Calonne inherited a large deficit from his predecessors and sought to reform France's inefficient tax system. He proposed a single land tax applied to all estates as well as other reforms. However, the Assembly of Notables, while supporting tax equality in principle, objected to shouldering the main tax burden and demanded transparency on royal finances before approving new taxes. This led Louis to dismiss both Calonne and the Assembly of Notables.

1. Calonne
Assembly of Notables

2.  Rude
 Marxist historians suggest that the revolution
unfolded in 4 distinct phrases, successively
drawing in different groups of people
 Aristocratic revolt – because the privileged
orders resisted the Crowns’ attempts at fiscal
reform
 Then drew in bourgeoisie, urban working
classes and peasantry in multi class rebellion

3. 
Tensions ins society – the Church,
nobility,Third estate
Impact of the Enlightenment
Long term causes

4. Short terms
causes
Foreign policy
Economic crisis
Financial crisis Political crisis

5. Foreign policy At war for 20 years from 1740-1783
American War of Independence 1.3 billion
livre
Awareness of political liberty for USA while
no political liberty in France – and still
taxation without representation in France,
unlike America
Economic crisis Bad harvests – rising price bread crisis – 88%
of wages
Less consumption – unemployment in
industry
Grain and food riots – FlourWar – proto
revolution
Financial crisis Inefficient and chaotic tax system –Third
Estate beared the burden
Tax farming
Regional exceptionalism and internal customs
barriers
Political crisis Louis XVI weakness
Aristocratic Revolt – power challenge by
Parlements

6.  Necker’s successors,
Charles Calonne
inherited an
problematic legacy.
 1.3 billion livre cost of
USWar of
Independence
 1786 – 112 million livre
deficit

7.  InitiallyCalonne sought control the situation
by seeking even more loans – 653 million
livres.
 Seems paradoxical but Calonne wanted to
maintain wanted to maintain confidence in
the Crown (by broadcasting its ability to
spend lavishly and raise new loans) but
recognised this could not continue
indefinitely.

8.  Necker’s Compte Rednu created two
problems for Calonne – firstly Calonne found
his own financial management questioned
and credibility Where had the surplus gone?
 On 20th August 1786 told Louis XVI that the
government was on verge of bankruptcy and
presented a plan for new reforms

9.  Two steps –
 1 - Introduce a single land tax – on land and the
amount owned – not the person – so would be
applied across all three estates. Paid by
everyone. Paid in produce and to be collected by
regional assemblies.
 Abolish most of the tax exemptions held by the
privileged estates. (Nobs still exempt from the
taille)

10.  2 – LikeTurgot, advocated laissez- faire grain
trade, abolish the Corvee, and abolish
internal customs barriers
 3 – Calonne wanted to call an Assembly of
Notables
 144 men selected by the King and Calonne

11.  Important part of the legal and administrative system
of the ancien regime were the Parlements.
 Very differ from English Parliament.
 13 courts of appeal for the French provinces.
 Paris Parlement was the sovereign court of appeal in
the nation. A jurisdiction of 10 million people
 By 1780s there were 1200 magistrates who presided
over the Parlements, all of whom were noblesse du
robe and thus members of the Second Estate.

12.  The Paris Parlement was the sovereign court of
appeal.
 Royal edicts had to be registered with the Paris
Parlement before they became law.
 The role of the Parlement was to scrutinise royal edits
– to check them in order to determine if they were in
accordance with France’s constriction and local laws
 The Parlement had the right to remonstrate (point
out defects) and return to the King for reconsidering
and perhaps redrafting.

13.  It did not have the power to reject edits, only
delay them.
 Furthermore by publishing the remonstrance,
the Parlements could rally public support by
evoking opposition to the edicts.
 Doyle ‘By deferring registration pending the kings
reply, they were able to delay and obstruct
government policy and since the death of Louis
XV, they had developed this technique into a
major vehicle of opposition’

14.  As an absolute monarch, the French king could
override the their objections using a lit de justice.
 But such opposition and drastic measures would
knock public confidence in the monarchy and
make royal borrowing even more expensive.
 The judges of the Paris Parlement had a history
of resisting royal power.

15.  Increasingly the Paris Parlement claimed its
functions gave it a king of quasi democratic
legitimacy – as if it represented the nation.
 Even entrenched noble interests were couched
in the language of the philosophers – the
Parlements spoke of their role in defencing the
‘natural laws’ of ‘citizens’, ‘inalienable rights’ and
as a barrier to despotism.
 (p.37 text)

16.  Attemt to covert the right of remonstrance
into the right of veto and for the nobility a
chance for them to regain some of the
powers they had lost in the reign of Louis XIV.

18.  A rebellion led by powerful nobles early in Louis XIV reign
led him to devise a way to emasculate and weaken the
powers of the French nobility.
 In the Sun King's reign the nobility had the means to raise
private armies and build fortifications.The king did not
have the means to raise and keep an army himself and had
to rely on these nobles to defend the nation.
 Lesser nobles, who had the ability to read and write, also
acted as the king's agents. Effectively, they were his
representatives of government to the people.They
collected taxes, posted edicts, and administered justice.

19.  Louis XIV reduced the nobles’ power by requiring
them to spend at least some portion of the year as
courtiers in residence atVersailles
 . AtVersailles, the aristocracy were removed from
their provincial power centres and came under the
surveillance and control of the royal government.
Rather than seen as demeaning, the nobles took
required membership of the royal court to be a high
honour. Nobles, being granted residence atVersailles,
were generally prepared to give up their former duties
as royal representatives outside Paris.

20.  While Louis was an absolute monarch for
reforms as radical as these, he needed the
approval of the Paris Parlement.
 To get new loans Calonne had to convince
bankers that his reform would pass into law,
that France would be a better situation to pay
the loans and it was supported by the most
powerful groups o France.

21.  Turgot has suggested as part of his Six Edicts
to replace the Corvee with a universal land
tax.

22.  Your Parlement understood that the edict
substituting a universal, indefinite, and
perpetual land tax for the corvée, under the guise
of the apparent relief it offers the people, could
at first glance have seemed a beneficent act
inspired by love of humanity. But at the same
time, Sire, your Parlement was sure that a more
careful examination of the edict would reveal to
Your Majesty that it represents a policy
burdensome even for those whom you wish to
help, and contrary to the sense of justice that
motivates you.

23.  The first rule of justice is to preserve for every man that which belongs to him… It
is a rule that consists not only of maintaining property rights, but also of
preserving personal rights, in addition to those which derive from the
prerogatives of birth and Estate. From this rule of law and equity it follows that
any system designed to create an equality of duties between men, even under
the guise of humanity and benevolence, would tend to destroy those distinctions
that are necessary to a well-ordered monarchy, and quickly result in disorder.The
inevitable result of absolute equality would be the overthrow of civil society,
which is maintained in harmony only through the hierarchy of power, authority,
precedence, and distinction which keeps each man in his place and protects all
states of being from confusion.
 In the assembly created by these different orders, all the people of your kingdom
are your subjects, and all must contribute to the needs of the state. But general
order and harmony must be upheld even in this contribution.The personal
responsibility of the clergy is to fulfil all the functions relating to education and
religion and to aid the unfortunate through alms.The noble devotes his life to the
defence of the state and assists the sovereign by providing council.The last class
of the nation, which cannot render such distinguished service to the state, fulfils
its obligation through taxes, industry and physical labour. .These institutions
were not formed by chance, and time cannot change them.

24.  Calonne's advice was for Louis to call an
Assembly of the Notables, 144 men.
 Members of the Parlements, Princes of the
Blood, important nobles and clergy. Only 10
were not noble.
 They were hand-picked and expected to
agree with the reforms.

25. 22 February 1787- 25 May 1787
6 November 1787 – 12 December 1788

26. Calonne,
cook
A contemporary cartoon depicting the Assembly of Notables as a gathering of barnyard birds
negotiating with Calonne:
Calonne: My dear delegates, I have gathered you to know with what sauce you would
like to be eaten.
Notables: But we don't want to be eaten at all !
Calonne:You are evading the question . . .

27.  Surprisingly the Assembly of the Notables
supported the principle of equality on
taxation, acknowledging no should have the
privilege of not paying tax. Few voted to
maintain their privileges.
 However they objected that the burden of tax
should fall mot heavily on them and
suggested other modes.

28.  The biggest impediment was the Notables demand to see
the royal accounts, refusing to approve any new taxes until
ty were fully informed of state finances.
 They also argued that they lacked the authority to impose
new perpetual taxes and that this should be approved by the
entire national in a meeting of the Estate General.
 As a result of this standoff, Louis dismissed Calonne and
replaced him with Brienne as his finance minster in May 1787
and dismissed the Assembly.