17. The Bourbon Restoration would last only fifteen years before being overthrown and replaced with the July Monarch
Restored briefly in 1814 prior to Napoleon’s return during the Hundred Days, following the Battle of Waterloo the year after the House of Bourbon was formally returned to power. Crowning the Count of Provence, brother to the executed Louis XVI, as Louis XVIII, his reign saw the monarchy tread a careful line between the legacies of the Revolution and desires of republicans. Permitting both a Parliament and a constitutional charter, the carefully planned and balanced efforts of Louis XVIII were swiftly underdone by his successor. Succeeded in 1824 by his brother, who took the regnal name Charles X, France endured an abortive return to the archaic days of absolutism.
An ardent reactionary, supportive of the ultra-royalist factions and the Catholic Church, Charles sought to impose widespread censorship of the press and limitations on the authorities of Parliament. Issuing on July 25, 1830, the St. Cloud Ordinances – a series of degrees re-establishing absolutism under authoritarian government controls – Charles had woefully overplayed his hand. Triggering riots across Paris, the July Revolution saw the fall of the House of Bourbon and its replacement with the more liberal House of Orléans, who in turn would be overthrown in 1848 upon the proclamation of the French Second Republic.