‘Desk Revolutionaries’ by Biancamaria Fontana review

The Directory, the regime which ruled France during the closing years of the revolutionary decade, took its name from the five-man executive body that was elected by a two-chamber legislature, according to the Constitution of 1795. It has been disparaged as an uninspiring, corrupt, and chaotic interlude between two far more dramatic periods, that of the Terror, which preceded it, and the Bonapartist dictatorship that followed. In the past, most historians simply ignored it, concluding their accounts of the Revolution in 1794, with the fall of Robespierre, but that is no longer the case. The Directory remained true to the founding principles of 1789, and is now rightly regarded as an integral part of a greater project to replace the ancien régime in France. Although this experiment failed to end the Revolution by restoring political stability as its leaders intended, they made an invaluable contribution to that protracted process. Their achievements have often been credited to Napoleon, who did bring the upheaval to a close, while many of the individuals who served the Directory would continue to do so under his Consulate and Empire.

Biancamaria Fontana has chosen to approach the Directory from a biographical point of view, devoting the substantive chapters of this book to seven of its leaders, six of whom (from a total of 13) held the post of director for varying lengths of time between 1795 and 1799, while the other was a minister of justice. Their appellation as ‘desk revolutionaries’ might have been more convincingly addressed, though the majority of these mostly lesser-known individuals worked diligently to organise a French Republic which had barely survived its unexpected inception in 1792. This perspective offers significant insight into the regime’s operation, as well as the solid, if unspectacular, measures that were adopted under the Directory, most notably in the realms of finance and taxation. Success on the battlefield was also secured with the annexation of additional territory to the Republic, yet continuing warfare was hardly conducive to orderly progress, and deep-rooted political divisions persisted. The recourse to purges of the legislature, in 1797 and 1798, so as to preserve the system only served to demonstrate its fragility.

The personnel examined here were all seasoned national deputies who had voted for Louis XVI’s execution in 1793 and were thus committed to creating a lasting Republic. Three of them, the directors Reubell, Merlin de Douai, and François de Neufchâteau, were lawyers and had acquired considerable experience of office-holding before the Revolution. The task of legal codification progressed, government finances were much improved, and the bureaucracy was streamlined. Another director, Carnot, an army engineer, pursued the task of military reform by integrating conscripts into the regular army, while the dissolute ex-noble Barras, whose personal conduct gave the Directory such a poor reputation, alone served in the post from beginning to end, when he colluded in its downfall in Brumaire (November 1799). This famous coup d’état was orchestrated by his short-lived fellow director, the abbé Sieyès, who, having played a major role in the events of 1789, now joined the executive with the aim of extending its powers. This could only be done by overthrowing the regime. Outmanoeuvred by Bonaparte, who supplied military support for the coup, Sieyès would collaborate with the subsequent Napoleonic regime, to which Merlin de Douai and Cambacérès in particular made outstanding contributions.

While the book’s content is well crafted, replete with contemporary depictions of its seven ‘desk revolutionaries’, the nature of the context in which they laboured needed further attention. There are a few inaccuracies, especially the reference to the rebellious French colony of Saint-Domingue securing independence as the Dominican Republic (it became Haiti). Russia is wrongly identified as a member of the anti-revolutionary coalition well before its entry into the war against France in 1799. Above all, the problems facing the Directory required elaboration, from the military defeats and internal crisis that ultimately prompted its overthrow, and also facilitated the increasing intervention of the army in politics, to the deepening rift with the Catholic Church, and the political animosities bequeathed by the previous years of turmoil. The Directory was attempting to establish a liberal regime, with elections at all levels, plus freedom of the press and assembly, but it could only survive by recourse to unconstitutional action and growing repression.

Fontana is justifiably sympathetic. Despite these extremely difficult circumstances, a determined effort was made to ensure that the Directory functioned effectively and offered a viable means of sustaining the first French Republic. Yet its Constitution was arguably flawed by the constant turnover of personnel (rotation of the directors, by lot, and annual legislative elections, for example), while unreconciled royalists sought a monarchical restoration and Jacobins demanded a return to radical republicanism. In the absence of enduring stability, the prospect of a more authoritarian regime proved attractive to these anxious politicians. Fontana’s ‘desk revolutionaries’ were drawn to Napoleon by the promise that the Revolution they had upheld would be consolidated. They were not to be disappointed, but a price was paid in terms of personal liberties. Ironically the directorial system survived in neighbouring Switzerland, where it was implanted by the French in 1798. In France itself the definitive establishment of a modern, liberal Republic would have to wait for another century; its ancestor deserves greater appreciation. 

• Desk Revolutionaries: The Men of the French Directory, 1795-9
  Biancamaria Fontana
  Reaktion Books, 272pp, £25
  Buy from bookshop.org (affiliate link)

Malcolm Crook is Emeritus Professor of French History at Keele University.