This book is the first full-dress electoral history of the French Restoration. It examines the institutional structure of Restoration elections as well as the play of political factors in the final years of the Bourbon monarchy. It tells why the French king Charles X and his prime minister Joseph de Villele decided to call the general election of 1827, and the reasons for the dramatic defeat they suffered; the means employed to elect a chamber of deputies that would sustain the reactionary leanings of the king; and the range of efforts by both left and extreme right oppositions to win the election. The study rests upon extensive research in the national and departmental archives of France and on a close reading of the press and pamphlet literature.
