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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 March 2001
The enactment of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy in 1790, which profoundly reformed the Catholic Church in France, has rightly been regarded as a major turning point in the French Revolution. Its implementation caused a substantial schism, not simply within the clergy, but also among the laity, with devastating consequences for the prevailing political consensus. Yet while a good deal of research has been devoted to an exploration of clerical responses to the crisis, rather less is known about lay reactions. By analysing turnout in the episcopal elections of 1790–1, which appointed new bishops to no less than eighty of the eighty-three departmental dioceses, this article illuminates the attitudes of wealthy notables who dominated the electoral assemblies. The study that follows also examines the operation of the electoral system and the characteristics of the priests who emerged victorious from the polls. On account of their modest social origins, and their endorsement of the unfolding revolutionary process, these prelates became known as ‘citizen bishops’.