The Paris Parlement in the 1780s

It was long thought that there was a clear rise of parlementary and aristocratic opposition to the absolute monarchy from 1715 to 1771, crushed by Maupeou only to resume in 1785, and motivated by an ideology of aristocratic reaction. This chapter argues against these older historical explanations for being misleadingly simple. Close examination of the sociology, procedures, and arguments, and their context, suggests there were important constant elements. The structure of the various crises was similar and so indeed were the magistrates’s motivations. The defense of their jurisdiction is the real constant in Crown–parlement relations, but this desire could be manipulated by court factions or interest groups like the Jansenists; this and poor political management from the centre largely explains the numerous crises. The key new element was the parti janséniste which played the leading role up to 1771, and this included elaborating a “new” history of the parlement that appealed to a so-called “ancient constitution” in which the judges were the depositories of the laws. Thus ideology is recognized as important, but its use is interpreted more as rhetoric than ideological motivation. The parlement’s role is here seen more in terms of institutional strategies and court politics than in terms of more general ideological or social contests. Therefore, and perhaps controversially, doubts are cast upon the current notion of “parlementary constitutionalism” as being the principal motivation of the judges. Since jurisdiction, the defense of corporate honour, was at the root of the confrontations, parlementary constitutionalism would therefore be left as an influential rhetoric adopted by the judges in various crises to legitimize more conservative aims. Nevertheless, as Margerison shows in this volume, for the wider public and pamphleteers, this parlementaire rhetoric took on a life of its own and was the basis of division between opposing sides in the pamphlet debate over the future constitution of France.