French and American Revolutions
...the colonists leaving them unfairly short. These acts led to several boycotts in the colonies because colonists did not feel that the British Parliament had the right to tax them without their consent. Although through boycotting the Parliament repealed a few of these acts, Britian asserted its right to regulate the colonies in all ways whatsoever. Britian’s tight grasp upon the colonists lives pushed them farther and farther towards a revolution. As the revolution itself grew nearer and nearer the colonists took many actions to bring upon the revolution. The colonists formed the First Continental congress which published a declaration of rights and grievances which promised obedience to the king but denied Parliament’s right to tax colonies. Also it set up a continental association to prohibit importation of English goods and later the export of American goods to England. With all of these factors combined the American Revolutionary era had begun to brew. Shortly after the American Revolution, a revolution in France occurred. There were several underlying causes to this revolution. For the most part the Revolution could be described as the clashing of a rising, powerful bourgeoisie class and a poor monarchy defending it’s powers. Throughout the eighteenth century, France still practiced feudalism. In that, the nobles and clergy enjoyed several privileges the common people did not share. Because the common people did not have any power and freedom in politics, the clergy and nobles could overpower the commoners and therefore the common people became very discontented with the more privileged classes. Another leading cause was the bankruptcy of the french government. Following the Seven Years War, the French government could not manage it’s money. This problem worsened when the France aided the American Revolution against Britain. Louis XIV had spent an incredible amount of money. Louis XVI failed to improve the financial situation by dismissing those who tried to introduce some sort of financial reforms. The governments inability to access the wealth of the French nation by taxation is what eventually triggered the prolonged differences between the classes and eventually led to the revolution. Also the monarchy engaged in a struggle to return to absolute power status as it had previously. The french nobles fought against the monarchy to prevent this absolute power. The result of these attempts to achieve absolute power was a series of new and increased taxes which further outraged the nobleman. However, the only successful taxation was done towards the peasants whom had the least money. Because of the of the problems between the monarchy and nobleman, the monarchy eventually fell and caused great unrest leading to the French Revolution. In many ways the American and French Revolutions were alike. Both were influenced by the ideas of Enlightenment. Enlightenment can be defined as the term used to describe the trends of thinking and writing in Europe and America during the eighteenth century. Also both revolutions were focused on a struggle with a higher power. Like the colonists struggling against the parliament, the french lower classes were also struggling against the french monarchy. Both revolutions also had some problems dealing with lack of money in the lower classes due to taxation. The colonists were being unfairly taxed by the British Parliament while the lower classes and nobleman were also being unfairly taxed by the French monarchy. In many ways the American and French revolutions were similar. Alt...