Deposition voted by the Senate — 3 avril 1814

Under Talleyrand's presidency, a provisional government had the Conservative Senate vote the deposition of Napoleon and his family, on the grounds that he had 'violated his oath'. The body meant to guard the Constitution undid the Empire in two sittings. The marshals, gathered at Fontainebleau, would refuse to march on Paris and force the abdication.

Talleyrand organises the succession

Having stayed in Paris when the court left, Talleyrand received Alexander I in his house on the rue Saint-Florentin and convinced him that no peace was possible either with Napoleon or with a regency. On 1 April 1814 the conservative Senate, summoned by him, set up a provisional government of five members over which he presided.

The Senate was the body which the Constitution of Year VIII had charged with guarding it, and whose members had been appointed and endowed by the Emperor. It was the Senate that would undo the Empire.

The act of deposition

On 2 April the Senate voted the act declaring Napoleon deposed from the throne, together with his family, and releasing army and citizens from their oath. The Legislative Body concurred the next day.

The ground was legal: the Emperor had 'violated his oath' by raising men and taxes without law, suppressing the intermediate bodies, governing by decree. The case was accurate; it was above all late, coming from assemblies that had registered everything for ten years.

Fontainebleau answers

At Fontainebleau, Napoleon wanted to march on Paris with the sixty thousand men left to him. On 4 April a delegation of marshals — Ney at their head — refused: the army would not march. He signed an abdication in favour of his son.

That same night Marmont's corps went over to the allies at Versailles, stripping Fontainebleau of its last lever. On 6 April the abdication became unconditional, and the Senate called Louis XVIII to the throne. The Empire was not overthrown by foreign arms alone: it was dissolved by its own institutions.