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The Declaration Of The Rights Of Man And Citizen

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The Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen was the product of an oppressed people who were tired of living under a government in which they had no voice. During the Ancién Regime in France, there social classes, called estates, greatly divided the people on the basis of power and wealth. The first estate being the clergy, the second nobility, and the third estate being everyone else in the country of France (“The French Revolution” 23:20). The first two estates made up 3% of the population, while the third estate made up 97%, yet the first two estates held all the power. The French government at the time was an absolute monarchy, meaning the king derived his power from god and could exercise it without other constituted bodies having a right to challenge him (Introduction: Louis XIV and French Absolutism p.205). However, France was in such a state of crises in the late 18th century that Louis XVI called together the estates general, an assembly where all three estates were represented, for the first time in one hundred years (“The French Revolution” 23:00). Robes Pierre, a representative of the third estate, insisted that the nobles and clergy begin to pay taxes, but since the first and second estate held two thirds of the vote, he was quickly dismissed. After six weeks of meeting without achieving anything for the state, the third estate representatives become silenced by the first two estates. Enraged, they move next door to a tennis court and make “The Tennis Court

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