DBQ: Was Napoleon Bonaparte A Good Leader?

In 1789, the French Revolution had started. The Frenchmen of the 3rd estate revolted against the King and the unfair inequality the French Laws. After the death of King Louis XVI, France fell into chaos. There have been attempts to restore order into France, however all failed. This time was called the Reign of Terror. Then Napoleon Bonaparte came and restored order. He was previously a military leader who had also fought in the French Revolution. However, he wasn’t all he was caked up to be. Napoleon was power hungry, egoistic and tried to push his beliefs over other countries’; however, even with this, Napoleon was a good ruler that, even with his manipulative ways, was able to have France support him through thick and thin.

Napoleon craved land and power. The point of the French Revolution was to gain freedom and to no longer have a monarchy. However, this was not shown after Napoleon conquered Italy. According to (Doc 7), Napoleon “considered himself entitled to strip all of his conquered Italian territories of their cultural and artistic treasures.” Napoleon is taking Italy’s way of life and more or less declaring them as Frenchmen with this conquer. He says “Rome is no longer Rome. The whole of Rome is in Paris.” Napoleon removed their right to remain Italians, which is the equivalent of removing their freedom all together.

Napoleon Crossing the Alps, painted by Jacques Louis David (Doc 3), shows a distinct painting of Napoleon. Him and his horse takes up most of the painting with little background. Napoleon’s pose showed him upon his horse calmly pointing upwards. Some of his troops are hauling things up the slope on foot in the background and aren’t as noticeable as Napoleon in the painting. In the bottom left corner of the painting, on one the rocks, is “BONAPARTE” engraved next to two other names. Napoleon’s amount of space on the painting shows his place of power and dominance over