The year was 1789 in France, and Louis XVI was King. He inherited a monarchy shaped by his predecessors, Louis XV and Louis XIV, who had built and expanded the elaborate court system centered at Versailles. Over time, maintaining this court became enormously expensive, while the French people grew increasingly frustrated by what they saw as government waste and royal excess.

In May of that year, King Louis XVI summoned representatives of the clergy, nobility, and commoners to the Menus-Plaisirs building in Versailles to discuss reforms and find a way forward. The discussions did not go well.

The wealthy representatives of the common people eventually broke away and declared themselves the National Assembly, challenging the authority of the King and the traditional political order. By the end of August 1789, this movement led to the signing of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen—one of the founding documents of the new political regime.

To celebrate, a banquet was organized to mark the arrival of the Flanders Regiment. A table was set for 210 guests on the Opera parterre, and the wine flowed freely.

Organizing a lavish banquet while many citizens struggled to afford food proved to be a terrible miscalculation. In October 1789, enraged by both hunger and royal opulence, an armed crowd of Parisian women—accompanied by a number of men—marched on Versailles. Their actions forced King Louis XVI and Queen Marie Antoinette to leave the palace and permanently relocate to Paris.

According to Google’s AI summary:

“Versailles is the birthplace of the French Revolution, serving as the dramatic backdrop for its most explosive early events. While the revolution eventually engulfed all of France—centered largely around Paris—it was triggered in Versailles in 1789.”

Yesterday, President Trump signed the Iran Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) at Versailles. Representative Seth Moulton commented:

“It’s an appropriate place to sign a surrender document. And it’s too bad that the president is completely oblivious to history to understand the parallels there.”

I generally understood what he was referring to, but I didn’t know the details.

It’s been mentioned many times recently so I’ve been wanting to spend more time studying the French Revolution, and this seemed as good a reason as any.

When we lived in Germany, we visited Versailles. What I remember most are the beautiful mirrors. I think we were on a guided tour, but either I couldn’t hear the guide or we wandered off in our own direction until it was time to return to the bus. Unfortunately, I didn’t pay much attention in my college history class, either. History wasn’t one of my favorite subjects—at least not then.

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Recently, however, I’ve become much more interested in it.

Looking back, I think some of what I learned during that visit to Versailles must have stayed with me because I had a vague sense of what Representative Moulton was talking about.

Trump has now added the United States to a long list of significant documents signed at Versailles. The Palace of Versailles is associated with several highly symbolic moments in history. Among them are the 1871 proclamation of the German Empire following the Franco-Prussian War and the 1919 Treaty of Versailles that formally ended World War I.

That is what Representative Moulton meant when he described Versailles as “an appropriate place to sign a surrender document.”

History may not repeat itself, but it does seem to rhyme.

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Written By: Me

Edited By: ChatGPT

Image By: ChatGPT (prompt & creation)