ABSTRACT
The Second Empire was replaced by the Third Republic in September 1870. As explained in Chapter 12, this was the achievement of Paris, largely in the face of the pro-imperial loyalties of the rest of France. But the permanence of this victory was by no means guaranteed, and it appeared that the provinces might well swing the pendulum back to authoritarian rule. The National Assembly which convened at Versailles in February 1871 contained an anti-republican majority and, under the temporary leadership of Thiers, took drastic measures to suppress the socialist and radical Commune of Paris. April’s notorious ‘Bloody Week’ saw the massacre of over 20,000 people in the streets of the capital, a virtual re-enactment of the conservative and counter-revolutionary measures of Cavaignac during the ‘June Days’ of 1849. Cavaignac, in effect, destroyed the Second Republic. It would have come as no surprise had Thiers done the same to the Third.
