Dbq French Revolution

The French Revolution started in 1789 with the storming of the Bastille. The French society was divided into three classes or estates. It was the Third Estate that revolted to bring about change. There were three main causes that led up to the French Revolution. First were unequal rights in a divided society, second was the financial crisis that occurred at the same time as an extreme famine, and thirdly was the enlightened thinking of the Third Estate.
The estates were divided between the Third Estate and the First and Second Estates, who lived lavishly. The estates consisted of the clergy, the nobles, and the rest of society. Lands held by the nobility were taxed very little. Lands held by the commoners were taxed heavily (Document 1). Whenever someone tried to bring up the idea of fair taxation they were immediately silenced. The Third Estate would always try to vote for reform in the Estates General, but the First and Second Estates always outvoted the Third Estate two to one (chapter 6, section 1 page 214). That made it extremely hard to make it fair between the estates. With these harsh taxes, the Third Estate should be able to receive fair paying jobs, but these jobs were reserved for the nobles and …show more content…
The financial crisis in France was caused by years of ongoing deficit spending, which was when the government spent more than they were taking in. To worsen this crisis, the government kept taking money and at the same time there was a bad harvest that sent food prices soaring (chapter 6, section 1 page 213). This brought hunger to the Third Estate. The price of bread rose above the people’s ability to pay and this causes great misery (Document 1). The financial crisis could have been solved by increasing the taxes and reducing what is spent, but the nobles and clergy fought back with great effort against any type of reform that would cause their exclusion from taxes to go