What Is One Action Napoleon Took That Showed He Supported Some Enlightenment Ideals?
One action was enacting the Napoleonic Code (1804), which established equality before the law, protected property rights, and promoted advancement by merit rather than birth. He also expanded religious tolerance and public education, all reflecting Enlightenment ideals.
The answer
The clearest single action is that Napoleon created the Napoleonic Code (the Civil Code of 1804). This unified France's tangled patchwork of local laws into one rational, written legal system and enshrined several Enlightenment principles: equality before the law, the abolition of feudal privileges, secured property rights, and careers open to talent, meaning positions were earned by ability rather than inherited by noble birth. These ideas came straight from Enlightenment thinkers who argued that law should be logical, uniform, and applied equally to all citizens.
Beyond the Code, other Napoleon actions also reflected Enlightenment values. He maintained religious tolerance, notably through the Concordat of 1801, which recognized Catholicism as the majority faith while protecting freedom of worship for others, and he confirmed rights for French Jews and Protestants. He built a system of state public education, including lycées and a merit-based university structure, reflecting the Enlightenment faith in reason and education. He also promoted the sciences and reformed public administration on rational lines. Any of these is a valid answer, but the Napoleonic Code is the most commonly cited and the most sweeping.
Ruling out the wrong choices
Multiple-choice versions of this question pair the correct answer with distractors that describe Napoleon's authoritarian side. Those are wrong because they contradict Enlightenment ideals rather than support them:
- Crowning himself emperor concentrated power in one person, the opposite of the Enlightenment emphasis on representative or limited government.
- Censoring newspapers and controlling the press violated the Enlightenment value of free expression and open inquiry.
- Reinstating a hereditary nobility and imperial court cut against the very equality his own Code proclaimed.
- Using secret police and reintroducing slavery in the colonies in 1802 flatly betrayed Enlightenment ideas of liberty and human rights.
So when a question asks which action supported Enlightenment ideals, you must pick the reform that expanded equality, merit, tolerance, or reason, not the acts that expanded his personal control.
The bigger picture: a complicated legacy
Napoleon is a genuinely mixed figure, which is exactly why this question can be tricky. He was a child of the French Revolution who spread many of its Enlightenment-derived reforms across Europe through conquest, yet he also crowned himself emperor, muzzled the press, and built an authoritarian police state. Historians describe him as both a reformer and a despot, an "enlightened" ruler in some policies and a tyrant in others.
The useful way to hold both truths is a side-by-side view. On the Enlightenment-aligned side sit the Civil Code, legal equality, religious tolerance, public education, and administrative reform. On the anti-Enlightenment side sit self-coronation, press censorship, secret police, restored nobility, and reinstated colonial slavery. Recognizing this split is what earns full marks: the correct answer to "which action showed support for Enlightenment ideals" always comes from the first column, with the Napoleonic Code the strongest example.
| Law | Napoleonic Code: equality before the law | Restored a hereditary nobility |
| Advancement | Careers open to talent (merit) | Crowned himself emperor |
| Religion | Religious tolerance (Concordat of 1801) | Used secret police and surveillance |
| Ideas | State public education and science | Censored newspapers and the press |
| Rights | Secured property rights | Reinstated slavery in the colonies (1802) |
Frequently asked
What was the Napoleonic Code?
The Napoleonic Code, or Civil Code of 1804, was a unified set of laws replacing France's patchwork of regional rules. It guaranteed equality before the law, protected property rights, abolished feudal privileges, and opened careers to merit, reflecting Enlightenment principles.
How did Napoleon reflect Enlightenment ideals?
Through legal equality in the Napoleonic Code, careers open to talent, religious tolerance under the Concordat of 1801, a merit-based public education system, and rational administrative and scientific reforms, all rooted in Enlightenment thinking about reason and equality.
In what ways did Napoleon go against Enlightenment ideals?
He crowned himself emperor, censored the press, ran a secret police force, restored a hereditary nobility, and reinstated slavery in the French colonies in 1802. These acts concentrated power and denied liberties the Enlightenment championed.
What reforms did Napoleon make in France?
He introduced the Napoleonic Code, centralized and rationalized the administration, created the Bank of France, established lycées and a national university, signed the Concordat with the Catholic Church, and reformed the tax and legal systems.