With
the "great fear" raging in the countryside,
the National Assembly was motivated to move quickly. On the night
of August 4, the delegates rose one by one to propose new reforms
and to surrender class privileges. The manorial system in which
peasants were tied to their landlords through obligations and
fees were gone, as was the corvee and all tithing to the church.
The nobility and the clergy gave up their exemptions from taxation.
By the end of August, feudalism was dead in France. These were
called the "August days."
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