LEGACY OF LOUIS XIV (d. 1715)
Taxes:
1695 capitation head tax 22 levels
by social status
1710 dixieme (tenth): 10% of all income by all groups
Regency of Duke of Orleans
(1715-1723)
Will of Louis XIV: Council of Regency headed by
Marquise
de Montespan (former mistress) &
royal bastards:
"legitimated" in 1714 by King
Aristocratic reaction: parlement of Paris
suppresses
the royal will as unconstitutional;
Regent
recognizes parlement’s right of remonstrance
Financial problems: deficit larger in 1715 than in 1788
JOHN LAW, Scottish banker & financier:
1716 private bank;
1717 Company of West: monopoly
on Louisiana trade
(Voltaire's El Dorado)
1718 Royal Bank: tax
collection rights, royal debt
1720 Controller General of Finance
in France;
speculative Louisiana "bubble" bursts; bankruptcy
CARDINAL FLEURY (1726-43) Minister after Orleans’ death
ARISTOCRATIC
RESURGENCE:
Requirement of “four quarterings” of nobility
1760 for presentation
at royal court
1770
for membership in parlements
1781
for officers in army
Les Grands: the upper nobility versus
Les bourgeois gentilshommes: Moliere comedy
of manners
(The Bourgeois
Gentlemen)
LOUIS XV (l7l5-74): versus parlements as focus of aristocratic opposition
1749 VINGTIÈME: head tax of 1/20 imposed after War of Austrian Succession
1762 parlement expels Jesuits: seen as ultramontane opponents of
"liberties of Gallican Church;" Gallican
church supported by parlements
1765
Calas Affair: Huguenot executed by Toulouse parlement for murder
of son
Voltaire: anti-clerical, anti-parlementaire, Enlightenment propaganda
Confrontation with parlements:
1766 Brittany: royal authority
of intendant D'Aiguillon versus
feudal independence
of pays d'etat, provincial parlement at Rennes
Louis XV
repudiates claims of parlements through lit de justice
1771
RENE MAUPEOU: last of great French
royal ministers, lawyer
leads opposition
to power of aristocratic parlements:
appointment of d'Aiguillon as Secretary of State for foreign affairs
repudiates national debt; suspends payment on rentes; forced loans
parlement
of Paris exiled by lettres de cachet because of protest:
replaced by "Maupeou parlements" appointed directly by King
coup d'état against privileged orders,
but undone at death of Louis XV