French National Convention

National Convention Convention nationale
French First Republic
Autel de la Convention nationale or Autel républicain François-Léon Sicard Panthéon de Paris, France, 1913
Type
Type	Unicameral
History
Established	20 September 1792
Disbanded	2 November 1795
Preceded by	Legislative Assembly
Succeeded by	Legislative Body
Seats	750
Meeting place
Tuileries Palace, Paris

The National Convention (French: Convention nationale) was the third government of the French Revolution, following the two-year National Constituent Assembly and the one-year Legislative Assembly. Created after the great insurrection of 10 August 1792, it was the first French government organized as a republic, abandoning the monarchy altogether. The Convention sat as a single-chamber assembly from 20 September 1792 to 26 October 1795 (4 Brumaire IV under the Convention's adopted calendar).

The Convention came about when the Legislative Assembly, which had found it impossible to work with the king, decreed the provisional suspension of King Louis XVI and the convocation of a National Convention to draw up a new constitution with no monarchy. The other major innovation was to decree that deputies to that Convention should be elected by all Frenchmen twenty-five years old or more, domiciled for a year and living by the product of their labor. The National Convention was therefore the first French assembly elected by a suffrage without distinctions of class.

Although the Convention lasted until 1795, power was effectively stripped from the elected deputies and concentrated in the small Committee of Public Safety from April 1793. The eight months from Fall 1793 to Spring 1794, when Maximilien Robespierre and his allies dominated the Committee of Public Safety, represents the most radical and bloodiest phase of the French Revolution. After the fall of Robespierre, the Convention lasted for another year until a new constitution was written, ushering in the French Directory.

The election took place from 2 to 6 September 1792 after the election of the electoral colleges by primary assemblies on 26 August. Owing to the abstention of aristocrats, the anti-republicans, and the fear of victimization the voter turnout in the departments was low – 11.9% of the electorate came, compared to 10.2% in the 1791 elections - in spite of the fact that the number of those eligible to vote had doubled. Therefore, the increased suffrage had very little impact. The electorate returned the same sort of men that the active citizens had chosen in 1791.