CAUSES OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION DBQ

In the south of France there is a taille [tax on the land and its produce].

There is an injustice in levying the amount each person must pay. Lands held

by the nobility are taxed very little. Lands held by commoners are taxed

heavily. . . .

5

September 5, 1788: The poor people seem very poor indeed. The children are

terribly ragged.

June 10, 1789: The lack of bread is terrible. Stories arrive every moment from

the provinces of riots. . . . The price of bread has risen above people’s ability

to pay. This causes great misery.

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July 1789: . . . I was joined by a poor woman who complained of the hard

times. “The tailles and feudal dues [rents owed the lords] are crushing us,”

she said.

That the king be forced to reform the abuses and tyranny of lettre de cachet
[a letter allowing a person to be jailed without trial].
That every tax . . . be granted [by the Estates General] only for a limited time.
That the taille [a tax on land] be borne equally by all classes. . . .
The meetings of the Estates General . . . shall be scheduled for definite
times. . . .
In order to assure the third estate the influence it deserves because of its
numbers, . . . its votes in the assembly should be taken and counted by head. 

The Revolution had been accomplished in the minds of men long before it
was translated into fact. . . .
The middle class . . . was sensitive to their inferior legal position. The
Revolution came from them—the middle class. The working classes were
incapable of starting or controlling the Revolution. They were just beginning
to learn to read.

The condition of France alone did not bring about the overthrow of the
monarchy. . . . For the sufferings of the people were not greater than they had
been before. . . . The ideas of the philosophes were not directly responsible
for the outbreak. . . .
[T]he spark that changed thought into action was supplied by the
Declaration of American Independence. . . . [T]he American example caused
the Revolution to break out.