The Basics of the Estates General and Napoleon Relationship with the Church

The meeting of the estates general was the cause of a series of unfortunate events that eventual caused the French revolution. The estates general has three components the first estate is the clergy. There are 240,300 people that fall into the first estate. The second estate contains the nobility they number 400,000ths. The third estate is everybody else. There are 27million of them. The estates general is a voting system where the three estates meet up and vote on things. Every estate gets one vote, so the common people get voted two to one by estates one and two.

The church and the French government were not on good terms. Relations were strained to say the least. Many incidences ensued such as the pope's ring being ripped off. The ring was a symbol of his power. And relations were like this for a while and then Napoleon came a long and made an alliance with the church. But napoleon wanted the church under his control. Some people were outraged by the terms and told the pope not to agree but the pope said this is the best we can get for the church.