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| French Constitution of 1791 | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Overview | |
| Original title | Constitution française du 3 septembre 1791 |
| Jurisdiction | France |
| Created | 3 September 1791 |
| Date effective | 14 September 1791 |
| System | Unitaryparliamentaryconstitutional monarchy |
| Head of state | Monarch |
| Chambers | Unicameral (Legislative Assembly) |
| Author(s) | National Constituent Assembly |
 Constitution française du 3 septembre 1791 at FrenchWikisource | |
TheFrench Constitution of 1791 (French:Constitution française du 3 septembre 1791) was the first writtenconstitution in France, created after the collapse of theabsolute monarchy of theAncien Régime.[1] One of the basic precepts of theFrench Revolution was adoptingconstitutionality and establishingpopular sovereignty.
Following theTennis Court Oath, theNational Assembly began the process of drafting a constitution as its primary objective. TheDeclaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, adopted on 26 August 1789 eventually became thepreamble of the constitution adopted on3 September 1791.[2] The Declaration offered sweeping generalizations about rights, liberty, and sovereignty.[3]
A twelve-member Constitutional Committee was convened on 14 July 1789 (coincidentally the day of theStorming of the Bastille). Its task was to do much of the drafting of the articles of the constitution. It included originally two members from theFirst Estate (Champion de Cicé,Archbishop of Bordeaux andTalleyrand,Bishop of Autun); two from theSecond (thecomte de Clermont-Tonnerre and themarquis de Lally-Tollendal); and four from theThird (Jean Joseph Mounier,Abbé Sieyès,Nicholas Bergasse, andIsaac René Guy le Chapelier).
Many proposals for redefining the French state were floated, particularly in the days after the remarkable sessions of4–5 August 1789 and the abolition of feudalism. For instance, theMarquis de Lafayette proposed a combination of the American and British systems, introducing abicameralparliament, with the king having the suspensiveveto power over the legislature, modeled to the authority then recently vested in thePresident of the United States.
The main controversies early on surrounded the issues of what level of power to be granted to theking of France (i.e.:veto, suspensive or absolute) and what form would the legislature take (i.e.:unicameral orbicameral). The Constitutional Committee proposed a bicameral legislature, but the motion was defeated on 10 September 1789 (849–89) in favor of a single house. The next day, they proposed an absolute veto but were again defeated (673–325) in favor of a suspensive veto, which could be overridden by three consecutive legislatures.
A second Constitutional Committee quickly replaced it, and included Talleyrand, Abbé Sieyès, and Le Chapelier from the original group, as well as new membersGui-Jean-Baptiste Target,Jacques Guillaume Thouret,Jean-Nicolas Démeunier,François Denis Tronchet, andJean-Paul Rabaut Saint-Étienne, all of theThird Estate. AsSimon Schama has pointed out, many of the members of the Constitutional Committee were themselves members of nobility, many of whom would later face execution.[4]
Their greatest controversy faced by this new committee surrounded the issue ofcitizenship. Would every subject of the French Crown be given equal rights, as the Declaration of Rights of Man and Citizen seemed to promise, or would there be some restrictions? TheOctober Days (5–6 October) intervened and rendered the question much more complicated. In the end, a distinction was held between active citizens (over the age of 25, paid direct taxes equal to three days' labor) which had political rights, and passive citizens, who had only civil rights. This conclusion was intolerable to such radical deputies asMaximilien Robespierre, and thereafter they never could be reconciled to the Constitution of 1791.
A second body, the Committee of Revisions, was struck September 1790, and includedAntoine Barnave,Adrien Duport, andCharles de Lameth. Because the National Assembly was both a legislature and a constitutional convention, it was not always clear when its decrees were constitutional articles or mere statutes. It was the job of this committee to sort it out. The committee became very important in the days after theChamps de Mars Massacre, when a wave of revulsion against popular movements swept France and resulted in a renewed effort to preserve powers for the Crown. The result is therise of the Feuillants, a new political faction led by Barnave, who used his position on the committee to preserve a number of powers for the Crown, such as the nomination of ambassadors, military leaders, and ministers.
After very long negotiations, the constitution was reluctantly accepted by KingLouis XVI in September 1791.Redefining the organization of the French government, citizenship and the limits to the powers of government, the National Assembly set out to represent the interests of thegeneral will. It abolished many “institutions which were injurious to liberty and equality of rights”. The National Assembly asserted its legal presence in French government by establishing its permanence in the Constitution and forming a system for recurring elections. The Assembly's belief in a sovereign nation and in equal representation can be seen in the constitutionalseparation of powers. The National Assembly was thelegislative body, the king and royal ministers made up theexecutive branch and thejudiciary was independent of the other two branches. On a local level, the previousfeudal geographic divisions were formally abolished, and the territory of the French state was divided into severaladministrative units,Departments (Départements), but with the principle ofcentralism.
The Assembly, as constitution-framers, were afraid that if only representatives governed France, it was likely to be ruled by the representatives' self-interest; therefore, the king was allowed a suspensive veto to balance out the interests of the people. By the same token, representative democracy weakened the king’s executive authority.
The constitution was not egalitarian by today's standards. It distinguished between the propertiedactive citizens and the poorerpassive citizens. Women lacked rights to liberties such as education, freedom to speak, write, print and worship.[citation needed]
Keith M. Baker writes in his essay “Constitution” that the National Assembly threaded between two options when drafting the Constitution: they could modify the existing, unwritten constitution centered on the threeestates of theEstates General or they could start over and rewrite it completely. The National Assembly wanted to reorganize social structure and legalize itself: while born of theEstates General of 1789, it had abolished the tricameral structure of that body.
With theonset of war and thethreat of the revolution's collapse, radicalJacobin and ultimatelyrepublican conceptions grew enormously in popularity, increasing the influence ofRobespierre,Danton,Marat and theParis Commune. When theKing used his veto powers to protectnon-juring priests and refused to raisemilitias in defense of therevolutionary government, the constitutional monarchy proved unworkable and was effectively ended by the10 August insurrection. ANational Convention was called, electingRobespierre as its first deputy; it was the first assembly in France elected by universal male suffrage. The convention declared France arepublic on 22 September 1792.[5]
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