The Three Social Classes Prior To The French Revolution

The social state of France was the final reason for the French Revolution. The French social class was divided into three classes that included the clergy, nobles, ant the common people. The First estate was made of the higher and lower clergy. The higher clergy lived amongst luxury while the lower clergy were miserable. The Second Estate was made of the court nobles and provincial nobles, the court nobles also lived in luxury and the provincial nobles did not enjoy the same treatment. The Third estate was made of common people such as farmers, cobblers, and sweepers. In document 10 it presents a political carton that shows people of the upper-class standing on and crushing someone of lower class. This shows how the upper class were riding

The first and second estates gained wealth while the proletariats became poorer. During this time, France had an outdated tax system in which the nobilities and the clergies were exempt on taxes even though they owned 90% of the lands. The commoners, on the other hand, had to pay for all the taxes (Doc 14). According to Doc 6, in the Plight of the

Based off of documents 3, 4 and 12, one can understand how the taxes impacted a family’s ability to buy basic necessities. Due to such heavy taxes, many people were poor or were forced to become beggars. Documents 10 and 15 describes how the workingman spends most of his money on basic items to survive and taxes but goes over his budget while the king spends a lot of money on personal desires and goes over his budget as well. This contributes to the financial crisis that France was in because the nobility and the commoners were spending more money than they already

France was ruled by King Louis XVI and he split France up into three social classes also known as estates. In the first estate there were the royals(kings, queens,etc). In the second estate you have their kids and their protectors. Meaning, you have the prince, the duke, the princess, the knights,etc. Lastly in the third estate you have the people who are financially stable but not rich or wealthy,but you also have the people who are not financially stable. The problem was, the people of the third estate is having major problems because they are the poorest people but they had to pay the most taxes. This made complications with all the estates. Eventually, the states decided that they shouldn’t be arguing with each other they should be rising up against the king because really it’s not the other estates fault. The whole French Revolution was basically to get the King overthrown as a King. Therefore, they decided to start to rise against the King. This was the start of the French

Governments had to raise taxes and start borrowing money from their own people, such as nobles. According to Jacob Soll in The Reckoning, the only way to lower the debt and interest rates in France was to tax the nobility. They were the greatest landowners and owned 90% of France’s

One major cause of the old regime were the taxes and laws between the three estates. As seen in Document 2, “the 3rd estate paid 50% of income in taxes while the 1st and 2nd paid less than 5%” (Doc 2). This clearly shows that the most populated estate, the third estate, paid half of their income as their taxes. Larger amounts of taxes the third estate paid versus the lower amount of taxes for the first and second estates. Another significant cause was the unequal three estates and the third estate was overpowered. The third estate had more power in laws and taxes and their relationship with the lower estates were not good. As demonstrated in Document 7, the cartoon of the “The political and social system in France” (Doc 7). This cartoon proves the relationship between the third estate and the two lower estates. The lower estates didn’t have anything to do with taxes and laws and the third estates were all in laws and taxes. The final

During the time frame of the Industrial Revolution there were 3 main social classes: The upper class, the middle class, and the lower class or the working class.

In France people wanted more of a say in how the country is run but many rulers thought of themselves as absolute monarchs and ruled using divine right. Divine right means that the king was destined to be king because God chose him to rule the country therefore he made all the decisions, whether it was new laws or putting people in jail. A lot of the power went to the nobility and clergy which always left the third estate, the common person, on the bottom with no power. The third estate was poor and was forced to pay all of the taxes. The third estate was also always outvoted when making decisions because the first and second estates teamed up.

Furthermore, the nobility and clergy were also exempt from all other taxes instituted by the French monarchy. The inequality between the upper two Estates and the Third Estate highlights a major social issue of pre-revolutionary France. By not collecting taxes from the clergy or the nobility, the French government in a continued effort to balance their budget would raise taxes to suit their needs.

The nobility had to pay little taxes, but nothing compare to what peasants had to pay. The commoners were really the foundation of France. According to the DBQ, document six it states, “The Third Estate is the People and the People is the foundation of the State; it is in fact the State itself.” The commoners lived poorly because of all the taxes they were giving directly to people who were above them. According to the DBQ, Document one, it states, “Lands held by the nobility are taxed very little. Lands held by commoners are taxed very heavily.” So by this information I believe the peasants were poor because of paying high taxes. They didn’t have much food, no freedom nor money, raggedy clothes, they had to work extremely hard, they had poor living conditions, and mistreatment of the monarchy, the clergy, and the nobility. The peasants were beginning to feel frustrated and outraged by the Monarchy’s inability to adhere, to the change of life that the peasants were demanding

In course of time, another social class has integrated into the feudal system, ended the feudal order and influenced the whole world as revolution actors, bourgeoisie. They lead to the development of increasing production in the medieval cities. However, they didn`t have any legal privileges same as aristocrats. Once they developed their own production techniques, they enjoyed legal privileges and ultimately changed the social structure of society. They were against the conclusive class discrimination, so the bourgeoisie was widely supported by the working class. As a reason of denying compromise of French aristocrats, bourgeois collaborated with laborers and peasants. The creation of the cooperation and the idea of French intellectuals made

Before the revolution France was ruled under the Ancien Regime system, meaning the country and all its people were under the reign of an absolute monarch. This was a tradition that had been upheld through the years and the Royal family had enjoyed a life funded by the people of France, the royal family’s lifestyle unaffected by the situation outside their palace. The Palace, Versailles, was built by king Louis XIV and the expenses for building this “village” was very high, and in later years the cost for its upkeep would play a significant role in Frances financial difficulties. In order for these difficulties to be overcome France needed a tax reform. The government had a very high tax rate on the poorest of their people, the Third Estate, and they were still not getting enough money to get out of their

After the Seven Years’ War, France had a large amount of debt which they decided to resolve with taxation. The commoners accepted the change but the clergy and nobility refused. They enjoyed being apart of the upper class where they were exempt from

Before the French Revolution, there were three estates, or classes: the nobility, the clergy and the commoners. The nobility and the clergy had many more privileges than the third estate and that is what caused the French Revolution. The Third estate was composed of the peasants, the workers and the bourgeoisie; unlike the other segments of the Third Estate, the bourgeoisie was able to communicate its grievances to the public during the period after the French Revolution: 1789-1799.

Economics also played an important role in the French Revolution. In France there was an abundance of debt and taxation. The French monarchy managed their fiscal affairs by using an unequal system of taxation, borrowing money, or selling noble titles and other privileges. This led to a long running fiscal debt. France could not solely rely on tariffs to generate income. Although other countries had higher taxation rates, the burden on the common people was greater in France. Peasants and other third estates were taxed harshly which in good times was burdensome and in bad times it was devastating. Nobility and clergy were exempted from paying taxes. This left the peasants, wage earners, and the professional and business classes with the burden of taxes. This burden caused the unrest, which eventually led to the French Revolution.