The
years
following
Napoléon's
downfall
were
marked
by a
determined
campaign,
including
the
White
Terror
, on
the
part
of
those
reactionary
elements
who
wanted
to
wipe
out
all
trace
of
the
Revolution
and
restore
the
ancien
régime
.
Louis
XVIII
resisted
these
moves
and
was
able
to
appoint
a
moderate
royalist
minister,
Decazes,
under
whose
leadership
the
liberal
faction
that
wished
to
preserve
the
Revolutionary
reforms
made
steady
gains.
This
process,
however,
was
wrecked
by
the
assassination
of
the
Duc
de
Berry
in
an
attempt
to
wipe
out
the
Bourbon
family.
In
response
to
reactionary
outrage,
the
king
dismissed
Decazes.
An
attempted
liberal
insurrection
was
crushed
and
the
four
Sergeants
of
La
Rochelle
were
shot
by
firing
squad.
Censorship
became
more
rigid
and
education
was
once
more
subjected
to
the
authority
of
the
Church.
In
1824,
Louis
was
succeeded
by
the
thoroughly
reactionary
Charles
X
,
who
pushed
through
a
law
indemnifying
émigré
aristocrats
for
property
lost
during
the
Revolution.
When
the
opposition
won
a
majority
in
the
elections
of
1830,
the
king
dissolved
the
Chamber
and
restricted
the
already
narrow
suffrage.
Barricades
went
up
in
the
streets
of
Paris.
Charles
X
abdicated
and
parliament
was
persuaded
to
accept
Louis-Philippe
,
Duc
d'Orléans,
as
king.
On
the
face
of
it,
divine
right
had
been
superseded
by
popular
sovereignty
as
the
basis
of
political
legitimacy.
The 1814
Charter
,
which
upheld
Revolutionary
and
Napoleonic
reforms,
was
retained,
censorship
abolished,
the
tricolour
restored
as
the
national
flag,
and
suffrage
widened.
However,
the Citizen
King
, as
he
was
called,
had
somewhat
more
absolutist
notions
about
being
a
monarch.
In
the
1830s
his
regime
survived
repeated
challenges
from
both
attempted
coups
by
reactionaries
and
some
serious
labour
unrest
in
Lyon
and
Paris.
The
1840s
were
calmer
under
the
ministry
of Guizot
,
the
first
Protestant
to
hold
high
office.
It
was
at
this
time
that
Algeria
was
colonized.
Guizot,
however,
was
not
popular.
He
resisted
attempts
to
extend
the
vote
to
enfranchise
the
middle
ranks
of
the
bourgeoisie.
In
1846,
economic
crisis
brought
bankruptcies,
unemployment
and
food
shortages.
Conditions
were
appalling
for
the
growing
urban
working
class,
whose
hopes
of a
more
just
future
received
a
theoretical
basis
in
the socialist
writings
and
activities
of
Blanqui,
Fourier,
Louis
Blanc
and
Proudhon,
among
others.
When
the
government
banned
an
opposition
banquet,
the
only
permissible
form
of
political
meeting,
in
February
1848,
workers
and
students
took
to
the
streets.
When
the
army
fired
on a
demonstration
and
killed
forty
people,
civil
war
appeared
imminent.
The
Citizen
King
fled
to
England.
