In my previous lecture, I explained the way in which Louis XVI had, for many people, come to represent stability. And as the National Assembly debated what to do with him after the ignominious flight to Varennes, many people felt that it was necessary to retying Louis XVI on the throne almost as a measure of stability that the revolution had achieved its work and could now end. So in September 1791, Louis XVI is invited to formally approve the first constitution of the French Revolution, the constitution of 1791. The National Assembly itself dissolves and is replaced by Legislative Assembly elected by active citizens in October. But, here, we have a contemporary representation of Louis XVI accepting the constitution of 1791 as those around him applaud as the future opens up in an altogether or specious way. While here in the foreground, the demons of discord, of anarchy, even of Republicanism are banished. So for Louis to accept the constitution is seen by large numbers of people as, in some sense, a reassuring gauge of stability for the gradual processes of reform of the revolution. Nevertheless, people are left wondering, "So what was the meaning of his attempt to flee the revolution just a few months earlier?" People like to believe in fact that he'd almost fled against his will, against his better judgment, that maybe it was Marie-Antoinette, maybe it was members of the court who convinced him he ought to leave. But, really, Louis and his heart of hearts had wanted to stay with his French people all the while. There is an attempt to pull a vial of silence over the worrying events of June 1791. The problem is that there are sources of discontent and tension that will not go away, that even though Louis accepting that constitution of 1791 is reassuring, there are all sorts of unresolved issues. We've seen how, across the country, there are many people for whom the revolution has not yet ended in terms of democratic rights, in terms of the end of feudalism. There is bitter church division. There are people outside the country, Louis' relatives, the crowned heads of Europe, who are now concerned about his safety and who make bellicose, threatening noises about the safety of the royal family. It seems as though despite the king accepting the constitution, there is a great deal of unresolved tension inside and outside the country. Is the revolution over, or is it only starting to come to terms with some of the most fundamental issues? That is aggravated enormously when news arrives in France of massive armed insurrection in the most important of the French colonies in the Caribbean, the colony of Saint-Domingue, in August 1791. With slaves frustrated by the unwillingness of the National Assembly to grant them emancipation and equality take matters into their own hands and launch a massive insurrection in that island colony. In such a situation of unresolved issues inside France of division about whether the revolution has completed its work, of concern about increasingly anti-revolutionary noises being made by many parish priests and their parishioners, of concern about the attitude of the pope, of the crowned heads of Europe, of what's going on in the colonies, there seem to be so many unresolved issues that many people are drawn to the argument of Jacques-Pierre Brissot, the most prominent of the the Jacobins, the leader of the Brissotin group within the new Legislative Assembly. There are many people who are drawn to his argument, that the only way that the revolution can achieve stability and that its future can be guaranteed is if enemies of the revolution are defeated once and for all. That's to say, he argues that a revolutionary declaration of war against those crowned heads of Austria and Prussia, in particular, who are making threatening noises about this wicked French Revolution, only a declaration of war and a war which would necessarily be brief and successful, only that can lead to the triumph of the revolution itself. And the great benefit of a declaration of war, he argues, is that those people inside France, who are opposed to the revolution, would have to make their minds up once and for all. Are we with the revolution or against it? Are we with old Europe or are we with new France? Brissot argues, and his arguments are compelling for the great and massive people inside the Legislative Assembly, that a war against Austria and Prussia would be successful, brief, and would effectively purge the revolution of traitorous elements. There are the people who want a war as well. People such as Marie-Antoinette and members of the court, who feel, unlike Brissot, that the war would be unsuccessful. And she welcomed that prospect, that only a war would lead the crowned heads of Europe, and her relatives, her nephew, on the Austrian throne to finally crush this godless and anti-monarchical French Revolution, that from her point of view had brought so much misery. There were very few people inside France who see the dangers of war. Among them is Robespierre, another is Desmoulins, people who argue that while France is divided internally, while there's still so much unfinished business about the French Revolution that it would be unwise to try and take the revolutionary principles across the face of Europe. As Robespierre says, nobody likes armed missionaries, but they are very much in the minority. And in April 1792, war is declared against Austria. As far as the assembly is concerned, this is a defensive war. The Constitution does not allow France to take part in a war of conquest or to use their forces against the liberty of another people. The French Nation is taking up arms solely in defense of its own independence. As far as the National Legislative Assembly is concerned, this is a war which is necessary because of the aggressive hostility of the crowned heads of Europe towards the French Revolution, their refusal to accept the changes that have taken place. And in April 1792, France goes to war against Austria and a little later against Prussia. It is an act which is to have profound consequences and for many years thereafter. In its early stages, the French Revolution had been enormously popular across Europe. It had been welcomed as almost as an inspiration for what might happen everywhere else. Across Europe, there are societies form, political clubs that are effectively friends of the French Revolution. The great German writer Goethe does this charming watercolor of the way he sees in 1791, the French frontier with the red liberty cap and a sign on the French border post saying, "Enter. This land is now free." And that's the positive attitude that reform-minded Europeans have of the French Revolution. The declaration of war in April 1792 is to change all of that very radically. It also creates a fundamental problem for Louis XVI. This is a man, after all, who in 1790 had taken an oath to defend the Constitution, to uphold the laws, to acting in consent with the National Assembly. A year later in June 1791, he tried to flee that revolution, and had apparently repudiated all of its works. He's put back on the throne in September 1791, but as the French army lurches from defeat to defeat. Once war is decreed in April 1792, people inevitably start wondering about the loyalty of Louis and of his Austrian born wife, Marie-Antoinette. He sees somehow responsible for the fact that this war is not as brief and as easy as Brissot had promised.
