Club de Clichy

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The Clichy Club (French: Club de Clichy ) was a political grouping that was active during the French Revolution from 1794 to 1799. The political orientation can be described with the keywords anti-abolitionism, conservatism, laissez-faire and monarchism.

history

During the French Revolution, the Clichy Club was founded in 1794 after the fall of Maximilien Robespierre on 9 Thermidor II (July 27, 1794). The political club, whose members were later referred to as the Clichyens , met in rooms on Rue de Clichy, which led west towards the fashionable Parisian suburb of Clichy . The club originally consisted of the dismissed representatives of the National Convention , most of whom were imprisoned during the reign of terror, and was also in the tradition of the Feuillants , who did not run for the convention elections in 1792 in protest. Under the Directory, they played an increasingly important role for political right and included Republicans and moderate monarchists, those who still believed that the best future for France lay in a constitutional monarchy partly based on the British model. The main actors were François Antoine de Boissy d'Anglas , Jean-Charles Pichegru and Camille Jordan . With the closure of the Jacobin Club in November 1794, the danger of the political left seemed to have subsided and the activities of the Clichy Club declined.

Under the Directory, the Paris salons began cautiously to come together under the leadership of women whose fortunes had not been ruined during the first decade of the revolution. Privacy has been politicized. As part of political opinion, the members of the Clichy Club who belonged to the monarchies signaled their loyalty to the party in the long black vests they wore. In her salon, Madame de Staël tried to mix up the social and political differences between the monarchies of the Clichy Club and factions that were more securely connected to the new regime, such as those that dealt with Benjamin Constant in the Hôtel de Salm ( Salmklub ) or in Charles gathered to bridge. Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord also moved in this circle .

The club, which was growing stronger and stronger, stood in constant opposition to the Thermidorians , who themselves had moved far from the original results of the revolution to the right, but had to defend themselves against this competition from the right, even if it only served to maintain power.

A high point in the political struggle was the election of François-Marie, Marquis de Barthélemy as one of the five directors. The Thermidorians who saw themselves at risk reacted with the coup d'état of the 18th Fructidor V and with it the removal of Barthélemy and the other director, Lazare Carnot, who was politically close to the club . As a result, there was also manipulation of the government in the future elections to the Council of Five Hundred .

The final end of the club came after Napoleon Bonaparte came to power . Pichegru, who was still corresponding with the Prince of Condé, was arrested after the 18th Brumaire. However, few others among the Clichyens were in such treacherous relations with the royalist pretender and his advisors.

In the history of slavery, the core of the French colonial planters, the Clichyens, coordinated a common voice against abolition as harmful to the French colonies. Public statements by the Clichy Club appeared generally in the right-wing press, L'Éclair , Le Véridique , Le Messager du Soir and Les nouvelles politiques .

Other members