Civil Constitution of the Clergy
성직자 민사기본법
Decree adopted by the French National Constituent Assembly on 12 July 1790 and promulgated by the king on 24 August 1790; it reorganized the secular clergy of France, subordinating the Catholic Church to the revolutionary state and creating the so-called constitutional Church. Condemned by Pope Pius VI in March 1791, which divided the French clergy into juring and refractory priests, it was abolished in 1801 by Napoleon's Concordat.
In depth
Adoption and background
After 4 August 1789 the clergy ceased to exist as a political order, and the Assembly's Ecclesiastical Committee, chaired by Treilhard with Martineau as rapporteur, drafted the bill; Camus and Lanjuinais defended it, and the committee was inspired by Jansenist, Gallican and richerist currents. Martineau's report was voted on 12 July 1790. Earlier measures: tithes were abolished on 11 August 1789, Church property was nationalized on 2 November 1789 and backed the assignats, monastic vows were forbidden on 13 February 1790, and administration of the remaining Church property passed to the State on 19 April 1790.
Louis XVI first opposed the decree, assented on 22 July 1790 and promulgated it on 24 August 1790. Pope Pius VI had written to Louis on 9 July 1790 rejecting the arrangement.
Content
Title I established one diocese per department, reducing dioceses from 130 to 83 and replacing the fourteen ancien-régime ecclesiastical provinces with ten metropolitan arrondissements; parishes were restructured, with a single parish in towns of under 6,000 souls.
Title II provided for bishops to be elected by departmental assemblies of electors and curés by district assemblies, whether or not the electors professed the Catholic religion; Grégoire's amendment restricting election to Catholics was rejected. The Pope was reduced to the 'visible head of the universal Church' and no longer instituted bishops, that role passing to the metropolitan or the senior bishop of the arrondissement; canonically instituted curés kept their institution from the bishop.
Titles III and IV made the clergy salaried state agents (the bishop of Paris 50,000 livres, other bishops 20,000, curés 1,200 to 6,000), abolished many titles and offices (canons, prebends, chapels, chapters, abbacies, priories), completed the destruction of the regular orders, and imposed strict residence; they also introduced internal discipline reform, including bishops' councils, ending the abuse of noble appointees drawing revenues without duties.
Distinction from the oath
The 1790 reorganization of the church is distinct from the 1791 oath obligation. On 27 November 1790 the Assembly voted to require the clergy to swear loyalty to the Constitution, and the king sanctioned it on 26 December 1790. By 16 January 1791 about half of those required to swear had done so, and only 7 of the 135 sitting bishops took the oath. In March 1791 Pope Pius VI declared the oath contrary to Church belief, splitting the clergy into juring and nonjuring, and condemned the reorganization of church order itself.
Consequences
Bishops took a vested oath of fidelity to nation, law and king (Title II, article XXI). Nonjuring priests were banned from public preaching on 5 February 1791, and on 7 May 1791 the Assembly allowed refractory priests to perform ceremonies if they did not agitate. In November 1791 nonjuring priests were declared suspect and liable to arrest, though Louis XVI vetoed the measure. The schism contributed to the Vendée war and to dechristianization in 1792–1793. The Constitutional Church did not escape the Terror: eight Constitutional bishops were executed on the guillotine.