The Uprising of June 20, i/p^ 131 



the demonstration. The silence of that body that followed the 

 reading of the directory's decree on June 19 indicated this. The 

 debates show an unwillingness to condemn the citizens, a sym- 

 pathy with the movement and resentment when the people's 

 motives were questioned or when the king was said to be in 

 danger. The national guard was divided in its sympathy. Sev- 

 eral of its commandants were leaders of the movement and the 

 general commandant was wholly inactive. Some of the guards 

 expressed themselves as unwilling to fire on the people. Under 

 these circumstances, it seemed impossible to prevent the demon- 

 stration. 



The plan of the faubourgs was to present petitions to the 

 assembly and to the king and to combine this act with the celebra- 

 tion of the oath of the tennis court by planting a liberty tree. 

 The plan was not well formed and its execution was a good deal 

 of an accident. The tree was planted, but not where it was in- 

 tended. The petition to the assembly had been drawn up in the 

 faubourgs. It voiced the fears of the people, charging plots and 

 conspiracies, appealed to the assembly for protection of their 

 liberties, advocated resistance to oppression as expressed in article 

 two of the declaration of rights and threatened tyrants with the 

 vengeance of the men of the 14th of July. It complained of the 

 dismissal of the patriotic ministers, the inaction of the armies and 

 the delays of the high national courts, but made no mention of 

 the king's vetoes. Whether this omission was due to the fact that 

 the petition was drawn up before the vetoes were officially an- 

 nounced or whether the framers of the petition were less con- 

 cerned with the vetoes than they were with the recall of the 

 ministers, is not clear. Possibly the demand for the withdrawal of 

 the vetoes was reserved for the petition to the king, but of this 

 petition we have no record. However that may be, the determina- 

 tion that the king should hear the wishes of the people on both 

 of these questions was evident and was successfully carried out 

 when the crowd entered the chateau. 



Here the demand for the recall of the ministers and for the with- 

 drawal of the vetoes was insistent. The distrust of the king was 

 pronounced and the warning that something would be done, that 



327 



