Economic Factors that shaped French Nationalism
France was almost always at war with its rival Britain, as well as other European countries, these wars cost France allot of money and were very unsuccessful. The French economy was in chaos because of the wars France was involved in, to raise money King Louis XVI decided that the common people including the aristocrats should pay more taxes. The people were outraged with this but the aristocrats blocked Louis X VI's plan. The common people were getting more and more upset because in the past the three estates would always met and vote separately but now the majority vote of each estate was expressed as a single vote, so the First and Second Estates could always outnumber the Third Estate by 2 to 1. This made the common people very angry and the common people who were mostly lawyers decided to create a constitution that set equal rights for all men, they declared themselves the National Assembly and they swore the Tennis Court Oath, saying they were the only group who represented the nation. Today this still has an impact on people and still inspires people that if you really want to make a change you can make it happen no matter what and the National Assembly is a perfect example because these people put their minds on something and they created something that was fair and equal for everybody, they stood up for what they believed in. In France the National Assembly inspired people in other parts of France to rise up against the nobles and the clergy and fight for what they believed in, In France the revolution had started. It was time for a change the people finally realized what they needed to do to get what they wanted.