BRISSOT DE WARVILLE, JEAN PIERRE ( 1754-93). A French jurist and politician.
Ile was born at Chartres, January 14, 1754. Though his father was a 'modest innkeeper,' Brissot received a good education, and wa_s trained for the bar. Two scholarly works on criminal law, Theo•ie des lois eriminelles 117140), and Iiibliotheync drs lois crimincllcs, published soon after, established his reputation as a jurist. llis passion for political studies carried him beyond the narrow bounds of his profession, and. in conjunction with his friends Claviere and N iraben u, he produced several works on finance. A master of the English lan guage, he attempted to conduct in London a jour nal entitled Journal des Lycecs, hut not being suc cessful, returned to Paris. lle was imprisoned in the Bastille for four months, on a false charge of having written a brochure against the Queen. Upon his release he again engaged in the writing of pamphlets upon politics and economics, and was compelled to take refuge in England for a time, on account of his fearless expression of opinion upon the condition of affairs in France. In 1788 he founded the Society of the Friends of the Negroes (Societe des Amis des Noirs),and visited the United States to study the problems of slavery and emancipation and to promote the abolition of the slave trade. At the outbreak of
the Revolution he returned to France and en tered actively into political affairs, establishing a journal, Le Potriote Francais. which at once became the recognized organ of the Republicans. He became the leader of a strong group of young reformers, who were known as Brissotins, and who afterwards formed the Girondist Party. He was frequently consulted by the Constitu tional Committee of the Assembly, and in 1791 was elected to that body from Paris, against the opposition of the Court party. He was also a member of the Convention, and used his influ ence against anarchy and for moderation. He disapproved the execution of the King. and urged that the question be submitted to the people. He thus incurred the distrust and hostility of the extreme Jacobins, who came into power in 1793, and was one of the twenty-one Girondist leaders who were guillotined on October 31 of that year.
Consult: Brissot, Memoires pour scrvir l'histoire de la Revolution, 4 vols. (Paris, 1830; new edition by Lescure, 1877) ; Desmoulins, The History of the Brissotins, translated from the French (London, 1794).