Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2011

Publication Title

Historical Reflections

First Page

86

Last Page

100

DOI

http://dx.doi.org/10.3167/hrrh.2011.370307%20

Abstract

This article focuses on From Jacobin to Liberal: Marc-Antoine Jullien, 1775–1848 and argues that this book, written near the end of Robert R. Palmer’s career, stands as a sort of bookend to his earlier masterpiece, Twelve Who Ruled. The focus of the book, Marc- Antoine Jullien, was a precocious idealist, just sixteen years old when he made his first speech before the Paris Jacobin club. He supported the Jacobin political vision and went on to serve as an emissary in the provinces for the Committee of Public Safety, the focus of Twelve Who Ruled. As such, young Jullien was denounced as a terrorist after the fall of Robespierre. He survived the Revolution, however, and Palmer sees in him an example of a young man whose political views evolved over time, from Jacobinism to liberalism. Challenging those who have viewed the French Revolution as leading inevitably to tyranny, Palmer presents the life of Marc-Antoine Jullien as exemplary of the positive legacy of that tumultuous event.

Rights

"This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedited version of an article published in Historical Reflections. The definitive publisher-authenticated version Hanson, Paul R. “From Jacobin to Liberal,” Historical Reflections, vol 37, no. 3 (Winter 2011), 86-100. is available online at: http://dx.doi.org/10.3167/hrrh.2011.370307"

Share

COinS