By June 1791, the French Revolution seemed to have reached a delicate balance. A new constitution was nearly complete, aiming to create a constitutional monarchy. But that month, King Louis XVI and his family attempted to flee France, an event known as the Flight to Varennes. They were caught and returned to Paris, but the king's betrayal shattered the fragile trust between the monarch and the revolutionaries.

This act served as a political earthquake, forcing every revolutionary to answer a terrifying question: could a king who tried to abandon his people be trusted to rule them? The most powerful political club in Paris, the Jacobin Club, fractured under the pressure of this question. Once a broad coalition of reformers, its members were now deeply divided over the future of France and the fate of the monarchy itself.

In the aftermath of the king's flight, a large group of moderate Jacobins made a decisive break. They walked out and formed their own political group, named the Feuillants after the former monastery where they met. Their core belief was that the Revolution had achieved its goals with the Constitution of 1791. Their primary aim was to halt the Revolution where it stood, preserve the constitutional monarchy, and prevent the nation from sliding into the chaos of republicanism or mob rule.

They argued that deposing the king would unravel the entire constitutional settlement, opening the door to civil and foreign war. For the Feuillants, stability was paramount. They envisioned a France governed by the rule of law and the propertied classes, with the king serving as a stabilizing, executive figurehead.

The Feuillants' membership largely consisted of the upper bourgeoisie: wealthy merchants, lawyers, financiers, and landowners. These were the men who had benefited most from the early phase of the Revolution, which had dismantled aristocratic privilege and opened up opportunities based on wealth rather than birth. Their political philosophy was reflected in a key distinction made by the 1791 Constitution: the separation of Frenchmen into "active" and "passive" citizens.

Two figures were central to the Feuillant cause: Antoine Barnave and the Marquis de Lafayette. Barnave, a brilliant lawyer and orator, became the chief political strategist for the moderates in the National Assembly. After the Flight to Varennes, he famously argued that the Revolution must stop, fearing that continued radicalism would destroy both the monarchy and private property.

Lafayette, already a hero of the American Revolution, was the commander of the National Guard. He represented the military and establishment support for a constitutional monarchy. His role was to maintain order in Paris and protect the new government from popular violence. For both men, the goal was to consolidate the gains of 1789 and create a stable, bourgeois-led state under a chastened but still-crowned king.