Revolutions of 1830 and 1848 topple two more French kings
Barricades in Paris end the Bourbon Restoration and the July Monarchy in turn
Quick facts
- Location
- Paris, France
- Key people
- Charles X, Louis-Philippe
- Outcome
- July Monarchy (1830-1848); Second Republic (1848)
What happened
After Napoleon's final defeat in 1815, the restored Bourbon king Charles X tried to rule as an absolute monarch, and his July Ordinances of 1830 dissolving the Chamber of Deputies and restricting the press triggered three days of Parisian street fighting known as the Trois Glorieuses. Charles X abdicated, and the politicians who managed the aftermath installed his distant cousin Louis-Philippe as a constitutional Citizen King rather than restoring the main Bourbon line. Louis-Philippe's July Monarchy in turn grew unpopular over economic hardship and restricted voting rights, and a banquet campaign protesting the ban on political gatherings escalated into the February Revolution of 1848, forcing Louis-Philippe's own abdication and the declaration of the Second Republic.
Why it matters
Both revolutions showed that no French government after 1789, however conservative, could simply restore the pre-revolutionary order; each collapsed when it tried to roll back the political rights Parisians had come to expect, and the pattern repeated once more with the Second Republic's own fall in 1851.
How we know
The Library of Congress's research guide on the period draws on contemporary primary sources, official gazettes, and period illustrations documenting both the July Ordinances crisis and the 1848 banquet campaign that preceded the respective uprisings.
Sources
- World History Encyclopedia. The "Spring of Nations": Revolutionary Europe in 1848 · Reputable sourceworldhistory.org · The domain "worldhistory.org" is on our Reputable source registry.
- Library of Congress Research Guides. Revolutions in France: 1789, 1830, 1848 · Primary sourceguides.loc.gov · The domain "guides.loc.gov" is on our Primary source registry. · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
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