Significance
The Oath signified the first time that French citizens formally stood in opposition to Louis XVI, and the National Assembly's refusal to back down forced the king to make concessions. The Oath also inspired a wide variety of revolutionary activity in the months afterwards, ranging from rioting across the French countryside to renewed calls for a written French constitution. Likewise, it reinforced the Assembly's strength and forced the King to formally request that voting occur based on head, not order.
Moreover, the Oath communicated in unambiguous fashion the idea that the deputies of the National Assembly were declaring themselves the supreme state power. From this point forward, Louis XVI would find the Crown increasingly unable to rest upon monarchical traditions of divine right. In terms of his political sympathies, Louis XVI was noticeably more liberal than any of his predecessors or immediate family. However, given personal circumstances and the death of his son, he had badly mismanaged the mood of the Assembly.
As well as bolstering the Left and reformist movement, the Oath also galvanized the French Right. In royalist and conservative circles, the oath was seen as an indicator of the Assembly's commitment to anarchy and it was felt that a more robust form of counter-revolutionary politics were needed to ensure the survival of the monarchy.
Read more about this topic: Tennis Court Oath
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“Politics is not an end, but a means. It is not a product, but a process. It is the art of government. Like other values it has its counterfeits. So much emphasis has been placed upon the false that the significance of the true has been obscured and politics has come to convey the meaning of crafty and cunning selfishness, instead of candid and sincere service.”
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)
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“The hysterical find too much significance in things. The depressed find too little.”
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