The reign of Terror was a violent and savage part of the French Revolution. The Reign of Terror lasted less than two years, from the execution of Louis XVI in January 1793 to late July 1794. During those eighteen months, more than 20,00 french people were put to death by the guillotine. Now the revolutionary government was inspired by enlightenment ideas of freedom and equality, found itself using extremely cruel measures against the french people. Were these measures used against the french people justified? This paper will argue that. The reign of Terror was not justified this claim can be supported by three main reasons the threats to the government weren’t big enough, the methods did not justify it, and the actions of the government contradicted the ideals of the revolution.
Starting off, the Reign of terror was not justified because none of the threats to the government were not big enough to justify such drastic action. One of the claims made by France was that they were under constant attack by Austrian and Prussian troops.
