Editing French Directory (section)

==== Preparing the coup d'état ====
{{main|18 Brumaire}}
[[File:Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès - crop.jpg|thumb|[[Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès]] first proposed the coup d'état, but he was left out of the final resulting government]]
[[File:Joseph Fouché.png|thumb|[[Joseph Fouché]], Minister of Police, assured that the police would not interfere in Bonaparte's seizure of power]]
The rule that Directors must to be at least forty years old became one justification for the [[Coup of 18 Brumaire]]: the coup d'état took place on 9 November 1799, when Bonaparte was thirty years old.{{sfn|Tulard|Fayard|Fierro|1998|pp=704–705}} Bonaparte returned to France, landing at the fishing village of [[Saint-Raphaël, Var|Saint-Raphaël]] on 9 October 1799, and made a triumphal progression northward to Paris. His victory over the Ottoman Turks at the [[Battle of Abukir (1799)|Battle of Abukir]] had been widely reported, and overshadowed the other French victories at the [[Second Battle of Zurich]] and the [[Battle of Bergen (1799)|Battle of Bergen]]. Between [[Avignon]] and Paris, he was welcomed by large, enthusiastic crowds, who saw him as a saviour of the Republic from foreign enemies and the corruption of the Directory. Upon his arrival in Paris he was elected to the {{Lang|fr|[[Institut de France]]|italic=no}} for the scientific accomplishments of his expedition to Egypt. He was welcomed by royalists because he was from a minor noble family in [[Corsica]], and by the Jacobins because he had suppressed the attempted royalist ''coup d'état'' at the beginning of the Directory. His brother Lucien, though only twenty-four years old, became a prominent figure in the Council of Five Hundred because of his name.{{sfn|Tulard|Fayard|Fierro|1998|pp=260–261}}

Bonaparte's first ambition was to be appointed to the Directory, but he was not yet forty years old, the minimum age set by the Constitution, and the Director [[Louis-Jérôme Gohier|Gohier]], a strict legalist, blocked that avenue. His earliest ally had been the Director Barras, but he disliked Barras because his wife [[Joséphine de Beauharnais|Joséphine]] had been his mistress before she married Bonaparte, and because of charges of corruption that surrounded Barras and his allies. Bonaparte wrote later that the Jacobin director, General [[Jean-François-Auguste Moulin]], approached Bonaparte and suggested that he lead a ''coup d'état'', but he declined; he wished to end the Revolution, not continue it.{{sfn|Lefebvre|1977|p=723}} Sieyés, who had been looking for a war hero and general to assist in a ''coup d'état'', had originally in mind General Joubert, but Joubert had been killed at the [[Battle of Novi]] in August 1799. He then approached General [[Jean Victor Marie Moreau]], but Moreau was not interested. The first meeting between Sieyés and Bonaparte, on 23 October 1799, went badly; the two men each had enormous egos and instantly disliked each other. Nonetheless, they had a strong common interest and, on 6 November 1799, they formalized their plan.{{sfn|Tulard|Fayard|Fierro|1998|pp=260–261}}

The ''coup d'état'' was carefully planned by Sieyès and Bonaparte, with the assistance of Bonaparte's brother Lucien, the diplomat and consummate intriguer [[Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord|Talleyrand]], the Minister of Police [[Joseph Fouché|Fouché]], and the Commissioner of the Directory, Pierre François Réal. The plan called for three Directors to suddenly resign, leaving the country without an Executive. The Councils would then be told that a Jacobin conspiracy threatened the Nation; the Councils would be moved for their own security to the [[Château de Saint-Cloud]], some {{convert|5|km}} west of Paris, safe from the mobs of the French capital. Bonaparte would be named head of government to defend the Republic against the conspiracy; the Councils would be dissolved, and a new Constitution would be written. If the coup went well, it was simply a parliamentary maneuver; it would be perfectly legal. Bonaparte would provide security and take the part of convincing the Deputies. Fouché and Réal would assure that there would be no interference from the police or the city of Paris. Fouché proposed that the leading Jacobin deputies be arrested at the start of the coup, but Bonaparte said it would not be necessary, which later proved to be an error.{{sfn|Tulard|Fayard|Fierro|1998|pp=261–263}} Shortly before the coup, Bonaparte met with the principal army commanders: Jourdan, Bernadotte, Augereau and Moreau, and informed them of the impending coup. They did not all support it, but agreed not to stand in his way. The president of the Council of Ancients was also brought into the coup, so he could play his part, and Bonaparte's brother Lucien would manage the Council of Five Hundred. On the evening of 6 November, the Councils held a banquet at the former church of [[Saint-Sulpice, Paris|Saint-Sulpice]]. Bonaparte attended, but seemed cold and distracted, and departed early.{{sfn|Lefebvre|1977|pp=723–724}}