... paid little or no taxes at all. People who are starving and can barely afford to survive can only pay so much before they refuse to pay anymore. It is not surprising that the third estate was driven to immediate action with Louis XVI's demand for higher taxes. Ideas of liberty and equality sprang up with the onset of the American Revolution and paved a way for the third estate to change France's system of government. Philosophers such as Voltaire spread ideas of reform that excited the peasants to believe there was a chance for a better life. Louis appointed a man by the name of Robert Turgot ease the financial crisis of France, but he had difficulties when he tried to introduce a major reform. Turgot could not establish a change in the taxation policies of France. He was unable to introduce a higher tax to the second ...

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