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Summary The Assembly of Notables
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Summary questions on the Assembly of Notables of the French Revolution
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The Assembly of Notables- SOW questions1. Why did the Assembly of Notables fail?
King Louis hand-picked the 144 notables including princes of the blood, archbishops and
noblemen, who he had thought would be willing to approve all or most of Calonne’s
measures even if it meant sacrificing some of their privileges. Louis expected wrongly as
these men did not want to bear the burden of increased taxation which, under Calonne’s
proposal of a land tax payed by all, would affect them directly. Notables of the clergy,
including Brienne, inevitably defended their ancient church privileges and high nobles
claimed that only a ‘true national assembly’ (quoted by Lafayette) could discuss taxation-
referring to an Estates- General. Also some notables weren’t convinced that the situation
was bad enough to warrant such big changes and when Calonne revealed the Compte Rendu
was in error it made matters worse- the assembly accused Calonne of incompetence and
trying to shift the blame onto others. Calonne further didn’t assist himself by pushing aside
legitimate criticisms and publishing articles accusing the notables of letting self-interest
stand in the way of change but this was not true- many were influenced by enlightenment
and willing to see a fairer taxation system but they distrusted Calonne so much so that they
weren’t prepared to work with him. Even when Brienne replaced Calonne, trying to push
more reforms, his plans for change were overshadowed by the need for money and thus
failed to get reforms through- the assembly was too used to challenging the king’s
representative and also there was further accusation of incompetence- led to mantra of ‘no
taxation without representation’ and thus the failure of the assembly as the notables held
firm in their desire for the Estates-General.
2. Was its summons a mistake?
Yes; to pass legislation edicts were usually sent to the Parlements to be ratified. If Louis had
sent this taxation edict to parlement, even if the members had remonstrated he could have
issued a lit de justice to enforce it, and if needed could send a lettre de cachet to exile those
who refused to comply. If this conventional route had been taken there wouldn’t have been
need to waste time with an Assembly (of which’s failure made the Parlements even more
hostile to registering the land tax) and avoid the Estates-General which consequently would
have avoided the failure of the assembly and thus reduced the extent of how weak and
unsuccessful both Louis and Calonne appeared.
3. Why were the Parlements so uncooperative?
Firstly, a number of notables sat in parlements (esp. Paris) and the parlements asserted their
rights to ‘speak for the nation’ and protect citizen’s rights against despotism- public viewed
them as champions who were protecting them from ‘sinister’ royal plans so consequently
parlements were never going to agree to anything which would hinder their reputations or
Enlightened perspectives. When asked to register edicts they refused as they argued only
the Estates-General had the authority to approve such measures- e.g Paris parlement when
in July 1787 Brienne tried to get his edicts registered by the normal procedure. Parlements
were never going to agree to measures which would negatively affect the lives of the
parlementaires, thus they inevitably refused to co-operate
4. Was this the first stage in revolution?
Yes; the revolt of the nobility in 1788 was violence in reaction to the changes implemented
by Brienne in May 1788: the removal of the right of the Paris parlement to register edicts;
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