BRISSOT, JACQUES PIERRE who as sumed the name of DE WARVILLE, French Girondist, was born at Chartres, where his father was an innkeeper, on Jan. 14, 1754. Brissot received a good education and entered the office of a lawyer at Paris. His first works, Theorie des lois criminelles (1781) and Bibliotheque philosophique du legislateur (1782), were on the philosophy of law, and showed how thoroughly Brissot was imbued with the ethical precepts of Rousseau. The first work was dedicated to Voltaire. Brissot was a prolific jour nalist and pamphleteer, and on an enforced absence from France he met some of the English abolitionists and visited the United States in 1788 in connection with the abolitionist movement.
From the first, Brissot threw himself heart and soul into the Revolution. He edited the Patriote francais from 1789 to I 793, and being a well-informed and capable man took a prominent part in affairs. Upon the demolition of the Bastille the keys were presented to him. Famous for his speeches at the Jacobin club, he was elected a member of the municipality of Paris, then of the legislative assembly, and later of the national convention. During the legislative assembly his knowledge of foreign affairs enabled him as member of the diplomatic committee practically to direct the foreign policy of France, and the declaration of war against the emperor on April 20, 1792, and that against England on July 1, 1793, were largely due to him. While to others these were a crusade for liberty, to Brissot they were a convenient way of exposing and dethroning the king. He was inferior in many ways to the nobler Girondins like Vergniaud, but he was im mensely their superior in parliamentary intrigue and political manoeuvring. So much did he become their leader that they were often named "Brissotins," and contemporary opinion often as cribed the violence of the conflict to the personal hatred between Robespierre and Brissot. He was involved in the downfall of his party and perished courageously by the guillotine on Oct. 31, '793.
See Helena Williams, Souvenirs de la Revolution francaise (1827) ; Memoires de Brissot, sur ses contemporains et la Revolution francaise, published by his sons, with notes by F. de Montrol (183o) ; F. A. Aulard, Les Portraits litteraires a la fin du XVIIIe siecle, pendant la Revolution (1883) ; F. A. Aulard, Les Orateurs de la Legislative et de la Convention (2nd ed. igo5).