When the King Took Flight (19 page)

Clearly, all eyes were now on the deputies of the National Assembly. The men who only a few months earlier had been universally heralded as "the Fathers of the Nation" were being castigated
and threatened with insurrection by a vociferous minority of the
Parisian population. Now the deputies would have little choice but
to act.

FOR OVER TWO YEARS the deputies had been at work in the National Assembly, drafting a constitution and reorganizing the country from top to bottom., in many respects, they were an exceptional
group of men. The electoral system, patched together by the royal
government in 1789, had brought in elites of local, regional, and
national stature from every part of the kingdom. There were close
to 30o nobles, most of them titled and exceedingly wealthy, representing the greatest families in France. There were several dozen
aristocratic bishops and archbishops, and over 200 parish priests
from towns and villages across the country. And there were some
6oo deputies of the Third Estate, commoners for the most part,
from a wide range of professions: lawyers, judges, doctors, merchants, landowners, and a variety of government employees. Most
of the Third Estate deputies were men of property, and many had
experience in municipal government. But their cultural common denominator was training in the law. Perhaps two-thirds of them had
pursued legal studies, and several ranked among the finest legal
minds of their age.

For the commoner deputies of the Estates General and for the
minority of liberal nobles and clergy who supported them, the early
weeks of the Revolution had marked an extraordinary, almost magical moment. Faced with the intransigence of most of the aristoc racy and with the near abdication of power by the royal government, encouraged by the support of the Parisian crowds, they had
learned from one another, stimulated one another, and pieced together ideas from a whole range of eighteenth-century notions
of reform. Soon they found themselves moving further and more
rapidly toward a radical transformation of France than any of
them would previously have imagined. By the middle of June 1789
they had converted themselves into a sovereign National Assembly,
solemnly dedicating themselves-in the dramatic "Tennis Court
Oath"-to drawing up the country's first constitution. A few weeks
later, on August 4, during a particularly stunning nighttime session,
they had swept away large portions of the Old Regime's political
and social institutions and the whole system of seigneurial rights
and caste privilege. Soon thereafter they had issued their "Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen," anticipating many of
the provisions of the Bill of Rights, ratified in the United States just
two years later. Following the king from Versailles to Paris after the
October Days, and moving their meetings to an adapted indoor riding arena just north of the Tuileries gardens, they had taken up with
unflinching energy the task of restructuring the country. Having
largely dismantled the previous regime, they had been compelled to
rebuild almost everything from scratch: the central government, the
regional administration, the courts, the legal code, the tax system,
the organization of the armed forces and of the church.

But as the deputies moved into the second year of the Revolution,
subtle changes in their mood and outlook had begun to appear. In
part, it was a question of sheer fatigue. For those who took their
mission seriously, for those who attended sessions regularly, participated in committees, read the endless proposals written by other
deputies, and maintained correspondence with their constituencies,
the relentless responsibilities could easily lead to exhaustion and lassitude. Few had been accustomed to such a pace of life before their
arrival in the capital, and few could now afford secretaries. "Our brains can no longer cope with such intense and sustained exertion,"
wrote one of the deputies. They were "harassed," thought another,
"with too much work, with too many sessions, with too many
struggles." In their correspondence they described themselves as
"exhausted" and "worn out," suffering from headaches, insomnia,
and weight loss. By early 1791, absenteeism had risen precipitously.
Most of the nobles and a great many of the priests had simply
ceased attending, and only about 400 of the nearly 1,200 representatives actually appeared on a regular basis.2

The exhaustion and overwork may also have contributed to the
terrible factional conflicts that marked the second year of the Revolution. "The Assembly no longer works as efficiently as in the beginning," wrote the deputy Doctor Jean-Francois Campmas. "It is
utterly exhausted and a prey to political passions." Since the end of
1789 the most progressive representatives had begun meeting separately at night in a large abandoned convent a block or two north of
the Assembly hall. Here the Friends of the Constitution, or Jacobins-after the convent of Saint-Jacques-debated issues and developed political strategies in advance of Assembly sessions, anticipating in many respects the activities of a modern political party.
Soon they had also developed a network of affiliated societies
throughout the country-the very network that the patriots of
Varennes had joined in early 1791. But only a few months after their
creation, the Jacobins found themselves at odds with a breakaway
contingent of more moderate deputies, organized as the Society of
1789. And both of these patriot "clubs" were frequently riven by
bitter personal and political rivalries. Lafayette, who early left the
Jacobins for the "Eighty-Niners," lamented the situation to his
friend George Washington in May 1791: "Even among those who
call themselves patriots, the passion for factions has gone as far as it
can go without leading to bloodshed."3

The challenges faced by the deputies were also complicated by a
series of unanticipated developments. In the spring of 1790 a diplomatic crisis between England and Spain first raised the threat of international intervention into France's affairs, a threat that continued
to preoccupy the Assembly to the eve of the king's flight. The pros pect of war seemed particularly unsettling in that rising hostilities
between commoner soldiers and aristocratic officers-the same
hostilities encountered by General Bouille in his efforts to organize
Louis' escape-had brought the French army to the verge of collapse. Even more disturbing was the opposition aroused in certain
areas of the country by the Civil Constitution of the Clergy and the
requirement of a clerical oath. Most patriot deputies saw this legislation as a rational and necessary reform of church organization,
but some segments of the population became convinced that the
Assembly was trying to change the Catholic religion itself. The seriousness of the crisis came home to the deputies when portions
of their own constituencies-sometimes including wives and close
friends-began attacking the religious policies of the Assembly.

At the same time, the representatives had been forced to confront
the problems of ever-increasing popular riots and unrest. The daily
threats of "anarchy" in Paris, in the very neighborhoods in which
the deputies lived and worked-the bread riots, the labor protests,
the insubordination of national guard units-caused many patriots
to question the democratic positions they had previously embraced.
Once considered the saviors of the Revolution, the common people
of Paris were soon viewed by many moderates as ungrateful, unpredictable, and dangerous. They had become all the more dangerous, in this view, through the irresponsible demagoguery of the
Cordeliers Club and the radical press. Beginning in the winter of
1790-91 a group of moderate Jacobins began pushing through a series of decrees intended to disarm popular radicalism. These measures included the exclusion of poorer citizens from the national
guard; the enforcement of laws against "crimes of the press"; and
the Le Chapelier law, banning worker organizations and strikes.4 At
the head of this group were the young lawyer from Grenoble
Antoine Barnave and his close friends, the nobles Charles and
Alexandre Lameth-both veterans of the American Revolutionary
War-and the liberal Paris magistrate Adrien Duport. For Barnave
and the group around him, it was now time to end the Revolution,
to put the French people back on the normal course of their lives
and to reinstill some sense of stability and civic discipline.

[To view this image, refer to
the print version of this title.]

Antoine-Pierre-JosephMarie Barnave. Leader
of the moderate
Jacobins, and later
of the Feuillants.

[To view this image, refer to
the print version of this title.]

Jerome Petion. Leader
of the radical Jacobins.

Yet ending a revolution was to prove every bit as difficult as beginning one. All of the moderates' measures were opposed tooth
and nail by a small group of radical Jacobins in the Assembly, led
by Jerome Petion and Maximilien Robespierre. An ascetic in his
lifestyle, though intensely passionate in his political convictions,
Robespierre, like Petion, refused to abandon his belief in the rights
and basic goodness of the common people. Indeed, the two men
and the group of deputies who followed them believed that the
Revolution was not in fact complete. Democracy should be expanded and suffrage extended to all male citizens, whatever their
status or economic condition.

But in the spring of 1791 Robespierre and his allies were rarely
able to prevail. As one former radical put it, "a time for moderation
has arrived."5 The desire to curb the popular influence in Paris and
to end the Revolution was even pushing many moderates to shore
up the power and prestige of the king. The Spanish ambassador
had already detected this policy reorientation at the end of 1790.
"Through secret intermediaries," he announced in December, "the
democratic leaders are now seeking to reach an understanding with
the monarchy, and are promising to work toward the prompt restoration of order." By April 1791 Barnave and the moderates had
largely ceased attending the Jacobin Club and-as Robespierre suspected but was unable to prove-had even entered into clandestine
negotiations with Louis XVI.6 The majority's desire to strengthen
the monarchy helps explain the exceptionally positive attitude toward the king among a great many of the patriot deputies, the wishful thinking with which they evaluated Louis' every action. It was
for this same reason that the king's sudden dash for freedom would
seem like such a harsh blow.

When the president of the National Assembly announced the terrible news at nine in the morning on June 21, the deputies sat in
stunned silence. One member remembered vividly "the consterna tion painted on every face" as they all tried to comprehend the implications of the event. Jean-Francois Gaultier de Biauzat, writing
on his lap during the meeting, noted simply: "may God help us
now."7 Over the previous weeks they had all heard predictions that
the king might be abducted. But there were always dozens of unproved rumors floating about, and, as jurists trained in sorting evidence analytically, they had learned to dismiss most of the stories
out of hand. And if truth be told, these were not rumors the deputies wanted to believe. As they came increasingly to envision the
monarch as the linchpin in the constitutional system, they had convinced themselves that the king could be trusted.

A parade of embarrassed officials soon arrived in the Assembly
hall, attempting to justify themselves and explain what had happened. Lafayette, who was ultimately responsible for security at the
Tuileries palace, entered "with a doleful and downcast appearance."
Mayor Bailly and several deputies charged with investigating the
earlier rumors also spoke and admitted their failure. Indeed, the rumors in question now appeared far more substantial than most deputies had realized. The queen's servingwoman-the very woman
the royal couple had so feared in the weeks before the flight-had
informed officials of the coming evasion with great accuracy. Extra
guards had supposedly been placed near the door she had indicated,
and still the royal family had disappeared as if by magic. Some deputies speculated that Lafayette himself was in on the plot or had
knowingly allowed it to succeed.' It seems more likely that the general never really believed the rumors. If we can trust his memoirs,
he had directly broached the reports with Louis himself, and the
king had given "such solemn and forceful denials that [Lafayette]
would have wagered his life that the king would not leave." Like
nearly everyone else, he had wanted to believe that the king was incapable of lying. Perhaps for this reason he had failed to impress
upon the guards the need to be especially vigilant.'