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Movement Meaning of Money: Monetary Mobilization in Hong Kong’s

Prodemocracy Movement

Article in Sociological Review · October 2023

DOI: 10.1177/00380261231202862

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Movement Meaning of Money: Monetary Mobilization in Hong Kong’s

Prodemocracy Movement
The Sociological Review
1–19
© The Author(s) 2023
Article reuse guidelines:
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DOI: 10.1177/00380261231202862
journals.sagepub.com/home/sor

Author:
Ming-sho Ho
Affiliation:
Department of Sociology and Taiwan Social Resilience Research Center, National
Taiwan University
Abstract:
The resource mobilization (RM) theory has long discovered the significance of
money for protests; yet can this insight be applied to nowadays decentralized
movements, characterized by the absence of organizational leadership and more
creative and spontaneous participation from below? While the RM perspective is
anchored on a political economy of organizational fundraising, it is time to bring in
Viviana Zelizer’s economic sociology to understand how participants utilize the role
of donors, consumers, savers, and investors for the movement purpose. Focusing on
Hong Kong’s prodemocracy movement, this article theorizes the full panoply of
“monetary mobilization” to revise RM’s narrow conception. By offering a safer and
anonymous channel of expression, monetary mobilization emerges as a substitute to
in-person participation for risk-averse citizens with financial means. Money is always
loaded with symbolic meanings and ethical considerations so that it also functions as
a vehicle of the moral outrage and utopian aspirations. Participants are keen to
establish a proper relationship between sponsors and beneficiaries by exercising
diligent oversight to prevent its corruption. Contrary to the instrumentalist conception,
money is per se not a fully fungible and all-purpose resource.
Keywords:
Money, protest, resource mobilization, social movement, crowdfunding
Funding statement:
 2

Sociological theorists, classical or modern, have paid close attention to the

emergence of money as a universal medium of economic change and its profound
consequences. Marx (1973, p. 70) famously noted the “cash nexus” has dissolved “all
feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations” and thus became the dominant form of social
interaction. Simmel (1978) viewed money as an inexorable leveler dissolving all
qualitative distinctions into quantitative differences. Bourdieu (1986) saw “economic
capital” as the most versatile form of accumulated resources easily converted into
cultural capital or social capital. Given its wide convertibility into other resources, can
money alone help protesters to achieve their goals? Or conversely, precisely due to its
universally accepted status as an exchange medium, money may reduce the idealistic
pursuit to a mundane business. Is money a facilitator or a threat for social
movements?
This article takes the preexisting debate to address the changed landscape of
contemporary movement activisms under neoliberal capitalism. In tandem with the
expansion of individuals’ economic freedom, protests grow more spontaneous and
less dependent on preexisting organizations. Rethinking the relation between money
and movements requires us to pay attention to the following two phenomena. First,
the advance of financial technology (online shopping, mobile banking, cashless
transaction, crowdfunding, and so on) has greatly empowered individuals in their
economic decisions. Beyond writing a check, citizens now have more options to
contribute their financial capacities. Secondly, as the classical image of social
movements as organization-led action gives way to a “leaderless” and horizontal
pattern of mobilization, donors have to find novel and direct ways to transfer their
contribution. Aside from giving money, supporters are also likely to reinvent their
economic roles of consumers, savers, and investors for the movement purpose.
This article draws inspirations from Viviana Zelizer’s The Social Meaning of
Money, which contends that money’s transformative potentials have been largely
overstated because people have continued to apply moral judgments in making
monetary decisions. As people universalized and standardized the circulation of
money, they also set up social limits to monetarization and attempted to re-embed it in
their everyday life. Despite its utilitarian design, money has continued to possess
symbolic and moral meanings (Zelizer, 1994, p. 19, 205). Central to this perspective
is that monetary transaction is always anchored in the ongoing social relationship
which participants view as legitimate. Zelizerian economic sociology helps shed light
on the significance of money for movement activism without the problematic
instrumentalist conception.
How can protesters use money for the pursuit of their common interests and
identities, and what are the monetary measures the authorities adopt in order to
 3

neutralize these challenges? Can money fulfill its designated role as a fungible
resource that facilitates the pursuit of movement goals? I propose the concept of
“monetary mobilization” to understand how citizens use their personal wealth in lieu
of physical participation at rallies or demonstrations. They contribute to the
movement by creatively reconfiguring their roles as donors, consumers, bank account
holders, investors, and so on. In response, the authorities seek to interrupt the cash
flow so as to reassert their control.
This article chooses Hong Kong’s prodemocracy movement as a niche case to
make sense of the rich implications of money in contentious politics. Practically all
social movements involve logistical operation, but the extensiveness of how
Hongkongers deployed money-based tactics remains unparalleled. As a preeminent
world city and financial hub, the semi-autonomous city within the People’s Republic
of China (PRC) witnessed dramatic campaigns for democracy that have garnered
global attention. In 2014, a 79-day peaceful mass occupation (the Umbrella
Movement) took place as citizens demanded genuine suffrage (Ho, 2019; Lee and
Chan 2019; Lee and Sing 2020). In 2019, a disruptive protest against legalizing the
extradition of criminal suspects to PRC courts exploded and led to a six-month
territory-wide uprising, which was subdued by the COVID-19 epidemic in January
2020 and the imposition of the draconian National Security Law in June (Liu et al.,
2022). The prodemocracy movement in Hong Kong has been forced to adopt a
subterraneous form due to repression, but it continues to flourish among overseas
diaspora communities.
This in-depth look at Hong Kong reveals the following findings: First, movement
supporters creatively deploy a rich variety of money-based tactics, including in-kind
contributions, mass withdrawals of bank savings, boycotting pro-government
businesses, patronizing pro-movement stores, and so on. The government applies
money-based repression by freezing bank accounts and launching anti-money
laundering investigations. Far from being a utilitarian means only, money plays a
colorful role in protest. Monetary mobilization is triggered by a strong emotional
feeling of guilt, and its symbolic impacts often outweigh the economic result. The
intensive use of money brought about unexpected results since the distinctions
between contribution and consumption, as well as between fundraising and
profit-making become blurred. The more money was involved, the more participants
took effort to make sure the intended relationship was not subverted by monetary
mobilization.

The Perspectives of Resource Mobilization and Neoliberalism

In their seminal article, McCarthy and Zald (1987a, p. 18) claim the “aggregation
 4

of resources (money and labor) is crucial to an understanding of social movement

activity.” Resource mobilization theory (RM) maintains the emergence of social
movements is not explained by people’s subjective and emotional conditions, but by
their objective capacity. Its proponents posit that growing affluence leads to the
flourishing of social movements as people with more discretionary income are likely
to contribute to social movements financially. The advent of welfare state facilitates
the flow of monetary resources to advocacy groups (McCarthy and Zald, 1987a, pp.
27-28; McCarthy and Zald, 1987b, pp. 360-361). Money is the resource par
excellence for being the most flexible (Zald and McCarthy 1987, p. 164), fungible
(Edwards et al., 2019, p. 80), and convertible and less context-dependent (Edwards
and McCarthy 2004, p. 129). RM scholars expect social movements to emerge with
the inflow of monetary and other resources from the outside, rather than a direct
expression of popular discontent.
RM paves way for a political economy of social movement (Garner and Zald
1987), in which how organizations gather monetary and nonmonetary resources for
sustaining their activities becomes the core research agenda. Studies in this direction
are typically interested in when and how the fundraising of movement organizations is
successful (Gupta, 2009; Hsieh et al., 2019). Researchers maintain that social
movements not only challenge policy makers, but also pressure business actors for a
better alternative of economic arrangement (King and Pearce, 2010; Luders, 2006).
Beyond protests and lobbying, movement activists invent a plethora of market-based
strategies, including shareholder activism, activist philanthropy, and consumer
boycott (Bartley and Child, 2014; King and Gish, 2015; Soule, 2009). Movement
achievement has an economic yardstick; movements can be characterized as
successful if they are able to create a new market or a new product (Crutchfield, 2018,
p. 124; Lounsbury, 2005; Vasi, 2009). All these findings rest on a core RM finding
that social movements behave analogously to commercial institutions since both need
to market their causes/products competitively (Clifford, 2015).
These works are instrumental in deepening the RM’s insistence on the pivotal
role of money. Yet, they prove insufficient in explaining the wide spectrum of
monetary mobilization in contemporary activisms. RM adopts an
organization-centered perspective, which is not entirely applicable to bottom-up and
participant-driven movements, which have become the worldwide norm of
protest-making (Frenzel et al., 2014; Vallee, 2019). Rather than taking the vantage
points of organizational leaders, it is imperative to examine how and why movement
adherents leverage their economic decisions.
RM scholars’ emphasis on monetary resources attracts criticisms of its utilitarian
assumptions (Fireman and Gamson, 1979). There emerges skepticism regarding the
 5

actual functions of money. Donor contributions are reactive to, rather than antecedent
to, the rise of grassroots protests (McAdam, 1982, pp. 25-31; Morris, 1984, p. 75).
Abundant resources sometimes inhibit grassroots militancy and tactical innovation
(Ganz, 2009; Piven and Cloward, 1992). Monetary considerations play a marginal
role in the movements devoted to nonmaterial causes related to gender, ecological,
and peace issues (Cohen, 1985; Melucci, 1990; Polletta and Jasper, 2001). Contrasting
appraisals by RM scholars and their opponents highlight the essentially contested role
of money in social movements.
Another related strain of literature deals with neoliberalism and its impacts.
There has been abundant research analyzing how neoliberalism has worsened
economic inequalities, thus planting the seeds for a global justice movement from the
1999 anti-WTO protest in Seattle onward to the 2011 Occupy Wall Street, the
European anti-austerity protests and beyond (Berberoglu, 2019; della Porta, 2015;
Fominaya, 2014; Smith, 2008). Neoliberalism amounts to a belief in market
fundamentalism that seeks to dismantle governmental regulations and moral restraints
to maximize the free play of market forces. Free market is thought to be populated
with smart buyers and sellers whose decisions, if unconstrained, will lead to an
optimal result for all. We can further ask whether the neoliberal zeitgeist, particularly
its belief in individual rationality and consumer sovereignty, has affected the tenor and
tone of contemporary movements. If each individual’s economic choice is extolled as
the magic solution to every social problem, we should not be surprised when such an
ethos seeps into the realm of social protests.
Researchers have pointed out how the decline of socialism has profoundly
affected contemporary movements as they have become ideologically thinner (Bayat,
2017; Gerbaudo, 2017). There is a growing trend of people who are willing to join a
movement mostly out of their own personal decision, rather because of organizational
membership (labor unions or political parties) or allegiance to particular leaders
(Castells, 2012; Juris, 2008). Interestingly, such an anti-hierarchy ethos neatly echoes
the neoliberal demand to restore individual freedom of choice.
Another piece of evidence of how neoliberalism succeeds in redefining
contemporary social movements is about the ease that protesters feel about
commercial social media. By the time of the Arab Spring, the notion of a “Facebook
Revolution” or a “Twitter Revolution” had gained global currency (Gerbaudo, 2012).
Protesters felt a less urgent need to find alternative venues for their digital presence.
The growing popularity of commercial crowdfunding platforms in advocacy
campaigns, which is now regarded as one of the state-of-the-art social innovations,
also strengthens the belief that one’s economic decisions could make a difference.
This belief empowers individual internet users and bestows a sense of potency as if
 6

one’s online clicks are capable of realizing major changes.

The Zelizerian Alternative: The Relationship-centered View of Money

Zelizer aims to shed light on the necessary entanglement of human sentiments
and monetary decisions, or culture and economics. People crave for money and enjoy
their purchasing power; yet, in so doing, they strive to fulfill a social purpose of their
choice. Zelizer rejects three common perspectives regarding the relation between the
social and the economic. First, the “separate-spheres” view posts two distinctive and
disconnected logics, namely, solidarity versus rationality. Partially deriving from the
previous one, the second “hostile-worlds” view further points to the danger of
cross-fertilization. Economic efficiency is easily sacrificed for moral values, just as
solidarity is compromised by monetary considerations. The third “nothing-but” view
attempts to dissolve different spheres to one underlying logic, usually an economic
reductionist account of all human activities (Zelizer. 2011, p. 5, 182). In her research
on life insurance, intimate relationship, care work, and other activities, Zelizer finds
ordinary people are keenly aware of the contradictory demands of economic necessity
and moral duties; nevertheless, they try to maintain a fulfilling life within their means.
A typical coping strategy consists in finding the “good match” according to the
relationship at question (Zelizer, 2011, p. 153). An economic transaction between
married couples, for instance, will be inappropriate for workplace colleagues.
Zelizer proposes a relationship-centered view of economic decisions. Money is
deployed to accomplish a rich array of social purposes, maintaining a social role (pin
money for housewives), sustaining community solidarity (relief for the destitute),
facilitating an exchange (compensation for the sellers), and so on. Money is more than
a technical means of calculation, payment, and storage, but always embedded in our
everyday life, thus transcending the means-and-end divide. Zelizer (2011, pp. 130-1)
highlights money’s inherent duality: it simultaneously makes possible a generalized
system of exchange as well as a social web of moral obligations.
A RM understanding of money is inadequate for its one-sided assumptions. From
the very beginning, RM theorists aimed to respond to the Olsonian challenge in that
collective action incurred cost and rational constituencies would not shoulder their
share voluntarily (McCarthy and Zald, 1987a, pp. 18-9). They sought to bring in a
cost-benefit analysis to counter the previous works that excessively relied on
abnormal psychology. With its single-focused attention on the consideration of
economic interests, the earlier RM theory closely followed what Zelizer has identified
as the “nothing-but” perspective.
The RM theory emerged as a mainstream paradigm from the 1980s onward even
though the label has become less evoked. This perspective kept evolving by
 7

incorporating more elements in its research agenda. Later RM researchers abandoned

its restrictive definition and the underlying economistic assumption. In the subsequent
formulation, moral, cultural, organizational, and informational resources were added
into its analytical tools, in addition to preexisting material and human ones (Cress and
Snow, 1996; Snow et al., 2005). By conceptualizing intangible and ideational
elements such as legitimacy, identity, know-how, and social ties as resources, RM
theorists expanded their research scope, yet at the same time incurring the criticisms
of excessive instrumentalist assumption (Goodwin and Jasper, 1999; Jasper, 2014).
In Zelizer’s scheme, the newer strand of RM theory evolves to a position that is
akin to the “separate-spheres” perspective in that practically everything that
movement participants can make use of is viewed as resources, whereas their
convictions and believes are thought to belong to another realm. Common to the new
and old RM theory is a one-sided understanding of resources as entirely external to
their users. The Zelizerian alternative offers a more balanced explanation to transcend
the instrumentalist view.

“A Rich People’s Movement”

Social movement researchers typically look at “poor people’s movements”
(Piven and Cloward, 1977). Hong Kong’s fabulous affluence has always been an issue
of political contention. By the time the city transitioned to China’s sovereignty, its per
capita income was higher than United Kingdom. The Basic Law vaguely promised
fifty years of preserving the “capitalistic system and way of life.” For its rich citizens,
there have always been concerns about their property. Observers described such a
pervasive sense of economic angst: “Hong Kong’s rejoining China in 1997 resembles
Los Angeles being asked to rejoin Mexico after 150 years as an American colony”
(Matthews et al., p. 150). Uneasiness about the city’s future resulted in a massive
wave of middle-class migration in the early 1990s, and after receiving right of abode
in their host countries, many returned for better-paying jobs in Hong Kong.
Hongkongers’ love affair with money has a long history. When the British seized
control of Hong Kong in 1841, they were eyeing a trading post, rather than territorial
and population aggrandizement. The transshipment hub’s viability took the form of
expediting the flow of money, cargo, and passengers. The postwar economic success
has bestowed lasting legacies. Hong Kong is among the few areas in Asia where
industrial entrepreneurs prospered without state fostering (Hamilton, 1999). The
British adopted laissez-faire policies including free trade, low tax, and minimal
intervention, making the city a paragon of libertarian ideals. Hong Kong’s
international admirers included Milton Friedman, whose neoclassical economic
doctrines laid the ideological foundation for neoliberalism. Hongkongers were said to
 8

develop the so-called “market mentality,” since they were more likely to embrace “a
judgment based on personal calculation of profit and loss rather than on one’s
belonging to a particular place and society” (Matthews et al., 2008, p. 15). Since
United Kingdom is often referred to as “a nation of shopkeepers”, it is little surprise
that such mercantile ethos ends up permeating its colony.
The 2019 anti-extradition movement emerged as Hong Kong’s largest incident of
contentious politics in terms of scale. In a city of more than seven million residents,
three protest gatherings of more than one million participants took place in one year
(Cheng et al., 2022). In that year, there were 9,216 people who had been arrested, and
among them 1,972 were criminally persecuted.1 As the police stepped up repression,
joining a rally or a demonstration became increasingly dangerous. Monetary
mobilization appeared a safer option for those supporters who were hesitant about
being present on the street. The anti-extradition movement proceeded in a
decentralized manner, as there were no individuals or organizations that could claim
leadership (Lee et al., 2022); consequently, supporters had to find novel channels to
assist protesters directly.
Hong Kong is one of the world’s most economically unequal places. With a Gini
coefficient of 0.539 (2021), a poverty rate of 21.4% (2019), skyrocketing property
prices, and threadbare safety net, the city’s disadvantaged citizens led a challenging
existence, and its youth faced the dismal prospect of precariats. In the 2019 movement,
the futureless youth have been the foot soldiers in the increasingly radicalized protests.
For instance, among the 10,270 arrestees as of November 2021, there were 4,009
students, either in universities or in secondary schools.2 That they bore the brunt of
full-throttle state repression triggered an outpouring of sympathy from the city’s more
established citizens, thus paving the way for innovation in monetary mobilization.
Hongkongers’ striving for democracy was certainly more than a “rich people’s
movement,” but for analytical purposes, this article will look at the financial and
logistical aspects of the movement.3

Research Method and Data

This article takes an in-depth look at Hong Kong, which offers a unique setting
to observe the frustrated prodemocracy sentiments in urban affluence. It is a rare case
of protests empowered by wealth, rather than driven by want,4 with the potential for
lessons to be applied elsewhere in the world. The research data comes from in-depth
interviews and documentary sources based on a larger research project on Hong
Kong’s social movements, which I am currently engage with. From August 2019 to
April 2022, the author and the research team have conducted 188 interviewees with
people who were involved in the protest movement in varying capacities. For this
 9

study, I select and extract only 23 interviews whose experience are pertinent to this
article’s topic, namely, the use of monetary resources in social movement. And my
selection criteria are explained as follows. All interviewees have been anonymized
and given an identifier code. Among the selected 23 interviewees, nine are so-called
“parents”, or those who provide cash or in-kind assistance to protesters. Parents are
generally older in age, steadily employed, and thus able to contribute their financial
resources. While seven parents operated in Hong Kong (P1, P2, P3, P4, P5, P6, and
P7), two of them were primarily based outside of the city during their participation
(PX1 in London and PX2 in Taipei), and their stories help shed light on transboundary
flow of monetary resources.
Nine interviewees are “frontline protesters” who were engaged in street activities
ranging peaceful to militant ones. They are selected because they reveal their
financing methods in the interview. Three of them did not receive any assistance from
others, as they or their teammates paid for their own protest equipment or first-aid kits
(MS1, MS2, and MS3). Three received in-kind assistance in form of legal counsel
(MA1, MA2, and MA3), while the other three established direct relationships with
“parents” and received monetary support (MM1, MM2, and MM3). Frontline activists
are younger, and except for two full-time workers, the rest were university students
during the protest. Finally, my sample includes five interviewees from Hong Kong’s
banking and insurance sectors, who were also involved in a number of monetary
mobilization. They are all “parents”, but I choose to note them differently (F1, F2, F3,
F4, and F5). Most of the interviewees were recruited by personal referrals by friends
or previous interviewees who were willing to help. My standard questionnaire starts
with interviewee background and political orientation, if possible, and goes all the
way to movement participation. But in this study, I will only extract those experiences
related to money, either at the giving or receiving ends. There was one interviewed
Taiwanese activist who played a critical role in assisting the settling the fleeing
protesters.

Monetary Mobilization
Hong Kong is a tightly packed city, and street protests often took place alongside
other commercial activities. Protesters naturally came up with the idea of
camouflaging their actions as shopping so as to outsmart the police. After the police
cleared the occupation zone at Mong Kok (a major shopping district) during the 2014
Umbrella Movement, netizens launched a wave of “shoppers’ revolutions” in which
protesters attempted to reoccupy the streets by pretending to be shoppers (Yuen, 2018).
A similar tactic surfaced in the summer of 2019; as the police proactively used force
to disperse street gatherings, shopping malls connected to major metro stations
 10

became popular sites for protests since mall operators were reluctant to see business
disruptions caused by police action. Peaceful protesters decorated the arcades with
posters and art works and sang collectively in the atrium (Li and Whitworth, 2022),
thus effectively transforming what Rizter (2005) called “cathedrals of consumption”
into mass rally grounds.

“Parenting” the Protesters

With the police’s indiscriminate use of pepper spray, tear gas, water cannon, and
rubber bullets, protest participants needed to equip themselves with helmets, goggles,
respirator masks with filters, and so on. All these gears, nicknamed “stationery”
because many frontline protesters were high school and college students who might
buy school supplies, were expensive, and as such, individual and organized
campaigns emerged to purchase and distribute it. To meet the local shortage, at least
two of my interviewees made the procurement trip to Taiwan, and with the help of
donation from Hongkongers at home and abroad (F2 and F3).
With the surging number of arrestees, there came the need for legal defense. Two
major organizations led the effort, the Spark Alliance and the 612 Humanitarian Relief
Fund, which solicited donations to pay the lawyer fee for defendants. When the Spark
Alliance was raided by the police, a bank account with more than HK$ 70 million, or
nearly US$ 9 million, was frozen.5 In 2021, the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund stated
a donation income of HK$ 254 million (US$ 33 million).6
Since many young protesters were not financially independent and their
movement participation often soured the relationship with their families, a form of
monetary mobilization emerged called “parenting,” which involved the supportive
acts of feeding, sheltering, transporting, and accommodating these protesters. Some
“parents” purchased vouchers from major chain restaurants and distributed them at
the protest sites or other venues (F3, F5, P1, and P4). Some owned extra apartments
which they provided as “safe houses” for fleeing protesters who could not go home
(P2). One interviewed “parent” bought new Octopus Cards (an electronically stored
value payment card) whenever receiving her monthly salary. She relied on a friend
who could forward them to the people who needed them (P7). Another interviewed
“parent” took a more hands-on approach by inviting a protester who was driven away
from home to live with his family. During the stay, they also provided cash
allowances (P3).
Monetary mobilization extended to financially assisting those protesters who fled
or took refuge abroad and those who were jailed. Overseas Hongkongers chipped in to
help these refugees (PX1 and PX2). A radio host Edmund Wan launched a fundraising
campaign “Thousands of Parents for Students in Taiwan” to assist young protesters to
 11

continue their studies abroad. When Wan was arrested, the police discovered a fund of
HK$13 million (US$1.67 million).7
Stand with Hong Kong Fight for Freedom, an activist group, raised over HK$20
million (US$2.57 million) via crowdfunding to place advertisements in global
newspapers. 8 In 2019 alone, I found 19 reported cases of movement-related
crowdfunding initiated by alumni, NGOs, politicians, and netizens. The goals
included filing lawsuits, compensating innocent victims, designing a goddess of
democracy statue, conducting chemical analysis of police tear gas, and so on.

Leveraging Buying Power

Hong Kong’s prodemocracy citizens utilized their daily purchases for political
purposes. There was a consumer boycott against chain restaurants (Starbucks,
Yoshinoya, and so on) whose operators took the government’s side. Later, a wave of
storefront vandalism ensued, targeting commercial establishments that were managed
by pro-government businesspersons (“blue stores”), gangsters (“black stores”), and
Chinese enterprises (“red stores”). Concomitantly, there rose a spontaneous campaign
to patronize pro-movement businesses (“yellow stores”) because they donated money
and resources to the movement, sheltered fleeing demonstrators, or employed those
who lost their jobs due to the protest. The notion of a self-sustaining “Yellow
Economic Circle” began to gain currency. The guiding idea was that pro-movement
consumers should jointly use their buying power to support yellow stores so that some
of their profits would circulate back to the movement, either in the form of donations
or by hiring jobless protesters.
The Yellow Economic Circle amounted to an innovative mixture. The economic
resistance movement was both an act of political consumerism (using consumers’
decisions for a more desirable market order) and a model of social and solidarity
economy. At its core was the expectation that shared economic interests could
empower and solidify a prodemocracy movement community. There existed a
nationalistic sentiment to re-create Hongkongers’ own economic sphere since the
integration with mainland China had created many economic grievances for the city’s
residents.
In the heyday, there were internet directories and smartphone apps that guided
consumers to suitable venues of consumption. Many shoppers deliberately overpaid
their bills with the anticipation that the extra money would end up in the right place
(MS1). One episode suffices here to illustrate the buying power of Hong Kong’s
prodemocracy consumers. In early 2021, the PRC abruptly banned the import of
pineapples from Taiwan citing a pest problem. A campaign to buy Taiwan pineapples
sprouted up in Hong Kong. Consuming Taiwan’s tropical delicacy immediately
 12

became a symbol of defiance against Beijing as well as a form of financial support for
Taiwan-based Hongkonger retailers. Taiwan’s pineapple exports to Hong Kong
registered a five-fold growth, and the city emerged as the second-highest international
buyer trailing only Japan in 2019.9

Leveraging the Power of Depositors, Investors, and Beyond

Middle-class Hongkongers are well-versed in the art of wealth management, and
besides, a substantial number of financial workers joined the movement ranks. It was
no surprise that their protests evolved to employ financially savvy tactics. The twin
campaigns #cashout and #HKDtoUSD (Hong Kong dollar to US dollar) in August
2021 are a clear example. Hong Kong’s thriving financial sectors have been noted for
a high degree of leverage, with bank reserves chronically low by international
standards. The #cashout campaign urged depositors to withdraw their savings to
generate an acute bank run. It was estimated that if two million citizens took out
US$25,000 each at the same time; Hong Kong’s banks would be drained of cash. Next,
the #HKDtoUSD campaign encouraged citizens to convert their saving to foreign
currency. This tactic aimed to create depreciation pressure on the local currency
whose value has been pegged to the US dollar. It served as the symbolic act of
Hongkongers taking back their “rightful” share of the city’s vast foreign exchange
reserves, which were said to be coveted by Beijing. Such financial non-cooperation
movements failed to result in visible impacts, probably because Beijing ordered its
state-owned enterprises to pour money into Hong Kong’s stock markets. However, the
pressure was clearly felt among bank managers and financial officials. One
interviewed HSBC worker revealed that her boss had to report daily cash reserves to
government regulators while bank employees practiced “contingent plans” routinely
(F1).
Prodemocracy Hongkongers invented a new strain of shareholder activism.
Jimmy Lai, the founder of Next Digital, has been an outspoken anticommunist, and
his Apple Daily remained the sole prodemocracy newspaper as the PRC tightened its
grip on Hong Kong’s once vibrant media market. On August 2020, the police raided
the Apple Daily headquarters and briefly detained Lai for investigation. On December
3, he was arrested again and formally arraigned. The two incidents triggered massive
newspaper buying, as many Hongkongers paid for available copies at retail outlets
and allowed them to be taken for free. There were also efforts to buy advertisements
printed in the threatened newspaper. Such demonstrations of solidarity spread over to
financial market operation. Both arrests were followed by visible spikes in Next
Digital’s stock price, as sympathizers rallied to support the media tycoon with their
personal investment. The first arrest resulted in a 431 percent rise in stock value, and
 13

the second 106 percent (see below figure).

Figure 1: Next Digital’s Stock Price (2020)

Source: Yahoo Finance (https://finance.yahoo.com/), accessed September 23,

2021.
Perhaps the most noteworthy example of how Hongkongers were willing to
leverage their pocketbooks can be found in the proposal to create an international
charter city. Inspired by the American economist Paul Romer’s idea to lease a piece of
land from a developing country to practice a new political and economic system, a
team of real estate developers, professionals, and academics launched the project to
build a new Hong Kong. Hong Kong 2.0 would preserve the existing institutions and
thus become a welcoming home for migrants. Its proponents even contacted the Irish
government to discuss such a plan, though without making much progress.10
Some interviewed middle-class Hongkongers were sanguine about the prospect
of leaving without having to settle into an unfamiliar environment (F3). The
international charter city enthusiasts apparently did not notice the irony: Hong Kong
was long a colony under the British, and arguably continued to be one under the
Chinese; and yet the city’s rich and mobile citizens aspired to become colonizers
themselves with their financial resources. As Ong (2006) points out, neoliberalism is
not a universalizing doctrine to maximize the free play of market forces, but rather an
exception-making technology to benefit the privileged players. The new Hong Kong
project indicates that the hegemony of neoliberalism encouraged the city’s frustrated
citizens to seek an economic solution for their political aspiration.

Uses and Motives of Monetary Mobilization

As an alternative to physical presence at rallies and demonstrations, monetary
mobilization provides a convenient solution to realize one’s commitment without
 14

taking personal risk. Low risk, anonymity, and individualism in spending one’s money
provide a more suitable venue for Hong Kong’s middle-class citizens. An interviewee
frankly acknowledged, “we are ‘peaceful, rational, and nonviolent (wo lei fei), and
being timid is our characteristic. We have nothing except money, and we just do what
we can do” (F4). Being a “parent” who establishes personal connections with
frontline protesters can be incriminating. Many donors minimize their involvement by
giving money to a “parent” they know without asking further questions. “There are
donors who don’t even care whether their contribution has been embezzled,” another
interviewee observed (MM2).
The safety concern explains the popularity of commercial electronic payment
platforms. Direct cash transfers can only take place between trustworthy friends. Bank
transfers or credit card payments leave digital footprints. Third-party payment
platforms operated by foreign companies have become the preferred channel despite
the hefty processing fee. Patreon, a US-based company, charges a commission of 5 to
12 percent for every contribution to its “creator.” Yet, many Hong Kong
prodemocracy movement leaders, including Joshua Wong, Benny Tai, and so on,
choose to be Patreon creators. As a Hongkonger who assisted overseas refugees said,
“even if I am arrested and the police forcibly opened my Patreon account, they would
not know my contributors” (PX1).
The choice of monetary mobilization in lieu of street participation is more or less
a rational calculation; yet, it requires certain emotional triggers to make the decision
for monetary mobilization. The prolonged confrontation in 2019 provided ample cues
to such emotional responses. Here is a reflection from a university student protester,
I still remember we went to a McDonald’s in Sheung Shui on July 13.
While we were in the queue, three teenager protesters standing behind us
wanted to buy one portion of large fries to share. They looked like high
school students and they had to chip in their coins to make the sum, whereas
we all had our individual meals. We felt so bad at the sight. We were
wondering whether we should buy the food for them or not, and they just
left. From then on, I always tried to bring more than I needed to the protest
scene (MS2).
Here lie the dual meanings of money in the movement context: monetary
mobilization is both a rational calculation and an emotional response. It is
simultaneously a form of ersatz participation for those who dare not express their
beliefs in public or reveal their identities, as well as a selfless contribution from those
who cannot make it to the streets. Money can serve both instrumental and expressive
purposes.
 15

Monetary Repression: Blocking the Cash Flow

The authorities certainly knew the prodemocracy movement was driven by cash
flows; how to remove this monetary fuel became the key in taming the protest wave.
The two above-mentioned legal aid organizations were accused of “money
laundering” and their bank accounts frozen. The government leveled the same charge
against social movement organizations, and many were forced to be shut down on this
trumped-up charge. Bank account freezes were applied to numerous individuals,
including Ted Hui, a former opposition lawmaker who fled to the West to escape
prosecution. 11 Many of my lesser-known interviewees found their online bank
services abruptly terminated once they fled abroad (P7). The national security
legislation of 2020 made it impossible for NGOs with records of overseas funding to
survive, since such liaison were deemed as a crime of foreign collusion.
The government took other steps to curb the cash flow. Yellow stores were
routinely inspected by official agents for sanitary and other reasons. 12 The
government intended to put these politically defiant establishments out of business. In
the wake of Next Digital’s stock price hike, the police arrested fifteen people for
“market manipulation.”
Money played multiple roles in the government’s repressive strategy. In response
to the financial non-cooperation campaign in the summer of 2019, PRC ordered its
state-owned enterprises to enlarge their presence in Hong Kong, either by acquiring
assets, purchasing securities, or floating more stocks, to stabilize the stock market and
the HK dollar. The authorities saw money both as an instrumental and expressive
resource to undermine Hongkongers’ pursuit for political freedom. Beside blocking
the monetary flow, the government set its eyes on the symbolic meanings of money to
de-legitimatize the protest movement because the “money laundering” charge implies
dubious and illicit sources, such as the CIA. By the same logic, the government
attempted to impose stringent regulations on crowdfunding in 2022 because it claimed
such online financial activities had been criminally used for “fraud”.13

Discussion
Hong Kong’s prodemocracy movement is probably the worlds’ most
capital-intensive and financially sophisticated one. Without the massive waves of
monetary mobilization, the intensive street protests lasting more than six months
could not take place. Zelizerian relationship-centered perspective offers critical
insights into such intensive mingling of money and movement. People take effort in
finding a good match between a payment and the accompanying social tie since
money is both an instrument to sustain the on-going relationship as well as a symbolic
expression of its underlying moral assumptions. Such balanced view helps us to
 16

address the following three puzzles.

First, despite the grand vision of a Yellow Economic Circle, why does the
definition of a “yellow store” remain elusive and subject to endless disputes? As soon
as politically conscious consumers flocked to prodemocracy stores, “fake yellow
stores” became ubiquitous, as protesters accused some business operators to be closet
pro-government supporters. There were also cases of substandard products and
services from some notable yellow stores. Protesters were angry that some store
owners cared more about their profits than politics (F2 and F3).
Secondly, prodemocracy Hongkongers launched monetary mobilization with the
expectation that their financial contribution was appropriate to the movement purpose.
Such anticipation gave rise to vigilantism in policing over the moral boundaries and
denouncing the perceived violators. There was the ghoulish expression “eating
steamed buns drenched in human blood” to condemn such acts of benefiting from
others’ misfortune. Such charges of immorality have been quite frequent among the
prodemocracy camp, resulting in bitter mutual recriminations (F3, MA1, and MS2).
One episode suffices here to understand the entanglement. A colorful YouTuber Big J
(Jason Chau), who became famous for voicing his opposition to the extradition
amendment. He attracted more attention for his livestreaming reports at the protest
scenes, with nearly one million followers on YouTube as of September 2021. Big J
launched a new clothing brand and claimed the products were authentic Hong
Kong-made with an eye to reviving the local garment industry and strengthening the
Yellow Economic Circle. He hinted the proceeds would be spent for the movement
purposes, but he declined to explain how the money was used in public. Apparently,
Big J had a successful business as he claimed to have earned revenue of HK$ 1
million (US$128,000) in the first two months. Outside his supporters/customers,
detractors were legion. Criticisms abounded about the use of Chinese-made materials,
the price, and choice of S. F. Express (a Chinese delivery company with alleged
connections to the military) for the courier service.
Finally, for the middle-aged and economically established middle class to
support younger frontline protesters, an appropriate relationship needed to be invented.
This explained why “parents” were the most frequently heard role description for
these financial sponsors. Such fictive kinship engendered a plethora of terminologies
including provisioning protest gears (“stationery”), driving protesters away from the
protest scene (“school pickup”), and sponsoring those protesters who had to flee
abroad for safety (“international studies”).
Ideal parents were expected to protect and nourish their children without
pampering them. Senior generations needed to shepherd the younger ones until they
reached the adulthood (MM1). Such moral duty entailed a constant fine-tuning for the
 17

optimal strategies for overseas escapees. Many of them were underage, unskilled, or
without college degrees, thus facing daunting challenges in their host countries.
Freshly arriving in an unfamiliar land, they needed all kinds of help. While there were
many ex-protesters who were determined to support themselves through honest work,
a few people appeared recklessly indulged in the largesse of others (P1). A
London-based activist who took part in resettling exiles was frustrated to see some
refusing to take a job even after obtaining a work permit. The response she received
was “I can receive more from the ‘parents’ for doing nothing” (PX1). Another
Taiwanese interviewee revealed the extent to which some exiled lived a rather
carefree lifestyle:
I have done the calculation. A Hongkonger can receive NT$70,000
(US$2,525) per month without doing anything in Taiwan. It is an irresistible
temptation. Some Hongkongers ride heavy motorcycles with a price tag
over than NT$300,000 (US$10,821). I told them that it is a luxury that I
cannot afford in my life (PX2).
Even though my interviewee vehemently decried such extravaganza, he
acknowledged these deviant cases counted less than five percent in his estimate. For
the sake of the majority who were working hard to adapt to the host country, he was
reluctant to expose these stories for the fear that Hong Kong parents might stop their
contribution (PX2).
Similar to the cases of dowry to cashless wives, annual bonus to loyal employees,
and cash allowance to worthy victims (Zelizer, 1994, p. 50, 92, 158), monetary
assistance to Hong Kong’s overseas exiles was always difficult. While donors were
apparently motivated by altruistic motives, they still needed to constantly calibrate the
way in which their financial contribution was made. Individual fraudulent and
predatory behaviors on the part of beneficiaries appeared, but they appeared
inconsequential, at least compared to the widespread moral policing to ensure proper
relationship went with the monetary payment.
Intensive monetary mobilization blurred the distinction between profit-making
and movement advocacy, and thus generated morally ambiguous situations and the
constant need to exercise personal discretion. Precisely because of its seeming
convenience, money is more likely to cause more pathologies and perversions than
other resources. To use Polanyi’s term, Hongkongers’ “human blood steamed buns”
narratives and the caution against cash donations served as a countermovement of
self-protection against the excessive monetization. The prodemocracy movement
needed this financial resource, and yet, a too intimate relationship could be dangerous,
and this is where Zelizer’s relationship-centered perspective help illuminate. Pace the
moral teaching of Sandal (2012), money is not inherently corrupting or destructive
 18

because people are on constant alert to make sure that these monetary contributions
do not stray away from their moral vision.

Conclusion
Chinese communists and their Hong Kong collaborators have long embraced a
conspiracy theory alleging that the prodemocracy movement is being funded by
foreign governments. The United States and Taiwan are among the most frequently
mentioned suspects. Hong Kong’s security chief once asserted that the distribution of
free metro tickets and helmets was evidence of “state-level” intervention.14 What the
officials tried to deny is the fact that the prodemocracy movement involves an
unprecedented level of monetary mobilization from its own citizens who contributed
their money in many novel ways. To put it bluntly, there was no need for secret CIA
funding to ignite the protest wave. Middle-class Hongkongers’ wallets have paid the
bill. Yet, regardless of the erroneous understanding of the monetary sources, Beijing
was determined to impose extreme repression and Hong Kong under national security
law was fast approaching a regular mainland city where political right barely existed.
This article analyzed the multifaceted role of money in Hong Kong’s
prodemocracy movement. Monetary mobilization emerged as an alternative to protest
participation when movement supporters could not make it to the streets for a variety
of reasons. It became a popular option particularly among those who had the financial
means but were concerned about personal safety. Hong Kong’s citizens have
ingeniously redefined the role of donors, consumers, and investors so as to create new
zones of engagement with the authoritarianism. The prodemocracy movement
evolved into a sophisticated economic warfare involving daily consumption,
crowdfunding, e-commerce, and securities trading. In response, the government
applied a number of unusual measures to stem the cash flow.
The intensive monetary mobilization gave rise to unanticipated consequences.
The endless discussion of “human blood steamed buns” and the preference for in-kind
assistance rather than cash payments for the exiled protesters indicated a collectively
felt pressure to patrol the moral boundary. As more money was poured into the
movement, Hongkongers made more efforts to ensure their payment goes with an
ideal relationship and fits the moral purpose. The analysis here further developed the
RM perspective to meet the contemporary world of decentralized movements.
Monetary resources still matter when it comes to protest-making, but it is necessary
that we move beyond the narrow political economy of organizational fundraising to
embrace an economic sociology of how movement participants make their own
monetary decisions. In addition, the RM’s instrumentalist view of money is faulty,
and needs to be better replaced by a more culturally sensitive understanding of money
 19

and its social embeddedness.

Social movements have been a preferred channel for the powerless, nameless,
and moneyless to make their voices. A successful protest is often measured by the
number of participants as well as their solidarity and determination, rather than the
depth of their pockets. The Hong Kong case offers a rare but potentially widely
applicable lesson to the students of contentious politics. Money empowers a
movement and poses an alarming threat to the authorities, but there remain inherent
limits to money. The Zelizerian perspective highlights the fact that monetary
mobilization is essentially constrained by moral ideas and embedded in the social
relationship. Money comes in handy in social protests, then and now, but it cannot
bankroll a true revolution on its own.

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Acknowledgement:
This research is funded by Taiwan’s National Science and Technology Council
(110-2410-H-002-231-MY2) and National Taiwan University
(NTUCC-110L891901).
Earlier versions are presented in the meetings of Taiwan Sociological
Association (November 11, 2022) and Association for Asian Studies (February 18,
2023). The author thanks Kinman Chan, Ching Kwan Lee, and anonymous reviewers
for the comments and as the assistance provided by Chun-hao Huang, Ka Wing Li,
Yu-Erh Li, Hawazzi Tsang, Jessie Tse, Ash Wan, and Wei An Chen. The Author
declares that there is no conflict of interest involved in this study.

Notes:

1
Initium Media, July 24, 2020, https://bit.ly/3CklrUM, accessed October 8, 2022.
2
Radio Free Asia, January 18, 2022, https://bit.ly/35h0ehT, accessed March 28, 2022.
3
Making financial contribution was not limited to wealthy Hongkongers, and less well-off participants

sometimes chipped in their share. During the trial, the defense attorney for a major movement fund

revealed its average donation was around HK$ 4,000 (US$ 510), indicating the considerable proportion

of small donors. On-site surveys of rally participants from July to December 2019 reveals that

monetary mobilization is less common than other physical and virtual participation. In average, there

are 37.8% respondents who report for having donated money, 42.6% for crowdfunding, and 44.8% for

donating nonmonetary resources. These figures are significantly lower than moving movement supplies

(49%), expressing one’s opinion in Lennon Walls (64.9%), distributing movement flyers (76.2%),
View publication stats

23

expressing one’s opinion on the Internet (73.7%), and joining online petitions (82.5%) (Centre for

Communication and Public Opinion Survey Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2020, p. 45; the

author’s calculation).
4
Wealth is by nature conservative and jittery over social disruption. During the 2019-2010 protest, one

of the most common arguments from the pro-government camp is the imperative of maintaining

stability. In the award-winning documentary film Revolution of Our Time, there is a revealing episode

in which an expat threw a tantrum against a social worker protester. He was angry because the protest

made it difficult to earn more money.

5
HK01, December 19, 2019, https://bit.ly/3Cy4STJ, accessed March 28, 2022.
6
Initium Media, May 12, 2022, https://bit.ly/3CklrUM, accessed October 8, 2022.
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Central News Agency, May 14, 2021, https://bit.ly/3ecHYuL, accessed October 8, 2022.
8
Stand News, August 19, 2021, https://bit.ly/3ypqzG0, accessed October 8, 2022.
9
Taiwan Agricultural Council, https://bit.ly/3o1lW0i, accessed September 22, 2021. The author’s own

calculation.
10
CNN, September 14, 2020, https://cnn.it/39y5tIF, accessed September 23, 2021.
11
Guardian, December 7, 2020, https://shorturl.at/bzHX2, accessed August 17, 2023.
12
HK01, April 21, 2021, https://shorturl.at/efqvU, accessed August 17, 2023.
13
RTHK, December 17, 2022, https://bit.ly/3RiKoqQ, accessed January 29, 2023.
14
HK01, September 26, 2021, https://bit.ly/39M3dNX, September 29, 2021.
Another random document with
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government. It is true, that many of the prejudices of frenchmen
were still inveterate, and in some measure influenced them; and it is
also certain, that their total ignorance of the operations of any
rational system of government was an impediment to this motion;
but it is nevertheless to be presumed, that, the liberty of frenchmen
having been previously secured by the establishment of the
declaration of rights, if the assembly had formed some kind of a
constitution, and proposed it to the nation, and to the king, if he
were considered as forming a part of it, for their acceptation, the
dispute between the people and court would have been brought to a
speedy issue; and the public attention directed to a point would have
given dignity and respectability to their proceedings. If such
measures had been followed, and it appears a little strange they were
not, most probably the king and court, perceiving that their future
consequence wholly depended on their acquiescence with the state of
reason, and temper of the times, would have relinquished all those
absurd and dangerous projects for overturning the rising political
fabric of the nation, which anarchy fostered.
It is the pillars of a building, which indicate it’s durability, and not
the minor beams that are inserted through them, in order to rear the
structure. The natural, civil, and political rights of man are the main
pillars of all social happiness; and by the firm establishment of them,
the freedom of men will be eternally secured. The moment,
therefore, a state has gained those important and sacred privileges, it
is clear, that it ought to form some kind of government, grounded
upon this firm and broad basis, that being the only possible way to
give them permanency. But the constituent assembly, unmindful of
the dreadful effects beginning to flow from an unbounded
licentiousness, continued to pursue a romantic sublimity of
character, dangerous to all sublunary laws; whilst most interestedly
attentive to things that should have been subordinate to their first
object, they were led into a procrastination, which in it’s
consequence has been fatal in the extreme.
The decree which made the king inviolable, passed on the 15th of
September, at the time the crown was declared hereditary, and the
empire indivisible, was the most idle, if not the most dangerous
measure, both for him and France, which could have been devised.
The former life of Louis had exhibited a series of follies, and
displayed an insincerity not to be tolerated, much less encouraged;
and it was likely, if this doctrine, a relict of the abasement of
ignorance, that kings can do no wrong, should be carried into a law,
forming part of the constitution, that he would avail himself of the
decree of the assembly to cover his contempt of the national
sovereignty. When kings are considered by the government of a
country merely as ciphers, it is very just and proper, that their
ministers should be responsible for their political conduct: but at the
moment when a state is about to establish a constitution on the basis
of reason, to undermine that foundation by a master-piece of
absurdity, appears a solecism as glaring as the doctrine itself is
laughable, when applied to an enlightened policy. In fact, whilst
Mirabeau contended for the infallibility of the king, he seems to have
had no right from reason to deride those who respected that of the
church: for, if the government must necessarily be supported by a
pious fraud, one was as respectable as the other.
The bigotry of Louis was well known; nay, it was notorious, that he
employed his confessor to erase from his tender conscience the
remembrance of the vices he resolved to indulge, and to reconcile the
meanest dissimulation with a servile fear of the Being whose first
attribute is truth.—This man, whose bestiality had been carefully
pampered by the queen and count d’Artois, because in those
moments of revelry, prolonged to the most disgusting excess of
gluttony and intoxication, he would sanction all their demands, was
made in his person and conduct sacred and unimpeachable. This was
the extreme folly of weakness. But, when it is also kept in view, that,
at the very period when he was declared inviolable, he was suspected,
in concert with the court, to be actually meditating his flight, there
seems to be a pusillanimity in it as contemptible as the pretended
dignity of the assembly was ridiculous.
True firmness consists in doing whatever is just and reasonable,
uninfluenced by any other consideration. The defining the power of
the crown in the assembly to be subordinate to the authority of the
people must have appeared to the kings of Europe a dangerous
encroachment on their indefeasible rights:—a heresy tending to
undermine their privileges, should such audacity pass unchastized,
and to destroy the splendour of royalty by presuming to control it’s
omnipotence. It was then scarcely to be expected, that their
resentment would be appeased by shielding the person of Louis
against the danger of intrigue and violence. It was not, indeed, the
preservation of the life of this unfortunate man, that interested them
so sensibly as to appall the sycophants of Europe.—No; it was the
attack made on despotism; and the attempt to draw aside the
splendid curtain which concealed it’s folly, that threw them into a
general ferment and agitation. This agitation could not fail to inspire
the court of Versailles with hope, and they stood prepared to take
advantage of the gathering storm, as eagerly as a distressed mariner,
who has long laid becalmed, perceiving at length a gentle heaving of
the sea, and feeling the undulating motion of his bark, foresees the
approaching breeze, and spreads his sails to catch the first breath of
wind. The effect of the feigned or real pity of many of the admirers of
the old system, who were deeply wounded by the wrong done, as they
insisted, to their king, was to be dreaded; for it was not to be
supposed, that the chivalrous spirit of France would be destroyed in
an instant, though swords had ceased to leap out of their scabbards
when beauty was not deified. It was then undoubtedly to be feared,
that they would risk their lives and fortunes to support the glory of
their master, and their own notions of honour: and the assembly, by
making Louis not accountable for any of his actions, however
insincere, unjust, or atrocious, was affording all his abettors a
shelter, encouraging at the same time his hypocrisy, and relaxing the
little energy of character, which his misfortune seemed to be calling
into play.
Mistaken lenity in politics is not more dangerous than a false
magnanimity is palpable littleness in the eyes of a man of simple
integrity. Besides, had the representatives of the people considered
Louis merely as a man, it is probable he would have acted more like
one. Instead of palliating the matter, they should, on the contrary,
have proclaimed to all Europe, with a tone of dignified firmness, that
the french nation, willing for themselves, regardless of the rights and
privileges of others, though respecting their prejudices, finding that
no compromise could be formed between the court and people,
whose interest neither justice nor policy ever required should be
distinct, do not consider themselves accountable to any power or
congress on earth, for any measure they may choose to adopt in
framing a constitution to regulate their own internal polity. That
treating their monarch like a man, and not as a mere idol for state
pageantry, they would wish, by establishing the dignity of truth and
justice, to give stability to the freedom of frenchmen, and leave a
monument in their institutions to immortalize a sincere and
acquiescing king. But that, though their ideas might differ greatly
from those of their neighbours, with whom they desired to live on the
most amicable terms, they would pursue the path of eternal reason in
consolidating the rights of man; and by a striking example lay the
foundation of the liberty of the whole globe, of that liberty which had
hitherto been confined to the small island of England, and enjoyed
imperfectly even there.
The house of Austria was at this period engaged in a war with the
turks, which obliged it to withdraw most of it’s troops from Flanders;
and the intelligence, that the flemings, highly discontented with the
innovations, which the vain weathercock Joseph the Second had
made in their form of worship, were on the eve of an insurrection,
more against the folly of the man than the despotism of his court,
calmed the fears of the french, as to the danger of being immediately
attacked by Germany. This security, for they had no dread of
Sardinia, made them consider the possibility of a counter-revolution
being effected by foreign enemies as far from alarming. It is true,
there was not any just cause of apprehension, unless they took into
the calculation, that the policy of Europe for ages past had been
subject to sudden changes; a state of profound tranquillity giving
place to sanguinary scenes of confusion, and inhuman butcheries—
often about such trifling insults and idle pretentions, as individuals
would be ashamed to make a pretext for quarrelling; and having
reason to expect these changes as long as the systems of courts
preserve their existence, France could not reckon, with any degree of
certainty, on the continuation of peace.—Neither did the national
assembly appear to have calculated upon it; for they undoubtedly
betrayed symptoms of pusillanimity, when they suffered their
conduct to be in the smallest degree influenced by the apprehension
of a combination of the crowned heads of Europe to replace the royal
diadem of France, should the most brilliant of it’s jewels be touched
by profane hands.
These fears, perhaps, were the secret cause, combined with the old
habit of adoring the king, as a point of honour, and loving the court,
as an affair of taste, that induced them to preserve the shadow of
monarchy in the new order of things. It’s preservation might have
been politically necessary; because, before abolishing any ancient
form, it is necessary to secure whatever political good may have
flowed from it, and guard against being exhausted by cutting off an
excrescence.—But, if the continuance of a king in the new system
were expedient to avert present evil, they should have allowed him
the power necessary to give energy to the government; and making
him responsible for the rectitude of his actions, the man would have
had a fair trial, and posterity, judging of his conduct, would have
been enabled to form a just estimate of a kingly government.
Machiavelian cunning, however, still directed the movements of all
the courts of Europe; and these political moles, too well perceiving
the timidity that was mixed with the blustering courage of the
assembly, only waited for a favourable season to overturn the rising
edifice. Their agents had private instructions to promote the escape
of Louis, as the surest mode of making a decided schism in the
national politics; and they firmly believed, that the affection still
subsisting for his christian majesty would facilitate the execution of
their plan. The court also presuming on the divisions and lenity of
the assembly, took the most indefatigable pains to foster in the mind
of the public, nay, in that of all Europe, pity for the degraded person
of the king, and detestation of the sacrilege, which had been
committed on the dignity of royalty. Their continual theme was the
ignominious state to which the most mild of the Bourbons was
reduced, by men, who usurped the reins of government, and
trampled on the honours of that august and ancient family.
Restraining the authority of a throne, which supported the most
abominable tyranny, they were shaking the despotism, which held in
bondage nine-tenths of the inhabitants of the world. These were
alarming signals to a certain class of men, to the drones and
myrmidons who live on the spoil and blood of industry and
innocence. The intrusion of knowledge, which was sure to render
them an useless set of beings in society, was to be prevented by
ingenious clamours, whilst a great number of weak, well-meaning
people, and still more knaves, enlisted under their banner.
The universal damp, which the revolution had given to the courts
of Europe, producing among them a lively sympathy for the sombre
atmosphere of Versailles, a general sorrow was consequently
expressed by all their minions, and expressed with unfeigned
concern; for the want of the usual routine of amusements tended to
make it real. Hope, indeed, began again to animate them, when the
king was prevailed on to concert his escape; yet their eagerness to
accelerate his departure for the frontiers, where they purposed to
erect the royal standard, to avail themselves of the proximity of
german connections, was in a great degree the cause of defeating that
ill-contrived design.
A design formed very early, and systematically pursued, was
probably rendered entirely abortive by the obstinacy of the court;
who still persisted to cherish the belief, that the public opinion was
changed only for the moment, and that their deeply rooted love of
royalty would bring them back to what they termed their duty, when
the effervescence excited by novelty had subsided. And thinking, that
the cordial reception given by the parisians to the soldiery had
contributed to estrange them, and effect the revolution, they
determined to regain their lost ground, and dazzle them by feasts,
instead of stealing on their affections by hospitality.—Still, bearing
impatiently their humiliating situation, the courtiers could not help
vauntingly exposing their project; and the babbling of joy showed the
weakness of the heads, that could so soon be intoxicated by hope.
A preparatory step was thought necessary to awaken a sense of
allegiance in the breasts of the people, and to promote a division
amongst them, if not their entire concurrence, after the cabinet
should have securely in their possession the person of the king; and
this division would then enable them to calculate their strength, and
act accordingly. For this purpose, in spite of the comments that had
been made on the festivity at Versailles, which seemed before to
insult the misery of the people, and greatly tended to provoke the
exertions that overturned the Bastille and changed the whole face of
things, they projected another entertainment to seduce the military,
encouraged to throng round the court, whilst famine was at the very
gates of Paris. But previously the old french guards, who had been
incorporated with the garde-bourgeoise, began to manifest some
symptoms of discontent at not being allowed to guard the person of
the king. Whether they considered their honour as wounded, or were
spirited up to aspire at regaining this privilege, is not decided; but it
is clear, that the court, either to facilitate the entrance of fresh
troops, or from a real dislike to men, who had taken such an active
part in disconcerting their first plot, opposed their wish; and even
the municipality, as has been already noticed, was induced to
request, that a regiment of fresh troops might be called in to guard
the person of the king, and keep the peace, which this trifling
dispute, swelled into an insurrection in the report, threatened to
disturb.
The king’s body-guards, whose time of service expired the first of
october, were still retained with those who came to replace them;
and an immense crowd of supernumeraries continued daily to
increase this corps, which had not yet sworn allegiance to the nation.
The officers, in particular, flocked to Versailles, amounting to
between eleven or twelve hundred, constantly parading together. The
universal topic was commiseration of the king’s fate, and
insinuations respecting the ambition of the assembly. Yet, even there
the court party seemed to be prevailing: a president attached to
loyalty was elected; and Mirabeau’s remonstrances, respecting the
augmentation of the troops, were disregarded.
Mean time, not only the officers of the new regiment, but those of
the national guards, were caressed by the court, whilst the citizens,
with more sagacity, were lavish of their attention to the soldiers. The
cabinet had not sufficient discernment to perceive, that the people
were now to be led, not driven; and the popular promoters of
anarchy, to serve their private interest, availed themselves,
unfortunately, but too well of this want of judgment.—Thus whilst
one party, declaiming on the necessity of order, seemed to be
endeavouring to rivet on them the chains of servitude, the other
lifted them above the law with vain glorious notions of their
sovereignty.—And this sovereignty of the people, the perfection of
the science of government, only to be attained when a nation is truly
enlightened, consisted in making them tyrants; nay the worst of
tyrants, because the instruments of mischief of the men, who
pretended to be subordinate to their will, though acting the very part
of the ministers whom they execrated.
 CHAPTER II.
ENTERTAINMENT AT VERSAILLES. THE NATIONAL COCKADE
TRAMPLED UNDER FOOT. A MOB OF WOMEN PROCEED TO THE
HOTEL-DE-VILLE—AND THENCE TO VERSAILLES. THE KING’S
REPLY TO THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY’S REQUEST, THAT HE
WOULD SANCTION THE DECLARATION OF RIGHTS AND THE FIRST
ARTICLES OF THE CONSTITUTION. DEBATES ON IT. ARRIVAL OF
THE MOB AT VERSAILLES. THE KING RECEIVES A DEPUTATION
FROM THE WOMEN, AND SANCTIONS THE DECREE FOR THE FREE
CIRCULATION OF GRAIN. THE ASSEMBLY SUMMONED. LA
FAYETTE ARRIVES WITH THE PARISIAN MILITIA. THE PALACE
ATTACKED BY THE MOB—WHO ARE DISPERSED BY THE NATIONAL
GUARDS. REFLECTIONS ON THE CONDUCT OF THE DUKE OF
ORLEANS.

On the first of october, in consequence of these fresh

machinations, a magnificent entertainment was given in the name of
the king’s body-guards; but really by some of their principal officers,
at the opera-house of the castle. The affectation of excluding the
dragoons, distinguished for their attachment to liberty, seemed to
show, but too plainly, the end in view, rendered still more
conspicuous by the unusual familiarity of persons of the first rank
with the lowest soldiers.
When their heads were heated by a sumptuous banquet, by the
tumult of an immense crowd, and the great profusion of delicious
wines and liqueurs, the conversation, purposely turned into one
channel, became unrestrained, and a chivalrous scene completed the
folly. The queen, to testify her satisfaction for the homage paid to
her, and the wishes expressed in her favour, exhibited herself to this
half-drunken multitude; carrying the dauphin in her arms, whom she
regarded with a mixture of sorrow and tenderness, and seeming to
implore in his favour the affection and zeal of the soldiers.
 This acting, for it is clear that the whole was a preconcerted
business, was still more intoxicating than the wine.—The
exclamation vive le roi, vive la reine, resounded from all sides, and
the royal healths were drunk over drawn swords, whilst that of the
nation was rejected with contempt by the body-guards. The music,
the choice could not have been the effect of chance, played the well
known air—O Richard! O my king! the universe abandons thee[32]!
and during this moment of fascination some voices, perhaps bribed
for the occasion, mingled execrations against the assembly. A
grenadier even darted from the midst of his comrades, and accusing
himself of having been unfaithful to his prince, endeavoured, several
times, to plunge his sword into his bosom. His held arm was not
indeed allowed to search for the disloyal heart; but some blood was
permitted to flow—and this theatrical display of sensibility, carried to
the highest pitch, produced emotions almost convulsive in the whole
circle, of which an english reader can scarcely form an idea. The king,
who is always represented as innocent, though always giving proofs
that he more than connived at the attempts to recover his power, was
likewise prevailed on to show himself at this entertainment. And
some of the same soldiery, who had refused to second the former
project of the cabal, were now induced to utter insults and menaces
against the very authority, they then supported. ‘The national
cockade,’ exclaimed Mirabeau, ‘that emblem of the defenders of
liberty, has been torn in pieces, and stamped under foot; and another
ensign put in it’s place.—Yes; even under the eye of the monarch,
who allowed himself to be styled—Restorer of the rights of his
people, they have dared to hoist a signal of faction.’
The same scene was renewed two days after, though with less
parade; and invitations for a similar treat were given for the
following week.
The rumour respecting them, which reached Paris, contained
many exaggerated circumstances; and was regarded as the
commencement of fresh hostilities, on the part of the court. The cry
now was, that the stunned aristocracy had again reared it’s head; and
that a number of old officers, chevaliers of St. Louis, had signed a
promise to join the body-guards in a new attempt. This list was said
to contain thirty thousand signatures; and idle as the tale was, it
seemed to be confirmed by the appearance of white and black
cockades, which inconsiderate individuals displayed at the risk of
their lives. These, said the parisians, are the first indications of a
projected civil war—the court wish only to have the king safe to head
them before they speak out:—he ought, therefore, to be removed to
Paris, inferred the politicians of the palais royal. The exasperating of
the people in this manner was certainly the most absurd blundering
folly that could have ruined a party, who apparently saw the
necessity of dividing the people in order to conquer them. It was, in
fact, a species of madness, and can be accounted for only by
recollecting the ineffable contempt really felt by the court for the
canaille, which made them still imagine the revolution to be only a
temporary convulsion, not believing it possible, in spite of the daily
events, that they could be crushed by the mass they despised. Their
presumption proceeded from their ignorance, and was incurable.
The queen was supposed to be at the head of this weak conspiracy,
to withdraw the soldiery from siding with the people. She had
presented colours to the national guards of Versailles, and when they
waited on her to express their thanks, she replied, with the most
winning affability, ‘the nation and the army ought to be as well
affected to the king as we ourselves are. I was quite charmed with
what passed on thursday.’ This was the day of the feast.
A scarcity of bread, the common grievance of the revolution,
aggravated the vague fears of the parisians, and made the people so
desperate, that it was not difficult to persuade them to undertake any
enterprize; and the torrent of resentment and enthusiasm required
only to be directed to a point to carry every thing before it. Liberty
was the constant watch word; though few knew in what it consisted.
—It seems, indeed, to be necessary, that every species of enthusiasm
should be fermented by ignorance to carry it to any height. Mystery
alone gives full play to the imagination, men pursuing with ardour
objects indistinctly seen or understood, because each man shapes
them to his taste, and looks for something beyond even his own
conception, when he is unable to form a just idea.
The parisians were now continually brooding over the wrongs they
had heretofore only enumerated in a song; and changing ridicule into
invective, all called for redress, looking for a degree of public
happiness immediately, which could not be attained, and ought not
to have been expected, before an alteration in the national character
seconded the new system of government.
From the enjoyment of more freedom than the women of other
parts of the world, those of France have acquired more independence
of spirit than any others; it has, therefore, been the scheme of
designing men very often since the revolution, to lurk behind them
as a kind of safe-guard, working them up to some desperate act, and
then terming it a folly, because merely the rage of women, who were
supposed to be actuated only by the emotions of the moment. Early
then on the fifth of october a multitude of women by some impulse
were collected together; and hastening to the hôtel-de-ville obliged
every female they met to accompany them, even entering many
houses to force others to follow in their train.
The concourse, at first, consisted mostly of market women, and the
lowest refuse of the streets, women who had thrown off the virtues of
one sex without having power to assume more than the vices of the
other. A number of men also followed them, armed with pikes,
bludgeons, and hatchets; but they were strictly speaking a mob,
affixing all the odium to the appellation it can possibly import; and
not to be confounded with the honest multitude, who took the
Bastille.—In fact, such a rabble has seldom been gathered together;
and they quickly showed, that their movement was not the effect of
public spirit.
They first talked of addressing the committee appointed by the
municipality to superintend the operations necessary to obtain
provision for the city, and to remonstrate respecting their inattention
or indifference to the public calamity. Mean time a new cord was
fixed to the notorious lamp-iron, where the amusement of death was
first tolerated. The national guards, forming a hedge of bayonets to
prevent the women from entering the hotel, kept them in suspense a
few moments.—When, uttering a loud and general cry, they hurled a
volley of stones at the soldiers, who, unwilling, or ashamed, to fire on
women, though with the appearance of furies, retreated into the hall,
and left the passage free. They then sought for arms; and breaking
open the doors of the magazines, soon procured fusils, cannons, and
ammunition; and even took advantage of the confusion to carry off
money and notes belonging to the public. In the interim some went
to search for the volunteers of the Bastille, and chose a commander
from among them to conduct the party to Versailles; whilst others
tied cords to the carriages of the cannons to drag them along.—But
these, being mostly marine artillery, did not follow with the alacrity
necessary to accord with their wishes; they, therefore, stopped
several coaches, forcing the men to get out and the ladies to join
them; fastening the cannons behind, on which a number of the most
furious mounted, brandishing whatever weapon they had found, or
the matches of the cannons. Some drove the horses, and others
charged themselves with the care of the powder and ball, falling into
ranks to facilitate their march. They took the road by the Champs
Elysées about noon, to the number of four thousand, escorted by
four or five hundred men, armed with every thing on which they
could lay their hands.
Mean time the tocsin sounded from all parts; the french guards,
still urged on by wounded pride, loudly declared, that the king ought
to be brought to Paris; and many of the citizens, not on duty,
concurred with the rest of the national guards in the same opinion,
particularly those accustomed to attend the harangues at the Palais
Royal. La Fayette, refusing to accompany, endeavoured to calm
them. But finding, that the tumult increased, and that prayers were
giving place to menaces, he offered to make known to the king, at
their head, the wishes of the capital, if the municipality gave him
orders to this effect. Their council was now assembled; yet
prolonging the deliberation till between four and five o’clock in the
afternoon, the people became so very impatient, that it was thought
prudent to allow them to set out: and the exclamations of the
populace proved how easy it was to govern, or lead them astray, by
every fresh hope.
Few events have happened at Paris, that have not been attributed
by the different parties to the machinations of the leaders on the
other side; to blacken whose characters, when they had the upper
hand, the most audacious falsehoods have been industriously
circulated; the detection of which has induced many calm observers
to believe, that all the accounts of plots and conspiracies were
fabricated in the same manner; not considering, that even the
universality of these suspicions was a proof of the intriguing
character of the people, who from a knowledge of themselves became
thus mistrustful of others. It was currently reported, that very
considerable sums had been distributed amongst the mob, before it
marched to Versailles; and, though many fabulous stories of showers
of gold have since been retailed by the credulous, this seems, from
their subsequent conduct, to have had some foundation: for nothing
like the heroism, the disinterestedness, appeared, which, in most
other risings of the parisians, has formed a striking contrast with
their barbarity; sometimes sufficient to oblige us, lamenting the
delusions of ignorance, to give the soft name of enthusiasm to
cruelty; respecting the intention, though detesting the effects. Now,
on the contrary, acting like a gang of thieves, they gave colour to the
report—that the first instigators of the riot were hired assassins.—
And hired by whom?—The public voice repeats, on every side, the
despicable duke of Orleans, whose immense estate had given him an
undue influence in the bailliages, and who still exercised all the
means that cunning could devise, and wealth produce, to revenge
himself on the royal family. He was particularly incensed against the
queen, who having treated him with the contempt which he
doubtless merited, and even influenced the king to banish him to one
of his country seats, when he uttered some popular sentiments, he
continued to nourish the most implacable hatred to her person,
whilst the changing sentiments of the nation respecting the present
branch of his family excited in him hopes, that would at once have
gratified both his revenge and his ambition.
There is no calculating the mischief which may be produced by a
revengeful cunning knave, possessing the forcible engine of gold to
move his projects, and acting by agency, which, like a subterraneous
fire, that for a long time has been putting the combustible matter
into a state of fusion, bursts out unexpectedly, and the sudden
eruption spreads around terrour and destruction.
The agents of despotism, and of vengeful ambition, employed the
same means to agitate the minds of the parisians; and covered as
they now are with foul stains, it is an acknowledgement due to their
original good disposition, to note, that at this period they were so
orderly it required considerable management to lead them into any
gross irregularity of conduct. It was, therefore, necessary for the
duke’s instruments to put in motion a body of the most desperate
women; some of whom were half famished for want of bread, which
had purposely been rendered scarce to facilitate the atrocious design
of murdering both the king and queen in a broil, that would appear
to be produced solely by the rage of famine.
The shameless manner in which the entertainment of the officers
of the body-guards had been conducted; the indiscreet visit of the
queen to interest the army in the cause of royalty, coming in artfully
after the rabble of soldiers had been allowed to enter; together with
the imprudent expressions of which she afterwards made use; served
as pretexts, nay, may have been some of the causes of these women
suspecting, that the dearth of bread in the capital was owing to the
contrivance of the court, who had so often produced the same effect
to promote their sinister purposes. They believed then, that the only
sure way to remedy such a grievous calamity, in future, would be to
implore the king to reside at Paris: and the national militia,
composed of more orderly citizens, who thought the report of a
premeditated escape was not without foundation, imagined, that
they should nip a civil war in the bud, by preventing the king’s
departure, and separate him effectually from the cabal, to whom they
attributed all his misconduct.
Whilst the multitude were advancing, the assembly were
considering the king’s reply to their request to sanction the
declaration of rights, and the first articles of the constitution, before
the supplies were granted. The reply was couched in terms somewhat
vague, yet it’s meaning could not be misunderstood.—He observed,
that the articles of the constitution could be judged of only in their
connection with the whole; nevertheless he thought it natural, that at
the moment the nation was called upon to assist the government by a
signal act of confidence and patriotism, they should expect to be re-
assured respecting their principal interest.—‘Accordingly,’ he
continues, ‘taking it for granted, that the first articles of the
constitution, which you have presented to me, united to the
completion of your labours, will satisfy the wishes of my people, and
secure the happiness and prosperity of the kingdom, conformably to
your desire I accept them; but with one positive condition, from
which I will never depart; namely, that from the general result of
your deliberations the executive power shall have it’s entire effect in
the hands of the monarch. Still it remains for me to assure you with
frankness, that, if I give my sanction of acceptance to the several
articles, which you have laid before me, it is not because they
indiscriminately give me an idea of perfection; but I believe it
laudable in me to pay this respect to the wishes of the deputies of the
nation, and to the alarming circumstances, which so earnestly press
us to desire above all things the prompt re-establishment of peace,
order, and confidence.
‘I shall not deliver my sentiments respecting your declaration of
the rights of man and of citizens. It contains excellent maxims proper
to direct your deliberations; but principles susceptible of application,
and even of different interpretations, cannot be justly appreciated,
and have only need of being so when their true sense is determined
by the laws, to which they ought to be the basis.’
In the subterfuge employed in this answer, the profound
dissimulation of the king appears; and that ‘pitiful respect for false
honour,’ which makes a man boggle at a naked untruth, even when
uttering a number of contemptible prevarications. Thus did he at
first struggle against every concession, against granting any real
freedom to the people; yet afterwards unable to maintain his ground,
he impotently gave way before the storm he had raised, every time
losing a part of the authority which depended on opinion.
The assembly manifested an universal discontent. One of the
members remarked, that the king withheld his acceptance of the
declaration of rights; and only yielded to circumstances in accepting
the constitutional articles: he, therefore, moved, that no taxes should
be levied, before the declaration of rights and the constitution should
be accepted, without any reservation.—Another asserted, that the
king’s reply ought to have been counter-signed by one of the
ministers. What an absurdity! yet the inviolability of the king
standing in their way, it seemed to be necessary to secure ministerial
responsibility, to render it null; not only to prevent the ministers
from finding shelter behind it, but to make it utterly useless to the
king, who was thus, literally speaking, reduced to a cipher. Mirabeau,
however, after alluding with energy to the entertainment, which, out
of derision, had been termed patriotic, made three or four motions.
One was, ‘that no act emanating from the king should be declared
without the signature of a secretary of state.’—So inconsistent was
the man, who argued with such eloquence for the absolute veto:—
Another was, ‘that his majesty would please to be explicit; and not by
a conditional consent, extorted by circumstances, leave any doubt of
his sincere concurrence in the mind of the people.’ It was also
noticed, to corroborate the inference, that the king was only yielding,
for the moment, to opinions which he hoped to see exploded, that the
decree for the circulation of grain had been altered before the
publication, and the usual preamble, for such is our pleasure,
formed a strange contrast with an acknowledgement of the legislative
rights of the nation. Robespierre, particularly, maintained, that the
nation had not any need of the assistance of the monarch to
constitute itself—that the king’s reply was not an acceptance, but a
censure; and, consequently, an attack on the rights of the people.
This seemed virtually the opinion of the assembly, though
Mirabeau’s soft style of expressing their will was adopted. It was
particularly in this decision, that the deputies displayed a great
degree of the weakness, which mistakes temerity for courage, and the
shadow of justice for verity.—And affecting to say, to reconcile a
contradiction, that the authority of kings is suspended as often as the
sovereign is occupied in framing the elements of the constitution, or
altering fundamental laws, they demonstrated the inconsistency of
their own system, and acknowledged it’s absurdity; which is still
more flagrantly shown in Mirabeau’s irrational declaration, that, ‘by
a pious fiction of the law, the king cannot himself deceive; but the
grievances of the people demanding victims, these victims are the
ministers.’
At this juncture of the debate the tumultuous concourse of women
arrived at Versailles: but it must not be unnoticed, that there was a
number of men with them, disguised in women’s clothes; which
proves, that this was not, as has been asserted, a sudden impulse of
necessity, There were besides men in their own garb armed like
ruffians, with countenances answerable, who, swearing vengeance
against the queen and the body-guards, seemed to be preparing to
put their threats in execution. Some barbarians, volunteers in guilt,
might perhaps have joined, spurred on solely by the hope of plunder,
and a love of tumult; but it is clear, that the principal movers played
a surer game.
The women had taken two routes; and one party, without arms,
presented themselves at the gate of the assembly, whilst the other
clustered round the palace waiting for them. The avenues were
already filled with body-guards, the flanders regiment was drawn up
in ranks; in short, the soldiers were gathered together quickly in one
quarter, though the people of Versailles were exceedingly alarmed,
and particularly by the appearance of the vagabonds, who followed
the female mob.
With some difficulty the women were prevailed on to allow a few
to enter orderly into the assembly, with a spokesman to make known
their demand; whilst crowds, taking refuge in the galleries from the
rain, presented there the strange sight of pikes, fusils, and
tremendous sticks bound with iron. Their orator represented the
grievances of the people, and the necessity of continually providing
for their subsistence: he expressed the concern of the parisians on
account of the slow formation of the constitution, and attributed this
delay to the opposition of the clergy. A bishop then presided in the
absence of Mounier, the president, who had been dispatched by the
assembly with their expostulatory petition to the king. A deputy, to
spare him the embarrassment of a reply to the insinuation against
his order, reprimanded the petitioner for calumniating that
respectable body. He accordingly made an apology, yet justified
himself by declaring, that he only reported the purport of the
discontentment of Paris. They were informed, in reply, by the vice-
president, that a deputation was already sent to the king, requesting
his sanction of a decree to facilitate the interiour circulation of grain
and flour: and finding, that it was impossible to attend to the
business of the day, he adjourned the assembly, without waiting for
the return of the president.
The women about the palace entered into conversation with the
soldiers, some of whom said, ‘that were the king to recover all his
authority, the people would never want bread!’ This indiscreet
insinuation exasperated them; and they replied in the language, that
is proverbial for being the most abusive. A fray also ensuing, brought
on by a dispute relative to the affair of the cockades, one of the body-
guards drew his sword, which provoked a national guard of
Versailles to give him a blow with his musket, that broke his arm.
The national troops were eager to convince the mob, that they
were equally offended at the disrespect paid to the emblem of liberty;
and the flemish regiment, though they were in battle array, made the
women let their rings drop into their guns, to be convinced that they
were not charged: saying, ‘It was true, they had drunk the wine of the
body guards; but what did that engage them to do? They had also
cried, vive le roi, as the people themselves did every day; and it was
their intention to serve him faithfully, but not against the nation!’—
with other speeches to the same effect;—adding, ‘that one of their
officers had ordered a thousand cockades; and they knew not why
they were not distributed!’ Enraged by the tenour of this discourse, a
body-guard’s man struck one of the soldiers talking thus, who, in
return, fired on him, and fractured his arm. All was now confusion;
and every thing tended to render the body-guards more odious to the
populace.
The king arrived in the midst of it from hunting, and admitted at
the same time the deputation from the national assembly, and an
address from the women. He received the latter with great affability,
testified his sorrow on account of the scarcity of bread at Paris, and
immediately sanctioned the decree, relative to the free circulation of
grain, which he had just received from the assembly. The woman
who spoke, attempting to kiss his hand, he embraced her with
politeness, and dismissed them in the most gentleman-like manner.
They immediately rejoined their companions, charmed by the
reception they had met with; and the king sent orders to the guards
not to make use of their arms. The count d’Estaing, the commander
in chief, announced likewise to the militia of Versailles, that the
body-guards would the next day take the oath of allegiance to the
nation, and put on the patriotic cockade. ‘They are not worthy,’ was
the indignant growl of the multitude.
Some women now returning to Paris, to report the gracious
behaviour of the king, were unfortunately maltreated by a
detachment of body-guards, commanded by a nobleman; and the
volunteers of the Bastille coming to their assistance, two men, and
three horses, were killed on the spot. These same irritated women
meeting, likewise, the parisian militia, on their way to Versailles,
gave them an exaggerated description of the conduct of the guards.
The court now taking the alarm, fearing that their plan would be
defeated, by the king’s being obliged to go to Paris, urged him
immediately to get out for Metz, and the carriages were actually
prepared. It is scarcely credible that they would have gone so far
without his concurrence.
 One loaded coach had been permitted to go out of the gate; but the
national troops beginning to suspect what was going forward,
obliged it to re-enter. The king then, with his usual address, finding
his escape at that time impracticable, and not wishing to shed blood
in forcing his way, made a merit of necessity, and declared he would
rather perish than see the blood of frenchmen streaming in his
quarrel! So easy is it for a man, versed in the language of duplicity, to
impose on the credulous; and to impress on candid minds a belief of
an opinion that they would gladly receive without any doubting allay,
did not other circumstances more strongly contradict the persuasion.
This declaration, however, which was re-echoed with great
eagerness, was considered as a manifest proof of the purity of his
intentions, and a mark of his fixed adherence to the cause which he
affected to espouse. Yet, to prove the contrary, it is only necessary to
observe, that he put off the acceptance of the declaration of rights,
and the first articles of the constitution, till after the attempt to
escape was frustrated: for it was near eleven o’clock when he sent for
the president, to put into his hands a simple acceptation, and to
request him to convoke the assembly immediately, that he might
avail himself of their counsel at this crisis; alarmed by the mob
without, who, exposed to all the inclemency of the weather, it being a
very wet and stormy night, were uttering the most horrid
imprecations against the queen and the body-guards.
A drum instantly summoned the assembly; and La Fayette arriving
with his army in less than an hour after, the president was again
called for, who returned to the assembly with the king’s assurance,
that he had not even thought of leaving them, nor would he ever
separate himself from the representatives of the people.
La Fayette had previously assured the king of the fidelity of the
metropolis, and that he had been expressly sent by the municipality
of Paris to guard his august person. A rumour had prevailed, ever
since the arrival of the women, that the parisian militia were coming
to second them; but as the commune of Paris had not determined till
late in the afternoon, the messenger from La Fayette to the palace
could not have reached Versailles long before him: but the court
supposing that they would come, and having heard of the wish of the
parisians to bring the king to Paris, where they had always spies to
give them the earliest notice of what was going forward, pressed him
to set out without loss of time; still they were actuated solely by the
desire of getting him away, and not from any apprehension that his
life was in danger.
After tranquilizing the king, La Fayette joined the parisian militia
in the avenue, to inform them, that the king had sanctioned the
decree of the assembly for expediting the more speedy circulation of
provisions; that he accepted, without any reservation, of the
declaration of rights, with the first articles of the constitution,
declaring at the same time his unshaken resolution to remain among
his people; and that he consented also to have a detachment of the
national troops of Paris to contribute to guard his person.
Joy now took place of dread at Versailles; and the citizens
distributed their addresses amongst the soldiers, offering them
lodgings; they having been previously requested, by the beating of a
drum, to receive as many of the parisian militia as they possibly
could. The rest, after passing several hours in arms round the palace,
sought for shelter, as the morning began to dawn, in the churches.
Every thing appearing quiet, the harassed king and queen were
prevailed on to seek the repose they needed; and La Fayette, about
five in the morning, retired to his chamber, to write to the
municipality an account of his proceedings, before he likewise
endeavoured to snatch a little rest.
Scarcely an hour after, the restless mob, great part of which had
taken refuge in the hall and galleries of the assembly, began to prowl
about. The most decent of the women, who had been pressed into the
service, stole away during the night. The rest, with the whole gang of
ruffians, rushed towards the palace, and finding its avenues
unguarded, entered like a torrent; and some among them, most
probably, conceived, that this was the moment to perpetrate the
crime for which they had been drawn from their lurking-holes in
Paris.
Insulting one of the body-guards who opposed their entrance, he
fired, and killed a man. This was a fresh pretext for entering to
search for the murderer, as he was termed by these rioters; and
driving the guards before them up the grand stair-case, they began to
break into the different apartments, vowing vengeance against the
body-guards, in which were mingled the bitterest curses, all levelled
at the queen.