Jean-Baptiste de Machault d'Arnouville, comte d'Arnouville, seigneur de Garge et de Gonesse, was born in Paris on 13 December 1701 and died on 12 July 1794 in a French Revolutionary prison. He was a French statesman, son of Louis Charles Machault d'Arnouville, lieutenant of police. In 1721, he was counsel to the

Parlement A ''parlement'' (), under the French Ancien Régime, was a provincial appellate court of the Kingdom of France. In 1789, France had 13 parlements, the oldest and most important of which was the Parlement of Paris. While both the modern Fr ...

of Paris, in 1728 he was ''

maître des requêtes A Master of Requests () is a counsel of the French ''Conseil d'État'' (Council of State), a high-level judicial officer of administrative law in France. The office has existed in one form or another since the Middle Ages. The occupational title ...

'', and ten years later was made president of the Great Council; although he had opposed the court in the

Unigenitus ''Unigenitus'' (named for its Latin opening words ''Unigenitus dei filius'', or "Only-begotten son of God") is an apostolic constitution in the form of a papal bull promulgated by Pope Clement XI in 1713. It opened the final phase of the Jansen ...

dispute, he was appointed intendant of Hainaut in 1743. From this position, through the influence at court of his old friend the marquis d'Argenson, he was called to succeed Philibert Orry as controller-general of the finances in December 1745. On taking office, he found that in the four years of the

War of the Austrian Succession The War of the Austrian Succession () was a European conflict that took place between 1740 and 1748. Fought primarily in Central Europe, the Austrian Netherlands, Italy, the Atlantic and Mediterranean, related conflicts included King George ...

the economies of

Cardinal Fleury Cardinal or The Cardinal may refer to: Animals * Cardinal (bird) or Cardinalidae, a family of North and South American birds **''Cardinalis'', genus of cardinal in the family Cardinalidae **'' Cardinalis cardinalis'', or northern cardinal, th ...

had been exhausted, and he was forced to develop the system of borrowing which was bringing French finances to the verge of bankruptcy. In 1749, he attempted a reform in the levying of direct taxes, which, if carried out, would have done much to prevent the later Revolutionary movement. He proposed to abolish the old tax of a tenth or

tithe A tithe (; from Old English: ''teogoþa'' "tenth") is a one-tenth part of something, paid as a contribution to a religious organization or compulsory tax to government. Today, tithes are normally voluntary and paid in cash or cheques or more ...

(in French ''dîme''), which was evaded by the clergy and most of the nobility, and substituted a tax of one-twentieth (in French "vingtième") that would have been levied on all. The inclusion of the church made this bill popular with the larger public, in addition to the philosophes, the Jansenists, and the Gallicans. However, there were loud remonstrances from bishops (particularly Christophe de Beaumont, the Archbishop of Paris) and the devout party at Louis XV's court. The clergy stood by their historical privileges, and the outcry of the nobility was virulent, and the proposal was rejected. Despite this, Machault managed to retain his office until July 1754, when he exchanged the controllership for the Naval Ministry. Foreseeing the disastrous results of the alliance with

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

, he was drawn to oppose more decidedly the schemes of

Madame de Pompadour Jeanne Antoinette Poisson, Marquise de Pompadour (, ; 29 December 1721 – 15 April 1764), commonly known as Madame de Pompadour, was a member of the French court. She was the official chief mistress of King Louis XV from 1745 to 1751, and rem ...

, whose personal ill-will he had gained. On 1 February 1757

Louis XV Louis XV (15 February 1710 – 10 May 1774), known as Louis the Beloved (french: le Bien-Aimé), was King of France from 1 September 1715 until his death in 1774. He succeeded his great-grandfather Louis XIV at the age of five. Until he reache ...

acquiesced in her demand for his removal. Machault retired to his estate at Arnouville until the

Revolution In political science, a revolution (Latin: ''revolutio'', "a turn around") is a fundamental and relatively sudden change in political power and political organization which occurs when the population revolts against the government, typically due ...

broke out in 1789, when, after a period of hiding, he was apprehended in 1794 at

Rouen Rouen (, ; or ) is a city on the River Seine in northern France. It is the prefecture of the region of Normandy and the department of Seine-Maritime. Formerly one of the largest and most prosperous cities of medieval Europe, the population ...

and brought to Paris as a suspect. He was imprisoned in the '' Prison des Madelonnettes'', where he died after a few weeks at the age of ninety-three.

Family

His eldest son, Louis Charles de Machault d'Arnouville (1737–1820), was

bishop of Amiens The Roman Catholic Diocese of Amiens (Latin: ''Dioecesis Ambianensis''; French: ''Diocèse d'Amiens'') is a diocese of the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic Church in France. The diocese comprises the department of Somme, of which the city of A ...

from 1774 until the Revolution. He was one of the most uncompromising

conservatives Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...

at the

Estates-General of 1789 The Estates General of 1789 was a general assembly representing the French estates of the realm: the clergy (First Estate), the nobility (Second Estate), and the commoners (Third Estate). It was the last of the Estates General of the Kingdom o ...

, where he voted consistently against every reform. He emigrated in 1791, which provoked the arrest of the members of his family still in France in 1793, when his father and his brothers Charles and Armand were arrested as parents and relatives of an ''émigré''. Upon his return to France in 1802, he resigned his bishopric in order not to be an obstacle to

Concordat of 1801 The Concordat of 1801 was an agreement between Napoleon Bonaparte and Pope Pius VII, signed on 15 July 1801 in Paris. It remained in effect until 1905, except in Alsace-Lorraine, where it remains in force. It sought national reconciliation ...

, and he retired to the ancestral château of Arnouville, where he died in 1820.

Family

References

Further reading