The Directory

Also called: Directoire, Constitution of Year III, 13 Vendémiaire

Under the Constitution of Year III five Directors and a two-chamber legislature ran France, relying more and more on the army amid revolts and coups from left and right.

To prevent another dictatorship the Thermidorians adopted the Constitution of Year III on 22 August 1795, dividing power. Legislation was shared by the Council of Five Hundred and the Council of Ancients (250 members), and executive power went to five Directors chosen by the Ancients. The vote was again limited by property. On 5 October (13 Vendémiaire) the young General Napoleon put down a royalist rising in Paris with cannon, and the Convention dissolved itself at the end of October. Barras and the four other Directors took up residence in the Luxembourg Palace in early November.

The Directory relied on the army to crush challenges from left and right, such as Babeuf’s Conspiracy of the Equals in 1796 and the coup of 18 Fructidor in 1797, which annulled royalist election gains. Amid the collapse of the paper money (assignats), corruption and endless war, generals such as Napoleon, famed for his Italian campaign of 1796–1797, grew in power.