Netherlands, the Brabant Revolution succeeded in expelling Austrian forces and established the new United Belgian States. The Liège Revolution expelled the tyrannical Prince-Bishop and installed a republic. Both failed to attract international support. By December 1790, the Brabant revolution had been crushed and Liège was subdued the following year.


title: French Revolution

text: During the Revolutionary Wars, the French invaded and occupied the region between 1794 and 1814, a time known as the French period. The new government enforced new reforms, incorporating the region into France itself. New rulers were sent in by Paris. Belgian men were drafted into the French wars and heavily taxed. Nearly everyone was Catholic, but the Church was repressed. Resistance was strong in every sector, as Belgian nationalism emerged to oppose French rule. The French legal system, however, was adopted, with its equal legal rights, and abolition of class distinctions. Belgium now had a government bureaucracy selected by merit.


title: French Revolution

text: Antwerp regained access to the sea and grew quickly as a major port and business centre. France promoted commerce and capitalism, paving the way for the ascent of the bourgeoisie and the rapid growth of manufacturing and mining. In economics, therefore, the nobility declined while middle-class Belgian entrepreneurs flourished because of their inclusion in a large market, paving the way for Belgium's leadership role after 1815 in the Industrial Revolution on the Continent.


title: French Revolution

text: The Kingdom of Denmark adopted liberalising reforms in line with those of the French Revolution, with no direct contact. Reform was gradual and the regime itself carried out agrarian reforms that had the effect of weakening absolutism by creating a class of independent peasant freeholders. Much of the initiative came from well-organised liberals who directed political change in the first half of the 19th century.


title: French Revolution

text: The Constitution of Norway of 1814 was inspired by the French Revolution, and was considered to be one of the most liberal and democratic constitutions at the time.


title: French Revolution

text: Coverage of the Revolution in the then Province of Quebec took place against the background of an ongoing campaign for constitutional reform by Loyalist emigrants from the United States. With the press reliant on reprinting articles from British newspapers, local opinion followed them in being generally positive on the aims and objectives of the revolutionaries. This made it increasingly difficult to justify the withholding of electoral rights, with the British Home Secretary William Grenville remarking it was difficult to deny "to so large a body of British Subjects, the benefits of the British Constitution". This led to the "Constitutional Act 1791", which split the Province into two separate colonies, each with its own electoral assembly, the predominantly French-speaking Lower Canada and predominantly English-speaking Upper Canada.


title: French Revolution

text: French migration into the Canadas significantly declined during and after the Revolution, with only limited numbers of artisans, professionals, and religious emigres permitted to settle in that period. Most emigres settled in Montreal or Quebec City, although French nobleman Joseph-Geneviève de Puisaye and a small group of Royalists settled lands north of York, modern day Toronto. The influx of religious migrants also reinvigorated the local Catholic Church, with exiled priests establishing a number of parishes throughout the Canadas.


title: French Revolution

text: The French Revolution deeply polarised American politics, and this polarisation led to the creation of the First Party System. In 1793, as war broke out in Europe, the Democratic-Republican Party led by former American minister to France Thomas Jefferson favored revolutionary France and pointed to the 1778 treaty that was still in effect. George Washington and his unanimous cabinet, including Jefferson, decided that the treaty did not bind the United States to enter the war. Washington proclaimed neutrality instead. Under President John Adams, a Federalist, an undeclared naval war took place with France from 1798 until 1799, often called the "Quasi War". Jefferson became president in 1801, but was hostile to Napoleon as a dictator and emperor. However, the two entered negotiations over the Louisiana Territory and agreed to the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, an acquisition that substantially increased the size of the United States.


title: French Revolution

text: The French Revolution has received enormous amounts of historical attention, both from the general public as well as scholars and academics, while perspectives on its significance and major developments have often been characterised as falling along ideological lines. In general, studies of the Revolution initially focused on political ideas and developments, but gradually shifted towards social history that analyses its impact on individuals.


title: French Revolution

text: Contemporary conservatives like Edmund Burke and Friedrich von Gentz argued it was the product of a few conspiratorial individuals who brainwashed the masses into subverting the old order, a claim rooted in the belief that the revolutionaries had no legitimate complaints. In the 19th century, the Revolution was heavily analysed by economists and political scientists like Alexis de Tocqueville, who suggested it was the result of a more prosperous middle class becoming conscious of its social importance. Perhaps the most influential was Karl Marx, who viewed the social class nature of the Revolution as fundamental to understanding human social evolution itself. He argued the egalitarian values it introduced gave rise to a classless and co-operative model for society called "socialism", which found direct expression in the 1870 to 1871 Paris Commune.


title: French Revolution

text: For much of the 20th century, historians influenced by Marx, notably Albert Soboul, emphasised the role of the peasants and urban workers in the Revolution and presented it as class struggle. The central theme of this argument was that the Revolution emerged from the rising bourgeoisie, with support from the sans-culottes, who united to destroy the aristocracy. However, Western scholars largely abandoned Marxist interpretations in the 1990s; the theme of class conflict was widely discredited, but no new explanatory model has gained widespread support. Nevertheless, in Western history the Revolution is still seen as a key dividing point between the early modern and late modern periods, and thus one of its most important events.


title: French Revolution

text: Within France itself, the Revolution permanently crippled the power of the aristocracy and drained the wealth of the Church, although the two institutions survived despite the damage they sustained. After the collapse of the First French Empire in 1815, the French public lost many of the rights and privileges earned since the Revolution, but remembered the participatory politics that characterised the period. According to one historian: "Thousands of men and even many women gained firsthand experience in the political arena: they talked, read, and listened in new ways; they voted; they joined new organisations; and they marched for their political goals. Revolution became a tradition, and republicanism an enduring option."


title: French Revolution

text: It is also suggested the French underwent a fundamental transformation in self-identity, evidenced by the elimination of privileges and their replacement by intrinsic human rights, as well as a decline in social deference that highlighted the principle of equality throughout the Revolution. The Revolution represented the most significant and dramatic challenge to political absolutism up to that point in history and spread democratic ideals throughout Europe and ultimately the world.


title: French Revolution

text: The history of the French Revolution has generally been written with three strong biases: the white one, the French one, and the Jacobin one.


title: French Revolution

text: The white bias minimizes or ignores the problem of slavery, the question of colonies, and the Haitian Revolution.


title: French Revolution

text: In his foreword to R. R. Palmer's book, "The Age of the Democratic Revolution: A Political History of Europe and America", D. Armitage noted the "omission of the Haitian revolution" from the work.


title: French Revolution

text: In his book "Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History", in the chapter 'An Unthinkable History. The Haitian Revolution as a Non-Event', M.-R. Trouillot said of the Haitian Revolution that it is "the revolution that the world forgot".


title: French Revolution

text: F. Gauthier wrote for her part that "until A. Césaire, the historiography of the French Revolution ignored the colonial problem".


title: French Revolution

text: The French bias includes the white one, but it minimizes or ignores more generally all subjects related to colonies and imperialism, regardless of the question of slavery, which concerned only the black population.


title: French Revolution

text: The French bias also attributes responsibility for the wars declared in 1792 and 1793 by France to Austria, England, etc., to these very powers. Historians such as Mignet, Thiers and Michelet have adopted this view. Mignet, for example, wrote in his "Histoire de la révolution française": "France was threatened by the fate that Holland had just suffered and perhaps that of Poland. The whole question was reduced to waiting or anticipating the war, taking advantage of the enthusiasm of the people or letting it cool. The real author of war is not the one who declares it, but the one who makes it necessary."


title: French Revolution

text: This view has been challenged, among others, by Blanning, in "The origins of the French revolutionary wars", and before him by Michon, in "Essai sur l'histoire du parti feuillant". Both blamed the war on France. Michon wrote, for example: "There was no question of an external danger, of aggression by foreign powers..."


title: French Revolution

text: For example, because of the debate between supporters and opponents of the war, with Brissot and Robespierre as the most notable figures, Brissot advocating war, Robespierre opposing it, neo-Jacobin historians like Michon have blamed the war, not on Austria and the others great powers, but on the Girondins. As Blanning said: "The predominantly neo-Jacobin tone of most French historical writing on the Revolution has cost Brissot and his supporters dear in terms of reputation. Georges Michon, whose detestation of Brissot was matched only by his adulation of Robespierre, delivered the definitive indictment: 'The war', he stated baldly, 'was desired and provoked by the Girondins.'"


title: French Revolution

text: The Jacobin bias is also particularly visible in the favorable sentiment with which the fall of the Girondins at the end of May-beginning of June 1793 is perceived.


title: French Revolution

text: If white, French and Jacobin biases are so strong among historians, it is because they were those of the majority of revolutionaries, with whom the majority of historians identify themselves. As Blanning said, the tone of most French historical writing on the Revolution is "predominantly neo-Jacobin".


title: French Revolution

text: The identification of historians with revolutionaries has been recognized and often strongly claimed by historians themselves. The "revolutionary heroes", as A. Cobban called them, have become, in fact, very few, the two main ones being Danton and Robespierre, two Jacobins. And because they were ultimately strongly opposed to each other, so are historians.


title: French Revolution

text: Danton was the "hero" of Michelet and Aulard. Mathiez, although a disciple of Aulard, nevertheless devoted much of his work to destroy Danton's reputation. "Danton’s reputation, said Cobban, can never more than partially recover from the vendetta waged in the name of Robespierre against him by Mathiez."


title: French Revolution

text: Robespierre was the "hero" of the Marxist historians Mathiez, Lefebvre and Soboul, but he was and is also the "hero" of non-Marxist historians like Hamel, Furet, Linton and many others.


title: French Revolution

text: Among them are those who identify themselves with non-Jacobin revolutionaries, especially Brissot and those of his party.


title: French Revolution

text: Although a major figure among revolutionaries, Brissot has rarely been prized by historians. A notable exception is J. Israel in "Revolutionary Ideas". As a result, he was attacked by Robespierre's partisans. Israel is interested not only in Brissot but in all those around him, men like Condorcet, for example, linking all these revolutionaries to the European intellectuals he calls the "radical enlighteners". In ‘A Response to Chappey and Missé’, Israel wrote: "I want to show that as regards the democratic republican core of the French Revolution, Robespierre was in no way "La révolution incarnée", quite the opposite. Obviously, my book clashes outright with the recent trend in French Revolution historiography, since 2000, that some now triumphantly designate the "retour de Robespierre." [...] Belissa and Bosc construe the maligners and detractors of Robespierre as "contra-revolutionnaire" but that term scarcely applies to the radical enlighteners I am focusing on..."


title: French Revolution

text: In opposition to historians who identify with revolutionaries are critical historians who take an outside look at the revolution, in the tradition of Tocqueville and his book "L'Ancien régime et la Révolution". Among those historians who radically combat Jacobin, French and, more rarely, white biases, are Taine, Cochin, Sorel, Cobban, Doyle, Bénot, Blanning and Hoel.


title: French Revolution

text: For these historians, the French Revolution is less a revolution than an acceleration of an evolution underway under the monarchy. The revolution is not to be seen in ideological terms, but essentially as a "power struggle", whether at the international level or within the French Empire, as Cobban said: "True, public opinion in all countries saw the struggle as an ideological one between revolution and established order; but those who actually determined international policies were free from this illusion, though they had to allow for and were prepared to make use of it in others. The history of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars can be told almost exclusively in terms of power politics and explained by the traditions of the countries involved and the personalities of their rulers and ministers. [...] The frank recognition of the dominance of power politics in international relations has not been without its effect on the writing of domestic French history."


title: Steven Seagal

text: Steven Frederic Seagal (; born April 10, 1952) is an American actor, screenwriter and martial artist. A 7th-dan black belt in aikido, he began his adult life as a martial arts instructor in Japan and eventually ended up running his father-in-law's dojo. He later moved to Los Angeles where he had the same profession. In 1988, Seagal made his acting debut in "Above the Law". By 1991, he had starred in four films.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In 1992, he played Navy SEAL counter-terrorist expert Casey Ryback in "Under Siege". During the latter half of the 1990s, Seagal starred in three more feature films and the direct-to-video film "The Patriot". Subsequently, his career shifted to mostly direct-to-video productions. He has since appeared in films and reality shows, including "", which depicted Seagal performing his duties as a reserve deputy sheriff.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal is a guitarist and has released two studio albums, "Songs from the Crystal Cave" and "Mojo Priest", and performed on the scores of several of his films. He has worked with Stevie Wonder and Tony Rebel, who both performed on his debut album. He has been involved in a line of "therapeutic oil" products and energy drinks. Seagal is an environmentalist, animal rights activist, and supporter of 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. He is a supporter of Vladimir Putin, to whom he once referred as "one of the great living world leaders". He was granted both Russian and Serbian citizenship in 2016. In 2018, he was appointed Russia's special envoy to the U.S.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Steven Frederic Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan, on April 10, 1952, the son of a medical technician and a mathematics teacher. His mother was of Irish descent, while his father was Jewish. His paternal grandparents were Russian Jewish immigrants. During an interview for the Russian talk show, Let Them Talk, Seagal stated that he has paternal ancestors from the Siberian city of Vladivostok, as well as Belarus and Saint Petersburg. He stated that genetic testing determined that he has Yakut and Buryat ancestry.


title: Steven Seagal

text: When he was five years old, he moved with his parents to Fullerton, California. His mother later told "People" magazine that prior to the move Seagal was frail and suffered from asthma: "He was a puny kid back then. But he really thrived after the move [from Michigan]." Seagal attended Buena Park High School in Buena Park, California, and Fullerton College between 1970 and 1971. As a teen, he spent much time in his garage listening to loud rock music. While working with a friendly old Japanese man at a dojo in Garden Grove he was encouraged to visit Japan.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. By 1974, he had returned to California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. In 1975 they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family. As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which the latter ran until the two parted ways in 1997.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal helped train Brazilian mixed martial artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at "UFC 129" in May 2011.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In 1987, Seagal began work on his first film, "Above the Law" (titled "Nico" in Europe), with director Andrew Davis. Following its success, Seagal's subsequent movies were "Hard to Kill", "Marked for Death", and "Out for Justice"; all were box office hits, making him an action hero. Later, he achieved wider, mainstream success in 1992 with the release of "Under Siege" (1992), which reunited Seagal with director Andrew Davis.


title: Steven Seagal

text: On April 20, 1991, Seagal hosted Season 16 Episode 18 of "Saturday Night Live". The series' long-time executive producer Lorne Michaels and cast-members David Spade and Tim Meadows called Seagal the show's worst host ever. Spade and Meadows cited Seagal's humorlessness, his ill-treatment of the cast and writers, and his refusal to do a "Hans and Franz" sketch because the skit's title characters had previously said that they could "beat up Steven Seagal". Seagal has never been invited back to the show. Meadows commented, "He didn't realize that you can't tell somebody they're stupid on Wednesday and expect them to continue writing for you on Saturday." The cast and crew's difficulties with Seagal were later echoed on-air by Michaels during guest host Nicolas Cage's monologue in the September 26, 1992 Season 18 premiere. When Cage worried that he would do so poorly that the audience would regard him as "the biggest jerk who's ever been on the show", Michaels replied: "No, no. That would be Steven Seagal."


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal directed and starred in "On Deadly Ground" (1994), featuring Michael Caine, R. Lee Ermey, and Billy Bob Thornton in minor supporting roles. The film emphasized environmental and spiritual themes, signaling a break with his previous persona as a genre-ready inner-city cop. "On Deadly Ground" was poorly received by critics, especially denouncing Seagal's long environmental speech in the film. Regardless, Seagal considers it one of the most important and relevant moments in his career. Seagal followed this with a sequel to one of his most successful films, "Under Siege", titled "" (1995).


title: Steven Seagal

text: In 1996, he had a role in the Kurt Russell film "Executive Decision", portraying a special ops soldier who only appears in the film's first 45 minutes. The same year, he filmed a police drama "The Glimmer Man" (1996). In another environmentally conscious and commercially unsuccessful film, "Fire Down Below" (1997), he played an EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance agent fighting industrialists dumping toxic waste in the Kentucky hills.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In 1998, Seagal made "The Patriot", another environmental thriller which was his first direct-to-video release in the United States (though it was released theatrically in most of the world). Seagal produced this film with his own money, and the film was shot on-location on and near his farm in Montana.


title: Steven Seagal

text: After producing "Prince of Central Park", Seagal returned to cinema screens with the release of "Exit Wounds" in March 2001. The film had fewer martial arts scenes than Seagal's previous films, but it was a commercial success, taking almost $80 million worldwide. However, he was unable to capitalize on this success and his next two projects were both critical and commercial failures. The movie "Ticker", co-starring Tom Sizemore and Dennis Hopper, was filmed in San Francisco before "Exit Wounds", and went straight to DVD. "Half Past Dead", starring hip hop star Ja Rule, made less than $20 million worldwide.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Other than his role as a villain in Robert Rodriguez's "Machete", all of the films Seagal has made since the latter half of 2001 have been released direct-to-video (DTV) in North America, with some theatrical releases to other countries around the world. Seagal is credited as a producer and sometimes a writer on many of these DTV movies, which include "Black Dawn", "Belly of the Beast", "Out of Reach", "Submerged", "Kill Switch", "Urban Justice", "Pistol Whipped", "Against the Dark", "Driven to Kill", "A Dangerous Man", "Born to Raise Hell", and "The Keeper".


title: Steven Seagal

text: In 2009, A&E Network premiered the reality television series "", focusing on Seagal as a deputy in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In the 2010s, Seagal's direct-to-video films increasingly started to become ensemble pieces, with Seagal playing minor or supporting roles, despite the fact that he often received top billing. "Maximum Conviction", "Force of Execution", "Gutshot Straight", "Code of Honor", "Sniper Special Ops", "The Asian Connection", "The Perfect Weapon", "Cartels", and "China Salesman" all exemplify this trend. This has led some commentators to criticize Seagal for his low-effort participation in movies which heavily promote his involvement.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In 2011, Seagal produced and starred in an American television action series entitled "True Justice". The series first aired on Nitro, a TV station in Spain, on May 12, 2011. It premiered in the UK on 5 USA, with the first episode broadcast July 20, 2011. April 26, 2012 the series was renewed for a second season airing on ReelzChannel July 4, 2012. In the UK, "True Justice" has been repackaged as a series of DVD "movies," with each disc editing together two episodes.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Many of Seagal's films share unique elements which have become characteristic of his body of work. His characters often have an elite past affiliation with the CIA, Special Forces, or Black Ops (for example, Casey Ryback in "Under Siege", a former Navy SEAL, Jack Cole in "The Glimmer Man", an ex-CIA police detective, or Jonathan Cold in "The Foreigner" and "Black Dawn", an ex-CIA Black Ops freelancer). His characters differ from those of other action movie icons by virtue of their near-invulnerability; they almost never face any significant physical threat, easily overpowering any opposition and never facing bodily harm or even temporary defeat. A notable exception is 2010's "Machete", which features Seagal in a rare villainous role.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In 2008, author and critic Vern (no last name) published "Seagalogy", a work which examines Seagal's filmography using the framework of auteur theory. The book divides Seagal's filmography into different chronological "eras" with distinct thematic elements. The book was updated in 2012 to include more recent films and Seagal's work on the reality TV show "".


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal plays the guitar. His songs have been featured in several of his movies, including "Fire Down Below" and "Ticker". Among his extensive collection are guitars previously owned by "the Kings"; Albert, BB, and Freddie, as well as Bo Diddley, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Jimi Hendrix.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In 2005, he released his first album, "Songs from the Crystal Cave", which has a mix of pop, world, country, and blues music. It features duets with Tony Rebel, Lt. Stichie, Lady Saw, and Stevie Wonder. The soundtrack to Seagal's 2005 film "Into the Sun" features several songs from the album. One of his album tracks, "Girl It's Alright", was also released as a single in several countries alongside an accompanying music video. Seagal's second album, titled "Mojo Priest", was released in April 2006. Subsequently, he spent the summer of 2006 touring the United States and Europe with his band, Thunderbox, in support of the album.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal has been a Reserve Deputy Chief in the Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, Sheriff's Office. In the late 1980s, after teaching the deputies martial arts, unarmed combat, and marksmanship, then-sheriff Harry Lee (1932–2007) asked Seagal to join the force. Seagal's rank in Louisiana was ceremonial.


title: Steven Seagal

text: "", a series which follows his work in the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, premiered on A&E on December 2, 2009. Seagal stated that "I've decided to work with A&E on this series now because I believe it's important to show the nation all the positive work being accomplished here in Louisiana—to see the passion and commitment that comes from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in this post-Katrina environment." The series premiere drew 3.6 million viewers, ranking as best season opener for any original A&E series ever.


title: Steven Seagal

text: On April 14, 2010, the series was suspended by Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand due to a sexual trafficking lawsuit filed against Seagal. The suit was later dropped. A&E resumed the show for the second season, which began on October 6, 2010.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Production on Season 3 started in February 2011, with a change of location from Louisiana to Maricopa County, Arizona. Two episodes were scheduled to be aired, beginning on January 4, 2012. Shortly before the episodes were to be aired, Season 3 was suspended, with no explanations given. Season 3 premiered on January 2, 2014, but the show was not renewed for a fourth season.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In October 2011, Seagal was sworn-in as the Sheriff department’s deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County, Texas, a law department responsible for patrolling a 98-mile stretch of the Texas-Mexico border.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In 2005, Seagal Enterprises began to market an energy drink known as "Steven Seagal's Lightning Bolt", but it has since been discontinued. Seagal has also marketed an aftershave called "Scent of Action", and a range of knives and weapons.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In 2013, Seagal joined newly formed Russian firearms manufacturer ORSIS, representing the company in both a promotional capacity as well as lobbying for the easement of US import restrictions on Russian sporting firearms. It was also announced he would work with the company to develop a signature long-range rifle known provisionally as "ORSIS by Steven Seagal".


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal has an extensive sword collection, and at one time had a custom gun made for him once a month.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal is a Buddhist. In February 1997, Lama Penor Rinpoche from Palyul monastery announced that Seagal was a tulku, and specifically the reincarnation of Chungdrag Dorje, a 17th-century terton (treasure revealer) of the Nyingma, the oldest sect of Tibetan Buddhism.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal reportedly holds citizenships in three countries: the United States, Serbia, and Russia. Born in the United States, he possesses "jus soli" U.S. citizenship. He was granted Serbian citizenship on January 11, 2016, following several visits to the country, and has been asked to teach aikido to the Serbian Special Forces.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal was granted Russian citizenship on November 3, 2016; according to government spokesman Dmitry Peskov, "He was asking quite insistently and over a lengthy period to be granted citizenship." While various media have cited Seagal and President Vladimir Putin as friends and Seagal stated that he "would like to consider [Putin] as a brother", Putin has distanced himself from Seagal; Peskov is reported to have said: "I wouldn't necessarily say he's a huge fan, but he's definitely seen some of his movies."


title: Steven Seagal

text: While in Japan, Seagal married his first wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido instructor. With Fujitani, he had a son, actor and model Kentaro Seagal, and a daughter, writer and actress Ayako Fujitani. Seagal left Miyako to move back to the United States.


title: Steven Seagal

text: During this time, he met actress and model Kelly LeBrock, with whom he began an affair that led to Fujitani granting him a divorce. Seagal was briefly married to actress Adrienne La Russa in 1984, but that marriage was annulled the same year over concerns that his divorce had not yet been finalized. LeBrock gave birth to Seagal's daughter Annaliza in early 1987. Seagal and LeBrock married in September 1987 and their son Dominic was born in June 1990. Their daughter Arissa was born in 1993. The following year, LeBrock filed for divorce citing "irreconcilable differences".


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal is married to Mongolian Erdenetuya Batsukh (), better known as "Elle". They have one son together, Kunzang. From an early age, Elle trained as a dancer at the Children's Palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. After her graduation from high school and the Children's Palace, she pursued a career as a professional dancer. She won a number of dancing contests and was considered the top female dancer in Mongolia, excelling at ballroom dancing in particular. Elle first met Seagal in 2001, when she worked as his interpreter during his visit to Mongolia.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal has seven children from four relationships, two grandchildren by his eldest son, Kentaro and one granddaughter by his daughter Ayako Fujitani. In addition to his biological offspring, Seagal is the guardian of Yabshi Pan Rinzinwangmo, the only child of the 10th Panchen Lama of Tibet. When she studied in the United States, Seagal was her minder and bodyguard.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In May 1991 (during the filming of "Out for Justice"), Warner Bros. employees Raenne Malone, Nicole Selinger, and Christine Keeve accused Seagal of sexual harassment. In return for remaining silent, Malone and another woman received around $50,000 each in an out-of-court settlement. Around the same time, at least four actresses claimed that Seagal had made sexual advances, typically during late-night "casting sessions".


title: Steven Seagal

text: In another incident, Jenny McCarthy claimed that Seagal asked her to undress during an audition for "Under Siege 2".


title: Steven Seagal

text: In 1995, Seagal was charged with employment discrimination, sexual harassment, and breach of contract. Cheryl Shuman filed a case against Seagal, accusing him of threatening and beating her during the filming of "On Deadly Ground". In August 1995, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki dismissed the case, calling the claims "repetitive and unintelligible".


title: Steven Seagal

text: On April 12, 2010, 23-year-old Kayden Nguyen filed a lawsuit against Seagal in a Los Angeles County Superior Court, requesting more than one million dollars in damages. In her suit, Nguyen alleged Seagal engaged in sexual harassment, the illegal trafficking of females for sex, failure to prevent sexual harassment, and wrongful termination. Seagal denied the allegations, but his reality show "" was suspended while his attorneys resolved the case. On July 14, 2010, three months after Nguyen filed her suit, she withdrew her claim without explanation.


title: Steven Seagal

text: On August 30, 2011, Jesus Sanchez Llovera filed a lawsuit against Seagal over his part in a Maricopa county police raid with heavy weapons (notably including an army surplus tank) of Llovera's residence for suspicion of cockfighting. The incident was taped for Seagal's A&E reality show "Steven Seagal: Lawman". Llovera was seeking $100,000 for damages caused during the raid and a letter of apology from Seagal to Llovera's children for the death of their family pet. Llovera claimed that his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid. Llovera failed to file court-ordered paperwork after his attorney withdrew from the case and the lawsuit was dismissed in January 2013.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In 2017, actress Portia de Rossi accused Seagal of sexually harassing her during a movie audition. De Rossi alleged that during an audition in Seagal's office, he told her "how important it was to have chemistry off-screen" before unzipping his pants.


title: Steven Seagal

text: On an April 18 appearance on "Jimmy Kimmel Live!", Katherine Heigl alleged on the final day of shooting for "Under Siege 2" that Seagal told her that he had girlfriends the same age as the 16 year-old Heigl. Kimmel responded by displaying a photo from the film's promotional tour showing Seagal's hand on Heigl's chest while they posed for a photo.


title: Steven Seagal

text: On November 9, 2017, Dutch model Faviola Dadis posted a statement on her Instagram account stating that she also had been sexually assaulted by Seagal years earlier.


title: Steven Seagal

text: On January 15, 2018, actress Rachel Grant publicly accused Seagal of sexually assaulting her in 2002, during pre-production on his direct-to-video film, "Out for a Kill" (2003), stating that she lost her job on the film after the incident. In February 2018, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office acknowledged that it was reviewing a potential sex abuse case involving Seagal. In March 2018, Regina Simons publicly claimed that in 1993, when she was 18, Seagal raped her at his home when she arrived for what she thought was a wrap party for the movie "On Deadly Ground."


title: Steven Seagal

text: On February 27, 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced settled charges against Seagal for failing to disclose payments he received for promoting an investment in an initial coin offering (ICO) conducted by Bitcoiin2Gen (B2G). Seagal was promised $250,000 in cash and $750,000 worth of B2G tokens in exchange for his social media promotions and a press release in which he "wholeheartedly" endorsed the ICO, which violated the anti-touting provisions of federal securities laws. Without admitting or denying the SEC's findings, Seagal agreed to pay $157,000 in disgorgement, representing the actual payments he received for his promotions, plus prejudgment interest and a $157,000 penalty. Seagal also agreed not to promote any securities, digital or otherwise, for three years.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Steven Seagal became embroiled in a legal case involving film producer Julius R. Nasso after Nasso attempted to extort Seagal. Nasso produced seven of Seagal's films beginning with "Marked for Death" in 1990. The two "became best friends", according to Seagal, and formed Seagal/Nasso Productions together. Their relationship became strained, however, and their partnership ended in 2000. Believing that Seagal owed him $3 million in compensation for backing out of a four-film deal, Nasso enlisted members of the Gambino crime family to threaten Seagal in an attempt to recoup money Nasso allegedly lost.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Gambino family captain Anthony Ciccone first visited Seagal in Toronto during the filming of "Exit Wounds" in October 2000. In January 2001, Primo Cassarino and other gangsters picked up Seagal by car to bring him to a meeting with Ciccone at a Brooklyn restaurant. At the meeting, Ciccone reportedly told Seagal that he had a choice of making four promised movies with Nasso or paying Nasso a penalty of $150,000 per movie, and that if Seagal refused, Ciccone would kill him.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal, who later claimed that he brought a handgun to the meeting, was able to stall Ciccone and escape the meeting unharmed. Ciccone and Cassarino again visited Seagal at his home in Los Angeles the following month. In the spring of 2001, Seagal sought out another mobster, Genovese crime family captain Angelo Prisco, to act as a "peacemaker". He visited Prisco in prison at Rahway, New Jersey and paid Prisco's lawyer $10,000.


title: Steven Seagal

text: On March 17, 2003, Cassarino, Ciccone and others were convicted of labor racketeering, extortion, and 63 other counts under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Seagal testified for the prosecution about the mobsters' extortion attempt. Nasso pleaded guilty to the charge of extortion conspiracy in August 2003. In February 2004, he was sentenced to a year and a day in prison, fined $75,000 and ordered to take mental health counselling on release from jail. In January 2008, Nasso agreed to drop a $60 million lawsuit against Seagal for an alleged breach of contract when the two settled out of court.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal has been accused by former stunt performers who have worked with him, including Kane Hodder, Stephen Quadros, and Gene LeBell, of intentionally hitting stuntmen during scenes.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Additionally, while serving as stunt coordinator for "Out for Justice", LeBell allegedly got into an on-set altercation with Seagal over his mistreatment of some of the film's stunt performers. After the actor claimed that, due to his aikido training, he was "immune" to being choked unconscious, LeBell offered Seagal the opportunity to prove it. LeBell is said to have placed his arms around Seagal's neck, and once Seagal said "go", proceeded to choke him unconscious, with Seagal losing control of his bowels.


title: Steven Seagal

text: LeBell was requested to confirm the on-set incident publicly in an interview with Ariel Helwani in 2012, but he avoided answering the question, albeit implying that it was true. He was quoted as "When we had a little altercation or difference of opinion, there were thirty stuntmen and cameramen that were watching. Sometimes Steven has a tendency to cheese off the wrong people, and you can get hurt doing that."


title: Steven Seagal

text: On the other hand, when Seagal was asked about the incident, he directly denied the allegations, calling LeBell a "sick, pathological scumbag liar", and offered the name of a witness who could prove Lebell had fabricated the entire story. The claim garnered a heated response from LeBell's trainee Ronda Rousey, who said that Seagal was the one lying, and declared "If [Seagal] says anything bad about Gene to my face, I'd make him crap his pants a second time."


title: Steven Seagal

text: Authentic or not, the reports of this incident led LeBell to be counted in 1992 as an additional member of Robert Wall's "Dirty Dozen", a group of martial artists willing to answer to a public challenge made by Seagal. LeBell however declined to participate, revealing the feud with Seagal was hurting him professionally. He did however criticize Seagal for his treatment of stuntmen, and left open the possibility of a professional fight if Seagal wanted to do it.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Allegations of mistreatment towards stuntmen have continued throughout Seagal's later career, with both stuntman Peter Harris Kent (Arnold Schwarzenegger's stunt double) and Mike Leeder publicly criticizing his on-set antics. Actor John Leguizamo also claimed that during rehearsals on "Executive Decision", in retaliation for laughing at him, Seagal caught him off guard and knocked him into a brick wall. Michael Jai White, who acted with him in a number of movies, stated that he routinely hit stunt men, and that he was known for it. He said they just accepted it. However, he stated that Seagal never hit him.


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal lent his voice as a narrator for an activist film project, "Medicine Lake Video". The project seeks to protect sacred tribal ground near Seagal's ranch in Siskiyou County. He also wrote an open letter to the leadership of Thailand in 2003, urging them to enact a law to prevent the torture of baby elephants.


title: Steven Seagal

text: In a March 2014 interview with "Rossiyskaya Gazeta", Seagal described Vladimir Putin as "one of the great living world leaders". He expressed support for the annexation of Crimea by Russia. In July 2014, following calls for a boycott, Seagal was dropped from the lineup of the August Blues Festival in Haapsalu, Estonia. The Estonian musician Tõnis Mägi, the minister of Foreign Affairs, Urmas Paet, and Parliament's Foreign Affairs chairman Marko Mihkelson had all condemned inviting Seagal into the country, with Paet saying, "Steven Seagal has tried to actively participate in politics during the past few months and has done it in a way which is unacceptable to the majority of the world that respects democracy and the rule of law."


title: Steven Seagal

text: In August 2014, Seagal appeared at a Night Wolves-organized show in Sevastopol, Crimea, supporting the Crimean annexation and depicting Ukraine as a country controlled by fascists. On November 3, Seagal was granted Russian citizenship by President Putin. His views on Ukraine and Russian citizenship caused Ukraine to ban him from entering the country because he "committed socially dangerous actions".


title: Steven Seagal

text: Seagal spoke out against the protests during the United States national anthem by professional athletes, stating, "I believe in free speech, I believe that everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but I don't agree that they should hold the United States of America or the world hostage by taking a venue where people are tuning in to watch a football game and imposing their political views." He also expressed skepticism of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.