The Law of 22 Prairial, also known as the loi de la Grande Terreur, the law of the Reign of Terror, was enacted on June 10, 1794 (22 Prairial of the Year II under the French Revolutionary Calendar). It was one of the ordinances passed during this stage of the French Revolution by means of which the Committee of Public Safety, under the auspices of Robespierre, via his mouthpiece Georges Auguste Couthon, simplified the judicial process to one of prosecution and indictment. It extended the reach of the Revolutionary Tribunal, and limited the ability of the accused to defend themselves, broadening the scope of those who might be brought within the purview of revolutionary justice. The penalty for all offences under the jurisdiction of the Revolutionary Tribunal was death.
It provided for a climate of moral suspicion with the clause which stipulated that:
Every citizen is empowered to seize conspirators and counterrevolutionaries, and to bring them before the magistrates. He is required to denounce them as soon as he knows of them.
Many in the Convention were opposed to the Law, including some who were on the Committee of Public Safety themselves, fearing that the concentration of power would lead inevitably to dictatorship and damage yet further the Republic.
The Law of 22Prairial, An II The Law of 22Prairial, An II
Finally, all who are designated in previous laws relative to the punishment of conspirators and counter-revolutionaries, and who, by whatever means or by whatever appearances they assume, have made an attempt against the liberty, unity, and security of the Republic, or labored to prevent the strengthening thereof.
The Convention modifies all those provisions of previous laws which are at variance with the present law, and it does not intend that laws concerning the organization of the ordinary courts should apply to the crimes of counter-revolution or to the functioning of the Revolutionary Tribunal.
The aim of revolutionary government is to establish it This was to be achieved by the passing of laws and controls necessary to strike terror in the hearts of counter revolutionaries.
The terror was their weapon, with which to establish and restructure areas of education, war and munitions, provisioning and supply, and ultimately change the very principles and traditions daily life relied upon.
It is for this reason that they were able to create a virtual dictatorship over France and introduce policies such as the policy of Suspects, and the Law of 22Prairial, (June 10, 1794), which suspended a suspects right to a public trial and to legal assistance.
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