The refusal of the majority of the clergy to take an oath of conformity to the civil constitution of their order as prescribed by the assembly led to further troubles; the influence of the clubs in the assembly increased; the king was compelled to dismiss his ministry. Mirabeau seemed the only man capable of controlling affairs at this crisis. At the beginning of 1791 there was a probability that secret negotiations and his own inclination might induce him to take office under the king and give his most powerful aid to the preservation of the monarchy; but all hope of this was brought to an end by his fatal illness, and he died on the 2d of April, at the most critical moment. In the months which followed the aspect of events grew daily graver. On the night of June 20 the king made an ill-arranged and disastrous attempt at flight from France, intending to escape and ultimately join the forces of the emigres, with whom Austria, Spain, Hanover, Sardinia, and Switzerland had united in a league to resist the revolution. Louis was stopped at Varennes and carried back to the capital. The assembly now fully assumed the executive power; and though the king's flight was not itself made the formal ground of any action against him, with its failure the last vestige of his authority disappeared.

Indeed, the assembly formally suspended the royal power until the completion of a new constitution upon which they were engaged-the one subsequently called, from the day of its completion, the constitution of the 3d of September. A multitude, influenced by the leaders of the clubs, gathered in the champ de Mars (July 17) to demand the deposition of the king, but Lafayette dispersed them after a brief conflict. The constitution of Sept. 3 prescribed that the legislative power should rest in an assembly chosen biennially, as had been before voted; and still, as before, the nominal executive authority remained with the king, as did the suspensive veto. Louis took the oath to support this constitution on Sept. 14, and on the 30th the assembly dissolved, after passing a vote for the raising of 100,000 men for the defence of the frontiers. Prussia had on Aug. 27 joined the coalition of powers against France. The regulation which excluded from the legislative assembly (which began its sessions on Oct. 1) all members of the outgoing constituent assembly, and prescribed new elections, had the effect to throw the leadership of the new body into the hands of the more democratic party. Of the 745 members, the majority had been chosen through the influence of the clubs.

Almost every shade of democratic opinion was represented, from the earnest and high-minded republicanism of the leaders of the party soon to become famous as the Gironde, to the violent extremes which found expression through men like Lacroix, Ohabot, and Couthon. The most important early measures of the session were those which declared the emigres guilty of high treason, and condemned the recalcitrant priests as agitators. Louis vetoed both these measures, and thus greatly stimulated the rapidly increasing opposition to the royal power. An army of 160,000 men was now (December) raised by order of the assembly.

Early in 1792 the property of the emigres was confiscated. The Girondists had gained the complete leadership of the assembly; and in March the king was forced to dismiss his ministers and to form a new ministry from members of this dominant party. Dumouriez held the portfolio of foreign affairs, and, although the only member not a Girondist, was the acknowledged leader. Urged on by him and by the assembly, the king on April 20 reluctantly declared war against Austria; and the long conflict between France and the monarchical powers of Europe was begun. At the news of the first defeats of the French army, the greatest popular excitement broke out in Paris. A series of decisive measures was passed by the assembly in the weeks following; the banishment of the priests and the formation of a force of 20,000 national or federal guards near Paris, acts in direct defiance of the few vestiges of royal power still remaining, were the most important of these. The collection of 20,000 republican troops especially, under the direct influence of the Jacobins (a club composed of the most violent agitators), though ostensibly for the protection of the king and capital, could seem nothing but a threat to Louis, whose body guard the assembly had voted to disband. On June 13 the king dismissed his ministers.

On the 19th the assembly was officially informed that he had vetoed both the above named measures. On the 20th a great body of the populace armed with pikes appeared before the meeting place of the assembly, demanded the abolition of the royal veto, forced their way into the hall, read an address in which the king was threatened with death, and afterward marched with violent demonstrations to the Tuileries, which they found prepared for defence, and protected by national guards with cannon. No force being employed against them, however, they pressed into the palace, and for an hour the king, the royal family, and their adherents were exposed to the greatest danger. Petion, mayor of Paris, at last succeeded in dispersing the mob. In spite of all efforts the leaders of this movement were not punished; affairs grew daily graver, both at home and abroad. The assembly now took more and more decisive measures, and on July 5, after Vergniaud's famous speech {La patrie est en danger), they swept away the last remains of even formal power from the king by decreeing solemnly "the country in danger," declaring themselves the permanent ruling body, calling the people to arms, and establishing a kind of exaggerated martial law throughout the nation.

By the 1st of August all seemed prepared for a violent crisis. The people had been further excited against the king by a foolish proclamation of the duke of Brunswick in his favor, and by the entry of the Prussian army into Champagne; the more violent party had rapidly gained the upper hand in the assembly and in Paris among the populace, where multitudes of armed men were in constant movement, ready to enforce the will of the people;" their real leadership was in the hands of the men who had established themselves as the representatives of the Paris sections at the hotel de ville, and who later, on the night of the 10th of August, laid aside all pretence of subjection to the regularly constituted authorities and formed themselves into an insurrectionary commune. (See Commune de Paris, I.) All was ripe for a violent uprising, and on the night of Aug. 9-10 the outbreak came. Summoned by the ringing of bells and the drum roll beaten in the streets, a force made up of the more violent classes of the populace and a comparatively small proportion of national guards collected and took up their march, hastily formed into columns, against the Tui-leries. A part of the guard posted about the palace affiliated with them and compelled the opening of the gates from within; the king allowed himself to be persuaded to seek safety in flight to the meeting place of the assembly; the Swiss guard alone began a defence which seemed likely to be successful.