JANSENISTS AND IDEOLOGUES: OPPOSITION THEORY IN THE PARLEMENT OF PARIS, 1750-1775

This study traces the origins and development of one important channel of opposition thought in France during the second half of the eighteenth century. Distinct from the Enlightenment, this strain of anti-absolutist political thought was spawned during the mid-century campaign of the archbishop of Paris, Christophe de Beaumont to destroy the Jansenist heresy. During this bitter religious controversy, in which the crown intermittently supported the anti-Jansenist episcopacy, a small but influential contingent of Jansenist magistrates and barristers within the parlement of Paris were able to bring the weight of the entire corps of magistrates to bear upon episcopal and royal authorities. The parti janseniste, as this group was called, not only protected Jansenists from the archbishop's campaign, but also shielded second order clergy from episcopal persecution, and prepared the base from which they would, by 1764, destroy the Society of Jesus of France. They also developed a set of constitutional arguments, centered around the role of the parlement, which they would ultimately use against the crown during the bitter struggle that followed Chancellor Maupeou's dismantling of the parlements in 1771.; In the course of working out these arguments in the 1750s and 1760s, members of the parti janseniste were able to refine a definition of legitimate political authority (applicable in both the ecclesiastical and secular polities) that submitted to public scrutiny and criticism the traditional definition of divine right absolute sovereign authority vested in a single individual, and effectively made it synonymous with tyranny and despotism. Their alternative model of legitimate authority endowed that governed body or nation with sovereignty, established civil government on a utilitarian and contractual foundation rather than a sacral one, and justified both passive and active resistance to establish authorities. The various elements of this constitutional theory were drawn from a number of familiar ecclesiastical and secular doctrines. Among the former were Gallicanism, Conciliarism, Jansenism, and Richerism, which were in turn carefully integrated with the existing tradition of parlementary constitutionalism and natural law theory. Out of these various doctrines, a broad opposition theory was devised which made its appeal in sufficiently general terms to attract a growing body of public support.; The significance of this comprehensive opposition ideology lies, at least in part, in its contribution to the broader movement to undermine the theory and practice of divine right absolutism during the eighteenth century. What made the ideas of these Jansenist propagandists so appealing (and consequently so effective) to a variety of groups within ancien regime France was their careful, selective use of a wide spectrum of doctrines with which they were professionally and theologically familar, and which were also part of the common hertiage of the kingdom. With the exception of the relatively recent addition of natural law theory, each of these traditions had its place in the complex ecclesiastical and political history of France. Common elements in these various traditions were carefully combined to produce a model of a rightly order polity which, when placed against the existing model of divine right absolutism, made the matter appear to be a despotic, and thus illegitimate sovereign authority. The integration of this alternative model into the existing institutions of the kingdom have this opposition theory a key place in the development of radical political theory in the years preceding the Revolution.