119 Facts About Robespierre

Maximilien Francois Marie Isidore de Robespierre was a French lawyer and statesman who became one of the best-known, influential and controversial figures of the French Revolution.

In 1791, Robespierre was elected as "public accuser" and became an outspoken advocate for male citizens without a political voice, for their unrestricted admission to the National Guard, to public offices, and to the commissioned ranks of the army, for the right to petition and the right to bear arms in self defence.

Robespierre's goal was to create a one and indivisible France, equality before the law, to abolish prerogatives and to defend the principles of direct democracy.

Robespierre earned the nickname "the incorruptible" for his adherence to strict moral values.

Robespierre was wounded in his jaw, but it is not known if it was self-inflicted or the outcome of the skirmish.

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About 90 people, including Robespierre, were executed in the days after, events that initiated a period known as the Thermidorian Reaction.

Robespierre defended the right of revolution and promoted a revolutionary armed force.

Robespierre's family has been traced back to the 15th century in Vaudricourt, Pas-de-Calais.

Robespierre studied the works of the Genevan philosophe Jean-Jacques Rousseau and was attracted to many of the ideas in his Contrat Social.

Robespierre became intrigued by the idea of a "virtuous self", a man who stands alone accompanied only by his conscience.

Robespierre soon resigned, owing to discomfort in ruling on capital cases arising from his early opposition to the death penalty.

Robespierre's defence was printed and he sent Benjamin Franklin a copy.

Robespierre attacked inequality before the law: the indignity of illegitimate or natural children, three years later the lettres de cachet and the sidelining of women in academic life.

Some claim Robespierre had seen Rousseau shortly before he died, but others maintain that the account was apocryphal.

Robespierre participated in a discussion regarding how the French provincial government should be elected, arguing in his Address to the Nation of Artois that if the former mode of election by the members of the provincial estates was again adopted, the new Estates-General would not represent the people of France.

Robespierre supported propositions with a coolness that had the air of conviction.

Robespierre associated with the new Society of the Friends of the Constitution, commonly known as the Jacobin Club.

Robespierre coined the famous motto by adding the word fraternity on the flags of the National Guard.

Robespierre demanded the reconstitution of the National Guard on a democratic basis.

Robespierre felt that the National Guard had to become the instrument of defending liberty and no longer be a threat to it.

The following day, Robespierre attacked Abbe Raynal, who sent an address criticising the work of the Assembly and demanding the restoration of the royal prerogative.

The next day, Robespierre accepted the function of "public accuser" in the criminal tribunal preparing indictments and ensuring the defence.

Robespierre, who attended the Jacobin club, did not dare to go back to the Rue Saintonge where he lodged, and so asked Laurent Lecointre if he knew a patriot near the Tuileries who could put him up for the night.

Robespierre was motivated by a desire to live closer to the Assembly and the Jacobin club.

Robespierre had been carefully preparing for this confrontation and it was the climax of his political career up to this point.

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Robespierre noticed the inns in Pas de Calais were filled with emigres.

Robespierre warned against the threat of dictatorship stemming from war, in the following terms:.

Robespierre urged that France should declare war against Austria .

Marat and Robespierre opposed him, arguing that victory would create a dictatorship, while defeat would restore the king to his former powers; neither end, he said, would serve the revolution.

Robespierre's speech was nevertheless published and sent to all clubs and Jacobin societies of France.

Robespierre began by assuring his audience that everything he intended to propose was strictly constitutional.

Robespierre then went on to advocate specific measures to strengthen, not so much the national defences as the forces that could be relied on to defend the revolution.

Robespierre promoted a people's army, continuously under arms and able to impose its will on Feuillants and Girondins in the Constitutional Cabinet of Louis XVI and the Legislative Assembly.

For Robespierre it was an ungrateful position as "public accuser"; it meant he was not allowed to the bar before the jury had spoken their verdict.

Not long after Robespierre was accused by Brissot and Guadet of trying to become the idol of the people.

Robespierre himself wrote a prospectus in which he explained to the subscribers his goals.

Robespierre responded by working to reduce the political influence of the officer class and the king.

Camille Desmoulins thinks everything is over and they can finally rest, but Robespierre overruled this by pointing out it could only be the beginning.

Robespierre published the twelfth and last issue of "Le Defenseur de la Constitution", both an account and political testament.

Robespierre himself preferred to represent the commune, and Fouquier-Tinville was appointed as president.

Marat and Robespierre both disliked Condorcet who proposed that the "enemies of the people" belonged to the whole nation and should be judged constitutionally in its name.

Robespierre was no longer willing to cooperate with Brissot, who promoted the Duke of Brunswick, and Roland, who proposed that the members of the government should leave Paris, taking the treasury and the king with it.

Robespierre's noted that Robespierre was in the chair that day, assisted by Collot d'Herbois and Billaud-Varenne as secretaries.

Robespierre, who seems to have been sick was given a week to respond.

Louvet de Couvrai accused Robespierre of governing the Paris departement, paying the "septembriseurs" in order to gain more votes in the election.

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Condorcet considered the French Revolution as a religion and Robespierre had all the characteristics of a leader of a sect, or a cult.

Robespierre had been taken ill and had done little other than support Saint-Just, a former colonel in the National Guard, who gave his first major speech to address and argue against the king's inviolability.

Robespierre argued that the dethroned king could now function only as a threat to liberty and national peace and that the members of the Assembly were not to be impartial judges but rather statesmen with responsibility for ensuring public safety:.

Unlike some Girondins, Robespierre specifically opposed judgment by primary assemblies or a referendum, believing that this could cause a civil war.

Robespierre demanded that relatives of the king should leave France, but Marie-Antoinette should be judged.

Robespierre spoke of vigorous measures to save the convention but left the committee within a few days.

Robespierre who was not elected was pessimistic about the prospects of parliamentary action and told the Jacobins that it was necessary to raise an army of Sans-culottes to defend Paris and arrest infidel deputies, naming and accusing Brissot, Isnard, Vergniaud, Guadet and Gensonne.

Robespierre was in effect questioning the individual right of ownership, and advocated a progressive tax and fraternity between the people of all the nations.

Robespierre said that public squares should be used to produce arms and pikes.

Robespierre openly called at the Jacobin Club "to place themselves in insurrection against corrupt deputies".

Robespierre left the convention after applause from the left side and went to the town hall.

Robespierre admitted he almost gave up his career because of his anxieties since he became a deputy.

Robespierre did not pronounce his surname as they were never friends.

Robespierre was criticized for being the most prominently known member of the Committee, but officially the Committee was non-hierarchical.

Robespierre was particularly concerned that public officials should be virtuous.

Robespierre defended 73 Girondins as useful, but more than 20 were sent on trial.

Robespierre attacked Danton, who had refused to take a seat in the Comite, and believed a stable government was needed which could resist the orders of the Comite de Salut Public.

Robespierre called for the dissolution of the convention; he believed they would be admired by posterity.

Danton who was dangerously ill for a few weeks, probably knowing that he could not get along with Robespierre, quit politics and set off to Arcis-sur-Aube with his 16-year-old wife, who pitied the Queen since her trial began.

Robespierre defended Danton and warned not to exaggerate the revolution.

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Under intense emotional pressure from Lyonnaise women, Robespierre suggested that a secret commission be set up to examine the cases of the Lyon rebels, to see if injustices had been committed.

Robespierre replied to the plea for an end to the Terror, justifying the collective dictatorship of the National Convention, administrative centralization, and the purging of local authorities.

Robespierre said he had to avoid two cliffs: indulgence and severity.

Robespierre reasoned thus: those who are virtuous are right; error is a corruption of the heart; error cannot be sincere; error is always deliberate.

Robespierre managed to acquire a small army of secret agents, which reported to him.

Robespierre's was accused of organizing a revolt against the patriots and the tribunal to free her husband and Danton.

When Barras and Freron paid a visit to Robespierre, they were received in an extremely unfriendly manner.

The despotism of Robespierre made this project impossible to be carried out, for he wrested all the decrees he wanted.

Robespierre argued passionately in the Assembly against the Colonial Committee, dominated by plantation and slaveholders in the Caribbean.

Robespierre did not argue for slavery's immediate abolition, but slavery advocates in France regarded Robespierre as a "bloodthirsty innovator" and a traitor plotting to give French colonies to England.

Robespierre defended the rights of free of color at the expense of the slaves.

Robespierre criticized the former governor of Saint-Domingue Sonthonax and Etienne Polverel, who had freed slaves on Haiti, but then proposed to arm them.

Robespierre denounced the French minister to the newly formed United States, Edmond-Charles Genet, who had sided with Sonthonax, and informed the Committee not to count on the whites to manage the colony.

Robespierre praised the French as the first to "summon all men to equality and liberty, and their full rights as citizens, " using the word slavery twice but without specifically mentioning the French colonies.

Robespierre opposed the Catholic Church and the pope, particularly their policy of clerical celibacy.

Robespierre dedicated festivals to the Supreme Being, to Truth, Justice, Modesty, Friendship, Frugality, Fidelity, Immortality, Misfortune, etc.

Robespierre was able to speak of the things about which he was truly passionate, including virtue, nature, deist beliefs and his disagreements with atheism.

Robespierre dressed elaborately, wearing feathers on his hat and holding fruit and flowers in his hands, and walked first in the festival procession.

Robespierre delivered two speeches in which he emphasized his concept of a Supreme Being: there would be no Christ, no Mohammed.

Robespierre did not create priests to harness us, like vile animals, to the chariots of kings and to give to the world examples of baseness, pride, perfidy, avarice, debauchery and falsehood.

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Robespierre created men to help each other, to love each other mutually, and to attain to happiness by the way of virtue.

Robespierre came down the mountain in a way that some claimed resembled Moses as the leader of the people.

Robespierre felt ridiculed and demanded on the 26th that the investigation of Theot be stopped and Fouquier-Tinville replaced.

Robespierre demanded the heads of nine people, who opposed his republic of virtue.

Robespierre refused to reunite husbands, wives and children dispersed in different prisons in a common detention facility.

Robespierre used this assassination attempt against him as a pretext for scapegoating the British.

Robespierre wanted to take away the authority of the Committee of General Security, as the committees were acting as two governments.

The next day Robespierre was compared to Catiline; he himself preferred the virtues of Cato the Younger.

Robespierre was obliged to commence the attack in the convention itself.

Robespierre gave the impression that no one was his friend, that no one could be trusted.

Robespierre complained of being blamed for everything; and that not only England but members of the Committee of General Security were involved in intrigue to bring him down.

Robespierre addressed the moderate party, by reminding them that they were indebted to him for the lives of the 73 Girondins.

The Convention decided not to have the text printed, as Robespierre's speech had first to be submitted to the two committees.

Robespierre was surprised that his speech would be sent to the very deputies he had intended to sue.

Robespierre rushed toward the rostrum, appealed to the Plain to defend him against the Montagnards, but his voice was shouted down.

Robespierre rushed to the benches of the Left but someone cried: "Get away from here; Condorcet used to sit here".

Robespierre soon found himself at a loss for words after Vadier gave a mocking impression of him referring to the discovery of a letter under the mattress of the illiterate Catherine Theot.

Robespierre shouted that the revolution was lost when he descended the tribune.

Robespierre landed on some bayonets and a citizen, resulting in a pelvic fracture, several serious head contusions, and in an alarming state of "weakness and anxiety".

Robespierre had strength enough to crawl into a drain where he was found twelve hours later and taken to the Conciergerie.

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Robespierre lay on the table, his head on a deal box, his shirt covered in blood.

Barras did not allow Robespierre to be sent there too; the circumstances did not permit it.

Robespierre was then placed in the cell in the Conciergerie in which Danton had slept while detained.

Robespierre was the tenth called to the platform and ascended the steps of the scaffold unassisted.

Robespierre is best known for his role as a member of the Committee of Public Safety as he signed 542 arrests, especially in the spring and summer of 1794.

Robespierre's described him as the great conspirator against the liberty of France; she mentioned the forced enthusiasm required from the participants of the Festival of the Supreme Being.

Two contrasting legends around Robespierre developed: a critical one that held Robespierre as an irresponsible, self-serving figure whose ambitions generated widespread calamity, and a supportive one that held him as an early friend of the proletariat, about to embark on economic revolution when he fell.

Robespierre's reputation peaked in the 1920s, during the Third French Republic when the influential French historian Albert Mathiez rejected the common view of Robespierre as demagogic, dictatorial, and fanatical.

Robespierre disapproved of any acts which could be seen as exposing the nation to counter-revolutionaries and traitors and became increasingly fearful of the defeat of the Revolution.

Robespierre instigated the Terror and the deaths of his peers as a measure of ensuring the Republic of Virtue but his ideals went beyond the needs and want of the people of France.

Robespierre became a threat to what he had wanted to ensure and the result was his downfall.

Palmer: the easiest way to justify Robespierre is to represent the other Revolutionists in an unfavourable or disgraceful light.

Peter McPhee stated on several previous occasions Robespierre had admitted that he was worn out; his personal and tactical judgment, once so acute, seems to have deserted him.

Robespierre is one of the few revolutionaries not to have a street named for him in the center of Paris.