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In reply to the discussion: Hst of the World, Mel Brooks Comedy ⚜ French Rev, Mme Defarge, Louis XVI, Impt Americans in France [View all]appalachiablue
(43,692 posts).. The American Revolution (17751783) influenced the French Revolution (17891799), both ideologically and politically. In fact, the two Revolutions were linked in a process of two-way, trans-Atlantic communication that began with the Enlightenment and continued during both revolutions.[1]
The two Revolutions were very different the American Revolution focused mainly on freeing the country from colonial domination, while the French Revolution targeted a thorough make-over of French society, including overturning what was already a failing monarchy.[2][3]
Despite the differences, the success of the American revolution was influential for France. It demonstrated that monarchical power could be successfully challenged and replaced with a republic. This emboldened French citizens who were disillusioned with the monarchy and the class structure of the ancien régime. American success helped validate the idea of popular uprising and offered a practical example of how a new, more just government might be constructed.
In addition, key American documents (for example, the United States Declaration of Independence) provided inspiration for French documents.[4] Supported by the emergence of global trade, the communication of revolutionary ideas within this network began with the Age of the Enlightenment. Enlightenment ideals such as natural rights, popular sovereignty, and the social contract were central to both revolutions. French and American intellectuals and revolutionaries drew heavily from thinkers like John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and Montesquieu..
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++ Presence of Americans in France during the Revolution ++
[1786 portrait of Thomas Jefferson by Mather Brown]
A number of influential Americans were present in France during the Revolution.
The most noteworthy of these were Thomas Jefferson, Gouverneur Morris and Thomas Paine.
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- Wiki, Gouverneur Morris Jan. 31, 1752 Nov. 6, 1816) was an American statesman, a Founding Father of the United States, and a signatory to the Articles of Confederation and the United States Constitution. He wrote the Preamble to the United States Constitution and has been called the "Penman of the Constitution".[2]
While most Americans still thought of themselves as citizens of their respective states, Morris advanced the idea of being a citizen of a single union of states.[3] He was also one of the most outspoken opponents of slavery among those who were present at the Constitutional Congress. He represented New York in the United States Senate from 1800 to 1803.
Morris was born into a wealthy landowning family in what is now New York City. After attending King's College (now Columbia University) he studied law under Judge William Smith and earned admission to the bar. He was elected to the New York Provincial Congress before serving in the Continental Congress.
.. Morris was "the only foreign representative who remained in his post throughout the worst days of the Terror."[25] On one occasion, when Morris "found himself the center of a hostile mob in favor of hanging him on the nearest lamppost, he unfastened his wooden leg, brandished it above his head, and proclaimed himself an American who had lost a limb fighting for liberty," upon which "[t]he mob's suspicions melted into enthusiastic cheers" (even though, as noted above, Morris had in fact lost his leg as a result of a carriage accident)...
...https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gouverneur_Morris
- Thomas Jefferson was the American Minister Plenipotentiary from May 1785 to September 1789. Morris was a businessman who was in Paris to help salvage a friends tobacco business, to sell western tracts of land and to find private investors to purchase war debt from the insolvent French government. He was later named Minister Plenipotentiary to France, a post he occupied from 1792 to 1794.
He was the only high American official to remain in France during the Reign of Terror. Both of them attended prestigious salons in Paris and proffered advice to influential Frenchmen. Jefferson, along with other prominent Americans, was consulted by the Marquis de Lafayette on his first draft of the Declaration of the Rights of Man.[4] Jefferson urged Lafayette and other nobles, including Adrienne Catherine de Noailles, to take a moderate democratizing approach.[13] In practice, however, their influence on the rapid unfolding of revolutionary events was marginal the attention of the French revolutionaries that they might have influenced was focused elsewhere.[9]:17-18
- Thomas Paine. Statue of Thomas Paine in the Parc Montsouris, Paris, dedicated in 1948
- Thomas Paine played a direct role in the French Revolution and came close to being guillotined.[9]:83 In 1792, the Legislative Assembly gave Paine an honorary French citizen in recognition of the publishing of his Rights of Man, Part II.[9]:62 He was elected as a deputy to the National Convention and was one of nine members of a group charged with the publishing of his Rights of Man, Part II.[9]:62 He was elected as a deputy to the National Convention and was one of nine members of a group charged with drafting a constitution. His draft had decidedly Girondin overtones (that is, he revealed himself to be a moderate within the revolutionary movement).[9]:1 He opposed the execution of the King, preferring that he be exiled to the United States.[14] This placed him firmly in the camp of the Girondins, who were soon to be purged as counter-revolutionaries during the Terror...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influence_of_the_American_Revolution_on_the_French_Revolution