Convening of the Estates-General

Background. The suggestion to summon the Estates-General came from the Assembly of Notables installed by the king on 22 February 1787. In 1787 the Parlement of Paris refused to ratify Charles Alexandre de Calonne's financial reform program, owing to the competing interests of its noble members; Calonne was dismissed on 8 April 1787 and banished shortly after for proposing a Subvention Territoriale, a land tax.

Summons and Organization. The Estates-General were summoned by a royal edict dated 24 January 1789. During the preceding autumn the Parlement of Paris had decided that the convention's organization would follow that of 1614, the last time the estates had met. French society had changed since 1614, however, and these Estates-General differed from those of 1614; the issue was widely discussed in the press during the autumn of 1788.

Convening and End. On 5 May 1789, amidst general festivities, the Estates-General convened in a temporary Île des États erected in a courtyard of the Hôtel des Menus Plaisirs at Versailles near the royal château. With the étiquette of 1614 strictly enforced, clergy and nobility sat in tiered regalia while Third Estate deputies were placed at the far end. After the Communes declared themselves the National Assembly on 17 June, the Estates-General ceased to exist.