Image Analysis: Notice & Wonder
Instructions: Look at the image and write down 2-3 things you notice (key details, main ideas,
themes) and then write down 2-3 things you wonder (questions you have because of the image,
things you are curious about when you look at the image.)
What
do you
notice?
What
do you
wonder?
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3-2-1 What I Learned
Instructions: After reading, complete this 3-2-1 chart using all of the vocabulary words.
Key Vocabulary
authoritarian opulent revolutionary guillotine insistence
favoring or enforcing strict
obedience to authority,
ostentatiously rich involving or causing a machine with a heavy the act of demanding
especially that of the and luxurious or a complete or blade sliding vertically something forcefully,
government, at the expense lavish. dramatic change. in grooves, used for not allowing refusal.
of personal freedom. beheading people.
3 Things I Learned…
From the reading I learned… Another thing I learned… One more thing I learned…
2 Drawings or Pictures to Represent the Reading…
1 Question I have is…
After reading, one question I have is…
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Read & Take Notes
Instructions: Read the passage below. Take notes in the space provided. Take Notes Here
Hey, it's John Green, and welcome back to Crash Course World History. Today,
we're diving into the French Revolution. Now, while the American Revolution is
often celebrated, the French Revolution is frequently portrayed as a chaotic,
bloody mess. But, as always, the truth is far more complex. It was undeniably
brutal, and like many revolutions, it simply replaced one authoritarian regime
with another. However, the ideas that emerged from the French Revolution
fundamentally changed the course of human history, arguably even more
profoundly than the American Revolution.
Let's set the stage. 18th-century France was a wealthy and populous nation,
but its tax system was deeply flawed due to the rigid social structure of the
Ancien Régime. This system, which included kings and nobles, essentially
meant that the wealthy – the nobles and the clergy – never paid taxes. By
1789, France was drowning in debt, largely due to its support of the American
Revolution. King Louis XVI was spending half the national budget just to keep
up with the interest payments on the debt. Despite attempts at reform by
various finance ministers, including even calls for local democracy, France was
on the brink of bankruptcy.
To make matters worse, a series of hailstorms devastated the harvest, leading
to soaring food prices and widespread hunger. The people of France were
furious, especially as the King, with his lavish lifestyle and fancy footwear,
didn't seem to be suffering alongside them. He and his wife, Marie Antoinette,
lived in the opulent Palace of Versailles, seemingly oblivious to the plight of the
people. Meanwhile, Enlightenment thinkers like Kant were challenging the very
foundations of religion, arguing that true enlightenment meant freeing oneself
from self-imposed immaturity, especially in matters of faith.
The situation was a powder keg: a hungry populace, intellectuals questioning
the divine right of kings, and a nobility indulging in luxury while failing to
address the financial crisis. In response, Louis XVI called a meeting of the
Estates General, France's closest equivalent to a national parliament, which
hadn't convened since 1614. The Estates General was essentially a
super-parliament composed of representatives from the First Estate (nobles),
the Second Estate (clergy), and the Third Estate (everyone else). The Third
Estate, with its 600 representatives, outnumbered the other two estates, but
after several
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Read & Take Notes
Instructions: Read the passage below. Take notes in the space provided. Take Notes Here
deadlocked votes, they decided to take matters into their own hands. They declared,
"Forget you guys, we're forming our own National Assembly!"
King Louis XVI was not pleased. When the National Assembly took a break, he locked
the doors, effectively preventing them from meeting. He declared, "Sorry, guys, you
can't assemble here. And if you can't assemble, how can you be a National Assembly?"
However, the Third Estate representatives were resourceful. They found a different
room, an indoor tennis court, where they took the famous Tennis Court Oath, vowing
not to disband until a French constitution was established.
Louis XVI responded by sending troops to Paris, ostensibly to quell the unrest caused
by food shortages. However, the revolutionaries saw this as a provocation and stormed
the Bastille Prison on July 14th, which is now celebrated as Bastille Day. The storming
of the Bastille was primarily about securing weapons, though it did free the seven
prisoners held there.
The National Assembly took a radical step on August 4th, abolishing most of the
Ancien Régime – feudal rights, tithes, noble privileges, and unequal taxation – all in the
name of creating a new constitution. On August 26th, they proclaimed the Declaration
of the Rights of Man and Citizen, which outlined a system of rights applicable to all
individuals and made those rights integral to the new constitution. This was a
significant departure from the American Bill of Rights, which was added as an
afterthought and didn't apply to slaves. The DoRoMaC, as I called it in high school,
declared that everyone had the right to liberty, property, and security – rights that the
French Revolution would ultimately fail to protect, but as we discussed last week, the
same can be said for many other supposedly successful revolutions.
Meanwhile, back at Versailles, Louis XVI remained King of France, and it seemed that
France might become a constitutional monarchy. This could have meant the royal family
retaining their luxurious palace, but in October 1789, a rumor spread that Marie
Antoinette was hoarding grain within the palace. This sparked the Women's March,
where armed peasant women stormed the palace, demanding that Louis and Marie
Antoinette relocate to Paris. They complied, as everyone is afraid of armed peasant
women. This serves as a reminder that for many people at the time, the French
Revolution wasn't primarily about
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Read & Take Notes
Instructions: Read the passage below. Take notes in the space provided. Take Notes Here
lofty Enlightenment ideals; it was about hunger and a political system that
disproportionately burdened the poor.
It's worth noting that this initial phase of the revolution wasn't entirely revolutionary.
The National Assembly aimed to create a constitutional monarchy, believing that a king
was essential for a functioning state. They were primarily concerned with ensuring that
voters and officeholders were men of property. Only the most radical faction, the
Jacobins, advocated for a republic. However, things were about to escalate dramatically,
and France's situation would worsen.
The Jacobins organized a massive petition drive that quickly spiraled out of control,
leading to troops under the control of the National Assembly, not the King, firing on the
crowd, killing 50 people. This marked a turning point, as the National Assembly, once
the revolutionary voice of the people, had now resorted to violence to suppress
revolutionary fervor. This pattern, where radical hope and change morph into
oppression, is a recurring theme throughout history during revolutions.
France's monarchical neighbors, particularly Leopold II, the Holy Roman Emperor and
Marie Antoinette's brother, were growing increasingly apprehensive about this
republican movement. It's worth noting that at this point, the Holy Roman Empire was
essentially just Austria. Like many monarchs, Leopold II favored monarchies and wanted
to maintain his position as a figurehead who could wear fancy clothes, point at things,
and own gold-plated winged lion-monkeys. Who could blame him?
He and King William Frederick II of Prussia issued the Declaration of Pillnitz, promising
to restore the French monarchy. In response, Louis and the National Assembly devised a
plan: invade Austria. Their goal was to plunder Austria's wealth, perhaps steal some
Austrian grain to alleviate France's food shortages, and spread revolutionary zeal.
However, Prussia joined forces with Austria against France. Louis, in a move that further
alienated him from the revolution, encouraged the Prussians. As a result, the Assembly
voted to suspend the monarchy, hold new elections with universal male suffrage, and
create a new republican constitution.
This new Convention decided to put Louis XVI on trial. He was found guilty and, by a
single vote, sentenced to death by
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Read & Take Notes
Instructions: Read the passage below. Take notes in the space provided. Take Notes Here
guillotine. This made it difficult for Austria and Prussia to restore him to the throne.
The death of Louis XVI marked the beginning of the Reign of Terror, the most notorious
and sensational phase of the revolution. If you could kill the king, you could kill anyone,
and that's precisely what the government did under the leadership of the Committee of
Public Safety (Motto: We suck at protecting public safety), led by Maximilien
Robespierre. The Terror saw the guillotining of 16,000 enemies of the revolution,
including Marie Antoinette and Robespierre himself, who was guillotined in the month
of Thermidor in the year Two.
While France was bankrupt and embroiled in numerous wars, the Committee of Public
Safety decided to revamp the calendar, arguing that traditional measurements were
irrational and religiously influenced. They renamed all the months and decreed that
each day would have 10 hours and each hour 100 minutes.
After the Terror, the revolution took a step back, and a new constitution was
implemented, one that granted significantly more power to the wealthy. France was still
at war with Austria and Britain, wars that France ultimately won, largely thanks to a
young soldier named Napoleon Bonaparte. This period was marked by numerous coups
and counter-coups, which I won't delve into now because they are incredibly complex.
However, the final coup, in 1799, established Napoleon Bonaparte as the First Consul
of France, granting him near-absolute executive power under yet another constitution.
Upon becoming First Consul, Napoleon declared, "Citizens! The revolution is
established on the principles with which it began. It is over." By this, he presumably
meant that France's government had gone from here to here to here.
As with the American Revolution, it's easy to conclude that the French Revolution
wasn't truly revolutionary. Napoleon was essentially an emperor, and in some ways, he
was even more of an absolute monarch than Louis XVI had been. The nobles gradually
returned to France, though they had lost most of their special privileges. The Catholic
Church also returned, albeit significantly weaker, having lost land and the ability to
collect tithes. When Napoleon fell, France restored the monarchy, and with the
exception of a four-year period between 1815 and 1870, France was ruled by either a
Bourbon or a
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Read & Take Notes
Instructions: Read the passage below. Take notes in the space provided. Take Notes Here
Bonaparte.
These were no longer absolute monarchs claiming divine right; they were constitutional
monarchs, the kind envisioned by the revolutionaries of 1789. However, the fact remains that
France had a king again, a nobility, and an established religion. It was undeniably not a democracy
or a republic.
This is perhaps why the French Revolution remains so controversial and open to interpretation.
Some argue that the revolution successfully disseminated Enlightenment ideals, even if it didn't
bring democracy to France. Others contend that the true legacy of the Revolution wasn't the
expansion of liberty but the strengthening of state power.
Regardless, I would argue that the French Revolution was ultimately far more revolutionary than
its American counterpart. While America never had an aristocracy in the same way, it did
maintain a form of aristocracy in other ways. The French Enlightenment thinker Diderot believed
that Americans should "fear a too unequal division of wealth resulting in a small number of
opulent citizens and a multitude of citizens living in misery." The American Revolution did nothing
to address this polarization of wealth.
What made the French Revolution so radical was its insistence on the universality of its ideals.
Look at Article 6 of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen: "Law is the expression of the
general will. Every citizen has a right to participate personally, or through his representative, in its
foundation. It must be the same for all, whether it protects or punishes." These are radical ideas:
that laws originate from citizens, not kings or gods, and that those laws should apply equally to
everyone. This is a far cry from Hammurabi, and in truth, a far cry from the slave-owning Thomas
Jefferson.
In the 1970s, Chinese President Zhou Enlai was asked about the impact of the French Revolution.
He replied, "It's too soon to say." And in a way, it still is. The French Revolution posed new
questions about the nature of human rights and their origin. We are still grappling with these
questions and figuring out how our answers should shape society today. Must government be of
the people to be for the people? Do our rights stem from nature, God, or neither? And what are
those rights? As William Faulkner said, "The past is never dead. It's not even
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Read & Take Notes
Instructions: Read the passage below. Take notes in the space provided. Take Notes Here
past."
Thanks for watching. I'll see you next week.
Crash Course is produced and directed by Stan Muller, our
script supervisor is Danica Johnson, the show is written by my
high school history teacher Raoul Meyer and myself, our
graphics team is Thought Bubble, and we are ably interned by
Meredith Danko. Last week's phrase of the week was "Giant
Tea Bag"; if you want to suggest future phrases of the week,
or guess at this week's, you can do so in the comments, where
you can also ask questions about today's video that will be
answered by our team of historians. Thanks for watching
Crash Course, and as we say in my hometown, Don't Forget To
Be Awesome.
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Answer and Explain
Instructions: For each question, answer the question and then explain why you picked the
answer you did using specific evidence from the text.
Question: 1. According to John Green, what was the main reason why the French Revolution was more radical than the
American Revolution?
Pick the Answer Explain: Why did you pick that
A) The French Revolution aimed to establish a republic, while the American Revolution
answer?
aimed to establish a constitutional monarchy.
B) The French Revolution was more violent and chaotic than the American Revolution.
C) The French Revolution challenged the idea of divine right and argued for the universality
of human rights, while the American Revolution did not.
D) The French Revolution was more successful in achieving its goals than the American
Revolution.
Question: 2. What was the main reason why the French people were furious with King Louis
XVI?
Pick the Answer Explain: Why did you pick that
answer?
A) He was a cruel and tyrannical ruler who oppressed his people.
B) He was a weak and indecisive leader who failed to address the country's
problems.
C) He was a lavish spender who lived in luxury while the people suffered from
hunger and poverty.
D) He was a supporter of the American Revolution, which drained the French
treasury.
Question:
3. What was the significance of the Tennis Court Oath?
Pick the Answer Explain: Why did you pick that
answer?
A) It marked the beginning of the French Revolution.
B) It declared the establishment of a new French constitution.
C) It showed the determination of the Third Estate to create a new
government.
D) It led to the storming of the Bastille Prison.
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Short Answer Questions
1. What was the main goal of the National Assembly in the early stages of the
Question French Revolution?
2. What was the significance of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen?
Question
3. What was the main reason for the Reign of Terror?
Question
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Reflect and Discuss
Instructions: Respond to the following question using the reading and your own knowledge
and experiences. Be as thorough as possible.
1. John Green argues that the French Revolution was more revolutionary than the American
Revolution. Do you agree? Why or why not? Use evidence from the text to support your
answer.
Write Your Response Here. Be sure to use what you learned in the reading and your own
knowledge and experiences to answer the question thoroughly.
Instructions: When instructed, you will share your responses with your group. Take notes
on their responses in the boxes below. Be sure to write their names at the top of each box.
Student #1: ______________________ Student #2: __________________________
Student #3: ______________________ Student #4: __________________________
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Reflect and Discuss
Instructions: Respond to the following question using the reading and your own knowledge
and experiences. Be as thorough as possible.
2. The text discusses how the French Revolution was fueled by hunger and a desire for equality.
How do these issues still affect people today? Give specific examples from your own life or the
world around you.
Write Your Response Here. Be sure to use what you learned in the reading and your own
knowledge and experiences to answer the question thoroughly.
Instructions: When instructed, you will share your responses with your group. Take notes
on their responses in the boxes below. Be sure to write their names at the top of each box.
Student #1: ______________________ Student #2: __________________________
Student #3: ______________________ Student #4: __________________________
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Reflect and Discuss
Instructions: Respond to the following question using the reading and your own knowledge
and experiences. Be as thorough as possible.
3. The French Revolution was a time of great upheaval and change. What are some ways that
your own life has been affected by change? What are some things you can do to make positive
change in the world?
Write Your Response Here. Be sure to use what you learned in the reading and your own
knowledge and experiences to answer the question thoroughly.
Instructions: When instructed, you will share your responses with your group. Take notes
on their responses in the boxes below. Be sure to write their names at the top of each box.
Student #1: ______________________ Student #2: __________________________
Student #3: ______________________ Student #4: __________________________
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