Talk:Liberté, égalité, fraternité

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pocadet@access995.com

This is a 10 centimes (1 Franc=100 Centimes) coin from 1919. Cmes means Centimes. The R and F mean République Française [This message was left by Ocollard and overwritten by a vandal in March 2006 Ahasuerus 21:05, 10 May 2006 (UTC)].

Contents 1 Revision 2 Death? 3 Gallois cigarettes ? 4 Reference link needed for "Marshall Petain" to the article "Philippe Pétain" 5 References and more 6 Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité, ou la Mort! 7 Unreferenced section 7.1 Fraternity

[edit] Revision

I rewrote a large part of the centre of the article "Liberty" "Equality "Fraternity" to be in proper English, so as not to read as though it had been translated from Babelfish. For example "devise" was translated as "currency", whereas in this sense it means "motto".

Also, I do not think that Gauloises cigarettes ever had "Liberté, égalité, fraternité" on them. They only have "Liberté".

--tigrou36 12:11, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Death?

Should there be something mentioned about the line from the Tale of Two Cities: "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, or Death"?

Keeperoftheseal 13:22, 6 April 2006 (UTC

[edit] Gallois cigarettes ?

I think that Gallois cigarettes refers in fact to the brand "Gauloises" (Gaul) ("Gallois" in french means "from Wales" !)

[edit] Reference link needed for "Marshall Petain" to the article "Philippe Pétain"

A link to the Philippe Pétain article is an important part of this article. Without the link Marshall Petain seems to be a minor character in French history.

[edit] References and more

I have done a bunch to this page today. Not really sure why. There are two reasonably decent references. Well, one is to the Embassy of France - they should know what they are talking about. The other is to an online history book that seemed pretty reasonable to me. I don't really like the formatting of the pictures, but so it goes. I may or may not bother to find some book references for some of this stuff. I also deleted a few things that seemed to have POV issues, or were just incorrect. --Jvv62 17:13, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité, ou la Mort!

This is the adagium of the French revolution in full. It is so said in the first chapter of the article (Origing): "slogan of the French Revolution was Liberté, égalité, fraternité, ou la mort! (Freedom, equality, brotherhood, or death!). This slogan outlived the revolution, and later became the rallying cry of activists, both militant and non-violent, who promote democracy or the overthrow of oppressive governments."

In the following analysis of the composing 4 parts, liberté, égalité, fraternité and ou la mort!, only the first 3 were analysed. The fourth was missing. I added it, the article in question that it links to proves it graphically what 'ou la mort!' meant: or death!. This is nothing of my own imagination, the historical facts are clear. NOT MENTIONING the fourth part, would be unscientific, ahistorical, und politically bias. Stijn Calle 13:22, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with explaining the 'or death!' bit, if it can be done from decent historical sources rather than your own analysis, which I disagree with. You have interpreted 'Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité, ou la Mort!' to mean 'we (the revolutionaries) will have L, E, and F, and if you try to stop us we will kill you.' A better interpretation is 'we (the revolutionaries) prefer to die ourselves if we cannot have L, E and F,' in my opinion. That makes more sense when you consider that "activists, both militant and non-violent" used the slogan. Therefore, the killings during the Terror do not 'explain' the 'ou mort' clause, graphically or otherwise. In any case, our opinions do not go into the article - respectable historical sources are required. Squiddy | (squirt ink?) 13:55, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

See article La Grande Terreur, Committee of Public Safety, Vendée, Revolt in the Vendée, Law of Suspects, Law of 22 Prairial. Fact is that the systematic and planned killing of opponants, legally enacted by the Law of 22 Prairial II, is a state organised mass murder, which was endemic to the revolution (40.000 deaths is not a casual incident, it is a general rule). It is democide by a totalitarian government, not "the wish of the revolutionaries to die whenever the revolution failed", they intended to fight untill they died, and killed all opponants of the revolution. This is no interpretation, it is fact. You cannot therefor remove the NPOV unilaterely. Stijn Calle 15:31, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

See further reading on number of casualties and endemic cause:

[1] "A classic study of the statistics of the Terror was made by the American historian Greer who estimated an overall total of 41,000 victims. But recent estimates of the number of deaths in the Vendée have caused historians to revise that figure considerably. One historian, Pierre Chaunu, spoke of the Vendée with deliberate provocation as a ‘genocide’ and claimed that 500,000 rebels had died. More realistic estimates, such as that by Jean-Clément Martin, suggest up to 250,000 insurgents and 200,000 republicans met their deaths in a war in which both sides suffered appalling atrocities. Another group that was decimated by the unleashing of the Terror was that of the revolutionaries themselves. Successive revolutionary factions fell victim to the Terror that, in many cases, they had themselves helped to orchestrate. In the atmosphere of fear and suspicion that prevailed in that fateful year, they were accused of conspiring against the Revolution that they had helped to build. These revolutionary victims included the Girondins in October 1793, the Hébertists in March 1794, followed a week later by the Dantonists, and finally, the Robespierrists in Thermidor (July 1794). Stijn Calle 15:45, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

[2] French Revolution (1789-94)

Encarta, "French Revolution"

Reign of Terror

Executed with Trial: 17,000

Executed w/o Trial: 12,000

Died in jail: "thousands"

TOTAL: 40,000

Vendee rebellion: 100,000

Britannica: 17,000 executed and 10,000 died in jail during the Reign of Terror.

James Trager, The People's Chronology (1992): 300-600,000 men, women, children k. in suppression of Vendée revolt. ("1793")

Herbert Rowen, A History of Early Modern Europe: 1500-1815 (1960)

September Massacres (Paris, 1792): >1,000

Reign of Terror: 17,000 k. after trial and 20,000 "with less formality".

M. de Jarjayes, A little bit of History [3]

Executions: 13,800-18,613 with trial, 25-40,000 without trial

Wars: 400,000 in Revolutionary Wars; 400-500,000 in civil wars

Spark Notes: 250,000 k. in 9 months of the Reign o'Terror [4]

Rummel: 263,000

Clodfelter: 80-100,000 d. in Vendee in 1793

Pitirim Sorokin, The Sociology of Revolution (1967): 1,400,000 "men perished", 1789-1801. This would include all those killed in the Revolutionary Wars as well. Stijn Calle 15:49, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

So how can you say that i 'invented' a theory. These facts show that 'ou la mort' was meant literally, for the opponants of the revolution. Stijn Calle 15:51, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Squiddy. Knowing the spirit of early revolutioners anywhere, the slogan is a lot more likely to mean (let us have) L,E,F, or (let us have) death. All these references talk about something else. --Cubbi 18:00, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

There are two interpretations, of which you have chosen one, Stijn. In doing so, you are going beyond what an encyclopedia-writer can legitimately do, and into the realm of original research. The long list of material you provide above is all irrelevant unless the authors themselves - not you - connect the death toll with the phrase which this article is supposed to be about. Squiddy | (squirt ink?) 11:38, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Well, in this case, the reference to 'or death!' should not be strikken of and deleted, but should stay, and BOTH interpretations should be mentioned. We should not hide information, but bring it in the open. Stijn Calle 11:57, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Since the article is primarily concerned with the current French slogan, 'ou la mort' is irrelevant. Also, in the ensuing discussion, Stijn cites an unrealistic death toll (most of the texts I have read question more than 30,000, including Republican losses putting down the Vendee). More importantly, it has been suggested that the slogan originated not in France, but in the Batavian Republic (the Netherlands), and as soon as I can dig out my books I will cite that as a possibility. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cypher z (talk • contribs) 23:32, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Unreferenced section

I'm moving this here. It may be interesting, but should first be sourced, and then correctly inserted in the main-text. Tazmaniacs (talk) 14:16, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Fraternity

The third element of the motto of the Republic, "Fraternity" is defined in the Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man and the Citizen, which appeared in the preamble of the Consititution of 5th Fructidor Year III (22 August 1795) ^{[citation needed]}: “Do not do unto others what you would not have done to you; always show to others the good that you would have shown to you”. "Fraternity" was only added to the Motto of the Republic in 1848: Catholic deputies offered it as a compromise to prevent the proclamation of the right to employment.

According to Paul Thibaud, philosopher and former director of philosophical journal 'Esprit' [2], “Fraternity is as great an obligation to respect one's fellow man as Liberty and Equality are perceived as rights. It is thus a moral imperative." ^{[citation needed]}