Editing Paris Commune (section)

=== Radicals and revolutionaries ===
[[File:Louis Auguste Blanqui.JPG|thumb|upright|[[Louis Auguste Blanqui]], leader of the Commune's far-left faction, was imprisoned for the entire time of the Commune.]]

Paris was the traditional home of French radical movements. Revolutionaries had gone into the streets and overthrown their governments during the popular uprisings of [[July Revolution|July 1830]] and the [[French Revolution of 1848]], as well as subsequent failed attempts such as the 1832 [[June Rebellion]] and the uprising of [[June Days Uprising|June 1848]].

Of the radical and revolutionary groups in Paris at the time of the Commune, the most conservative were the "radical republicans". This group included the young doctor and future prime minister [[Georges Clemenceau]], who was a member of the National Assembly and Mayor of the [[18th arrondissement of Paris|18th arrondissement]]. Clemenceau tried to negotiate a compromise between the Commune and the government, but neither side trusted him. He was considered extremely radical by the provincial deputies of rural France, but too moderate by the leaders of the Commune.

The most extreme revolutionaries in Paris were the followers of [[Louis Auguste Blanqui]], a charismatic professional revolutionary who had spent most of his adult life in prison.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Pilbeam |first=Pamela M. |title=French socialists before Marx: workers, women and the social question in France |date=2000 |publisher=[[McGill-Queen's University Press]] |isbn=9780773583856 |location=Montreal |pages=33 |oclc=767669805}}</ref> He had about a thousand followers, many of them armed and organized into [[Clandestine cell system|cells]] of ten persons each. Each cell operated independently and was unaware of the members of the other groups, communicating only with their leaders by code. Blanqui had written a manual on revolution, ''[[Instructions for an Armed Uprising]]'', to give guidance to his followers. Though their numbers were small, the [[Blanquists]] provided many of the most disciplined soldiers and several of the senior leaders of the Commune.