I'm curious as to what people think the reason was that the United States became a Republic while France turned into a Dictatorship?
then again, I'm sure some of our French board members might know of a basis to disagree with your characterizations of the two outcomes.
You can say that again.
2) the US revolution was one of status quo, trying to upset the existing order, internally or externally, as little as possible, while the french one was trying to get equality for all men, by force of bayonets if necessary, ( vide the different treatment of slavery and right of black men ).
I agree. But one has to remember that the French society was much less equal than the American one*.
* If we don't count Indians and slaves, of course.
Actually, most French enlightenment thinkers were appalled by the results of the French Revolution (From the Terror onwards) because of its use of violence and terrorism to impose its beliefs.How about different thinkers. I get the impression that the French enlightment thinkers and philosophers had a slightly different outlook on things and they leaned more toward what ahppened in the end.
SaintStone said:;1970080 my definition of Dictatorship means "A government with a single head of state with legally unrestricted powers of legislative, executive, and judicial authority"
SaintStone said:and my definition of Republic "A government by elected officials selected by the citizens of that nation, possibly with appointed officials chosen by those elected officials".
SaintStone said:Given these definitions, I do not believe one could place the early constitution (even Articles of Confederation) of America as anything other then a republic or the Napoleonic french government as anything but a dictatorship.
Nationalist Frenchie said:2) the US revolution was one of status quo, trying to upset the existing order, internally or externally, as little as possible, while the french one was trying to get equality for all men, by force of bayonets if necessary, ( vide the different treatment of slavery and right of black men ).
In short, the US revolution wasn't really one, but an independence war, limited to change the notables on top, while the french one, was one of idealistists, who tried to change everything in as little time as possible. The US independence then led to a stable Republic ( aka slave-based oligarchy ) much more quickly than the french one, but the french became a democracy ( if an unstable one ) much more quickly than the US. In fact, you can say the US revolution was finished in the 1960s, with the civil rights ( and count the secession war as part of the delayed cost of the US revolution ).
During the French Revolution there were several groups involved, which all tried to reach different goals (for example: constitutional monarchy for the upper middle class; freedom and land for the peasants; true democracy for the Jakobians; etc.) These groups cooperated from time to time or fought each other.