The French monarchy’s absolutism was laid out by two powerful ministers, Cardinal Richelieu and Cardinal Mazarin. Both tried to impose royal administration on France. The Fronde was widespread rebellions due to consolidated monarchy power which angered aristocracy and nobles between 1649 and 1652. The unsuccessful rebellions from French nobles convinced Louis XIV that heavy policies would endanger the throne. His plan was to create a monarchial institution on France while assuring the nobles and wealthy their influence on the locals. Louis worked through existing political administrations rather than destroying them. Louis XIV assumed the throne after his chief minister, Cardinal Mazarin, died in 1661. He pursued personal rule by establishing …show more content…
political tasks such as centralizing and tightening control of France, limiting noble influence, and controlled foreign affairs that would make France a hallmark of leading European power in the late 1600s. Louis XIV did not appoint anyone to chief minister and instead, embarked on personal rule when he assumed the crown in 1661.
His concept of royal authority was the divine right to rule absolute power. His declaration, “L’état, c’est moi” (“I am the State”) illustrated his status that God’s chosen regents cannot be bound to parliaments. However, he kept local authority loyal to him and satisfied by not limiting their power. He and his ministers supported financial privileges of local institutions. Louis consulted parlements with economic regulations before coming to conclusions that would affect them. Many regional parlements supported the monarch in this way. Louis clashed with Paris’ parlement and subsequently, he reduced the parlement’s power by placing the policy to register laws before questioning them; this is an example of his supremacy in the court. In the palace of Versailles, nobles struggled for sovereign favor than disputing in individual wars. His absolute monarchy stabilized France and centralized a strong government that would endure for many …show more content…
years. Louis XIV’s financial minister, Jean-Baptiste Colbert helped with the growth of industry and his economic policies provided Louis to raise a large and powerful army to spread France. The economy was strong and upheld by agriculture, lacemaking, and mining. His war minister, Marquis de Louvois then aided Louis to expand the French army. Louis’s army was the most powerful in Europe. Louis used his mighty army to secure French borders. Louis XIV had interests to expand his borders towards Spain which concerned neighboring states. Louis gained control of towns bordering Spanish Netherlands that are the alleged rights of his wife, Marie Thérèse, daughter of King Philip IV of Spain. France gains more territory after Louis invades Netherlands again and this time, he is considered as a menace to western Europe. Furthermore, Louis’s later wars thwart his restless push to go beyond his borders and into Germany; his army maintains at full strength all while through Louis’s thrust at expanding French borders. Louis’s political advances to create a prominent France were compensated after many approaches of expansion and later established his policies on his domestic and foreign territories. Louis XIV attempted religious conformity for political unity but was soon shown as a wasted effort.
He repressed Jansenists by persecuting them which fostered opposition to royal power. This fostered a long-term political stance. After Louis XIV died, Paris’ Parlement and other judicial bodies sympathized Jansenists and reassert their authority within the French monarchy. Louis XIV sought to bring France under Roman Catholicism which launched a campaign against Huguenots (French Protestants). Louis’s public reputation was destroyed by bullying Huguenots to Catholicism publicly by banning them from government positions, excluding them from professions, and using financial ways to convert them. He revoked the Edict of Nantes that Henry IV installed for religious tolerance in October 1685. Protestants who were highly skilled left France and joined the resistance against Louis in other countries. This revocation and ongoing persecution led France to be the symbol of religious oppression in Europe while Europe was reputed as complete religious
tolerance. France was held in a dominant position in Europe and was regarded as a threat to other nations such as the Holy Roman Empire, Spain, and England. The exiled Huguenots ventured off to England, Germany, and other areas away from Louis’s eye. The large nations and small countries formed a coalition called the Grand Alliance. This formation ensued a war that left French resources strained. The Spanish Succession between 1701 to 1714 left France famine-ridden and in massive debt. France stayed a significant power but was less strong in 1715. France still dominated the largest population, unfortunately, financial troubles from warfare faltered the monarchy by 1720. Louis XIV left the monarchy to his great-grandson Louis XV but like him, Louis XV was too young to carry the throne. His uncle, duke of Orléans, was regent and during his regency moral scandals ensued that would impede the superiority of the monarchy and lessen its power. Conversely, Cardinal Fleury helped maintain the monarch’s authority by continuing repression of Jansenists and engaged in economic affluence. The beginning of the 1660s marked France’s new sovereign that would undoubtedly, name France as one of the most powerful monarchies in the continent. Louis XIV knew how to politically stand in government by increasing loyalty to him from appointed government officials and keeping local authority happy.
Louis XIV is considered the “perfect absolutist” and he has been said to have been one of the greatest rulers in France’s history. He came up with several different strategic plans to gain absolute
The Edict of Nantes had given Protestants, or Huguenots, in France the ability to practice their religion without fear of violence or persecution. Enacted in the late 1500s in an effort to resemble France after the destruction of the French Wars of Religion, the Edict of Nantes served as a means to unite the French population and end the violence that often accompanied religious persecution. Louis’ decision to revoke such a peace-promoting edict, in an effort to homogenize his country and align his subjects with his own beliefs, clearly illustrates his giving of priority to his own agenda, as opposed to that which would best benefit his country. However, while the claim that the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes was detrimental to French society, seems to be disproven by Doc 6, which essentially asserts that the king’s revocation has resulted in the rapid conversion of “whole towns” and describes the king as “the invincible hero destined to… destroy the terrible monster of heresy”, the author’s inherently biased point of view must be addressed. This description, which could be used as evidence to support the fact that Louis did act in interest of the state, must be taken with a grain of salt as the author himself, a member of the Assembly of the Clergy, does not even have the best interest of the state in mind; rather, he is
nation. In order to become a true absolute ruler Louis xiv needed to make sure
The way Louis XIV ruled over France was not quite the way his father ruled. Louis XIV was considered to have unruly nobility. Louis XIV was also in the process of reinforcing the traditional Gallicanism, which is a doctrine limiting the authority of the Pope in France. Also, Louis XIV began to diminish the power of the nobility and clergy. He achieved great control over the second estate (nobility) in France by essentially attaching much of the higher nobility to his range at his palace at Versailles, which required them to spend most of the year under his close watch instead of in th...
A Comparison of the Characteristics of the Absolutist Rule of Charles I of England and Louis XIV of France
His Court and The Regency, King Louis XIV wrote, “The royal power is absolute. The royal throne is not the throne of a man, but the throne of God himself. Kings should be guarded as holy things, and whoever
In order to gain the power he desired as an absolute monarch, Louis used a few key techniques that were very successful. His first and most necessary step to get all control was to take all of the nobles’ power, and make it so they were completely under his control. He first did this by taking the nobles’ positions of power, and either getting rid of them by doing it himself, or giving the jobs to loyal middleclass or some nobles who were completely loyal and under his control. Louis had very simple reasoning for doing this, which was that if the nobles had any power or control, they would have a better chance of overthrowing him, and that since there can only be so much total power, the more they had, the less ...
... move, defunding any revolts they might plan, and preoccupying their time with petty social matters instead of matters of the state. If Louis’ reign was not supported by the enabling qualities of the Palace of Versailles, his reign would certainly not be as absolute as it was.
At the beginning of the 17th century, France was a place of internal strife and bickering bureaucrats. The king, Louis XIII, had come to the throne in 1610 at the age of nine, leaving the running of the kingdom to his mother, Marie de Medici. One of her court favorites, Armand de Plessis de Richelieu, rose through the ranks, eventually gaining the title of Cardinal and becoming one of Louis’ key advisors and minister. His political manifesto, Political Testament, was a treatise for King Louis XIII that offered him advice mainly concerned with the management and subtle subjugation of the nobles and the behavior of a prince. Beneath all of the obeisant rhetoric, Richelieu was essentially writing a handbook for Louis XIII on how to survive as a king in a political landscape increasingly dominated by the aristocracy. Richelieu’s ideology shows a pragmatic attitude reminiscent of The Prince, a political work by 15th century Florentine politician Niccoló Machiavelli.
by Spain and the pope, however, the league refused to accept a Protestant king of France
When Louis the XIV began his rule in 1643, his actions immediately began to suggest and absolute dictatorship. Because of the misery he had previously suffered, one of the first things he did was to decrease the power of the nobility. He withdrew himself from the rich upper class, doing everything secretly. The wealth had no connection to Louis, and therefore all power they previously had was gone. He had complete control over the nobles, spying, going through mail, and a secret police force made sure that Louis had absolute power. Louis appointed all of his officials, middle class men who served him without wanting any power. Louis wanted it clear that none of his power would be shared. He wanted "people to know by the rank of the men who served him that he had no intention of sharing power with them." If Louis XIV appointed advisors from the upper classes, they would expect to gain power, and Louis was not willing to give it to them. The way Louis XIV ruled, the sole powerful leader, made him an absolute ruler. He had divine rule, and did not want to give any power to anyone other than himself. These beliefs made him an absolute ruler.
The French government was a complete monarchy. At the time France had thirteen different regions. Each of these thirteen regions made up their own rules. What did that mean? France didn't have a unified law system, basically a government, to make up the rules; everyone made their own through Parliament. The Parliament had the jurisdiction to make laws in their own region. Each individual Parliament had between 50 to 130 members made up of judges and “legal elites” in that region. This was the only government in France. The Parliament were the ones set prices on foods, and held trials including murders and thefts. Even though they served as the government of the region, they were hated by everybody, including the king. The King had people called intendents who “curbed the power of nobility” who were hated even more than Parliament.
The French citizens were correct in overthrowing the French monarchy because King Louis XVI was a poor leader. One of the qualities that made King Louis XVI a poor leader was that he was not interested in ruling the country. According to the World History Textbook, “He was easily bored with affairs of state and much preferred to spend his time in physical activities.” (Beck Roger, Black Linda, Krieger, Larry, Naylor Phillip, Shabaka Dahia, 653) It is obvious that King Louis XVI was more interested in personal enjoyment then the livelihood of his country. He would rather be noble having fun rather than being a leader making decisions for his country. When King Louis XVI was removed from power, he was given what he wanted, the escape from the affairs of state. Another example why King L...
An Analysis of the Absolute Monarchy of France in the 17th Century This historical study will define the absolute monarchy as it was defied through the French government in the 17th century. The term ‘absolute” is defined I the monarchy through the absolute control over the people through the king and the royal family. All matters of civic, financial, and political governance was controlled through the king’s sole power as the monarchical ruler of the French people. In France, Louis XIII is an important example of the absolute monarchy, which controlled all facts of military and economic power through a single ruler. Udder Louis XIII’s reign, the consolidation of power away from the Edicts of Nantes to dominant local politics and sovereignty
Over the course of Louis’ rein, he showed that he was a bad monarch because he abused his power. Ultimately, he made the citizens unhappy. Louis believed that Kings “are born to possess all and command all” and their power should not be questioned. This caused him to make impulsive decisions without thinking of the citizens opinions because they were not supposed to question him. If his power was questioned Louis was quickly able to say that God gave him the power to make decisions therefore they were right.