ABSTRACT
This chapter recounts the failure of the workers’ demonstration on 16 April 1848. Often misunderstood or misinterpreted, this day was the first real open confrontation between moderate republicans and democratic republicans, a few days before the election on 23 April. It resulted in a victory for the former over the latter, in particular because the club leaders and Ledru-Rollin rallied behind the moderate republicans against the phantom threat of Auguste Blanqui and a communist coup d’état. After 16 April, the street was no longer seen as a legitimate means for the Parisian people to influence politics – a fact that would have major consequences once the Assembly was elected. As a result, the short-lived institutions of the February Republic were all reinterpreted along the same lines. The National Guard, the Luxembourg Commission, and the club movement saw their legitimacy to speak on behalf of the people invalidated.
