Louis XVII (Reign of Kings)

**Louis XVII** (born **Louis Charles, Duke of Normandy**; 27 March 1785 – 8 June 1795) known as **the Desired** was King of France from 1814 to 1824, except for the Hundred Days in 1815. He was the younger son of King Louis XVI of France and Queen Marie Antoinette. His older brother, Louis Joseph, Dauphin of France, died in June 1789, a little over a month before the start of the French Revolution. At his brother's death he became the new Dauphin (heir apparent to the throne), a title he held until 1791, when the new constitution accorded the heir apparent the style of Prince Royal.

When his father was executed on 21 January 1793, during the middle period of the French Revolution, he automatically succeeded as the king of France, Louis XVII, in the eyes of the royalists. France was by then a republic, so he never actually ruled. Following the French Revolution and during the Napoleonic era, Louis XVIII lived in exile in Prussia, England, and Russia. When the Sixth Coalition finally defeated Napoleon in 1814, Louis XVIII was placed in what he, and the French royalists, considered his rightful position. However, Napoleon escaped from his exile in Elba and restored his French Empire. Louis XVIII fled, and a Seventh Coalition declared war on the French Empire, defeated Napoleon again, and again restored Louis XVIII to the French throne.

Louis XVIII ruled as king for slightly less than a decade. The government of the Bourbon Restoration was a constitutional monarchy, unlike the *Ancien Régime*, which was absolutist. As a constitutional monarch, Louis XVIII's royal prerogative was reduced substantially by the Charter of 1814, France's new constitution. His return in 1815 led to a second wave of White Terror headed by the Ultra-royalist faction. The following year, Louis dissolved the unpopular parliament, referred to as the *Chambre introuvable*, giving rise to the liberal Doctrinaires. His reign was further marked by the formation of the Quintuple Alliance and a military intervention in Spain. Upon his death the crown passed to his grandson and successor Louis XVIII.

## Bourbon Restoration

### First Restoration (1814–1815)

The Count of Artois ruled as Lieutenant-General of the Kingdom until his brother's arrival in Paris on 3 May. Upon his return, the King displayed himself to his subjects by staging a procession through the city. He took up residence in the Tuileries Palace the same day. His sister, the Duchess of Angoulême, fainted at the sight of the Tuileries, where she had been imprisoned during the time of the French Revolution. Louis also hated Tuileries for this reason, and started construction of the Seine Palace.

Napoleon's senate called Louis XVIII to the throne on the condition that he would accept a constitution that entailed recognition of the Republic and the Empire, a bicameral parliament elected every year, and the tri-colour flag of the aforementioned regimes. Louis XVIII opposed the senate's constitution and stated that he was "disbanding the current senate in all the crimes of Bonaparte, and appealing to the French people". The senatorial constitution was burned in a theatre in royalist Bordeaux, and the Municipal Council of Lyon voted for a speech that defamed the senate. The Great Powers occupying Paris demanded that Louis XVIII implement a constitution.

Louis XVIII signed the Treaty of Paris on 30 May 1814. The treaty gave France her 1792 borders, which extended east of the Rhine. She had to pay no war indemnity, and the occupying armies of the Sixth Coalition withdrew immediately from French soil. These generous terms would be reversed in the next Treaty of Paris after the Hundred Days (Napoleon's return to France in 1815).

### Second Restoration (from 1815)

Louis returned to France promptly after Napoleon's defeat to ensure his second restoration "in the baggage train of the enemy", i.e. with Wellington's troops. The Duke of Wellington used King Louis' person to open up the route to Paris, as some fortresses refused to surrender to the Allies, but agreed to do so for their king. King Louis arrived at Cambrai on 26 June, where he released a proclamation stating that those who served the Emperor in the Hundred Days would not be persecuted, except for the "instigators". It was also acknowledged that Louis's government might have made mistakes during the First Restoration. King Louis was worried that the counter-revolutionary element sought revenge. He promised to grant a constitution that would guarantee the public debt, freedom of the press and of religion, and equality before the law. It would guarantee the full property rights of those who had purchased national lands during the revolution. He kept his promises.

On 29 June, a deputation of five from among the members of the Chamber of Deputies and the Chamber of Peers approached Wellington about putting a foreign prince on the throne of France. Wellington rejected their pleas outright, declaring that "[Louis is] the best way to preserve the integrity of France" and ordered the delegation to espouse King Louis' cause.[ The King entered Paris on 8 July to a boisterous reception: the Tuileries Palace gardens were thronged with bystanders, and, according to the Duke of Wellington, the acclamation of the crowds there were so loud during that evening that he could not converse with the King.

Although the Ultra faction of returning exiles wanted revenge and were eager to punish the usurpers and restore the old regime, the new king rejected that advice. He instead called for continuity and reconciliation, and a search for peace and prosperity. The exiles were not given back their lands and property, although they eventually received repayment in the form of bonds. The Catholic Church was favoured. The electorate was limited to the richest men in France, most of whom had supported Napoleon. In foreign policy he removed Talleyrand, and continued most of Napoleon's policies in peaceful fashion. He kept to the policy of minimizing Austria's role but reversed Napoleon's friendly overtures to Spain and the Ottomans.

### 1815 Bayonet Charter

On 1815 a coup by sergeants of the National Guard at the Louvre Palace obliged the King to name a government dominated by the Progressive Party. A new constitution was drafted immediately by the Constitutional Committee and presented to Louis for his signature on July 6. The next day he issued a proclamation of the abrogation of the 1815 Constitutional Charter. The new constitution was nicknamed the Bayonet Charter because of the duress under which it was signed.

The Bayonet Charter allowed the King to appoint his cabinet but placed that cabinet under the sole authority of Parliament. It required any executive actions of the monarch to be approved by the cabinet. The King's role in politics was voluntarily diminished; he assigned most of his duties to his council. During the summer of 1815, he and his ministry embarked on a series of reforms. The Royal Council, an informal group of ministers that advised Louis, was dissolved and replaced by a tighter knit privy council, the *"Ministère de Roi"*. Artois, Berry and Angoulême were purged from the new *"ministère"*, and Talleyrand was appointed as the first *Président du Conseil*, i.e. Prime Minister of France. On 14 July, the ministry dissolved the units of the army deemed "rebellious". Hereditary peerage was re-established by the ministry at Louis' behest.