At the heart of the revolutionary movement that swept France in 1789 was the replacement of the term subject with the term citizen. Subjects were given their rights by a divinely appointed ruler. Since rights were assigned to subjects at the discretion of the monarch, it followed that not all subjects would necessarily enjoy the same rights and that those rights could be withdrawn at any time. In sharp contrast, the rights of the citizen were the product of natural law and hence universal, immutable, and irrevocable. Government did not exist in order to dispense rights and privileges; it existed to protect them. Likewise, the purpose of the law was not to enforce inequality, but to create conditions in which all citizens could enjoy the full expression of their national rights. However, almost as quickly as this vision was articulated in the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (see Document 22-1), critics noted an important omission in this foundational document of the Revolution. While the authors had taken great care to define the rights of citizens, they had been less precise in identifying which groups were to be included as citizens. Were women to have the same rights as men? Was slavery compatible with the new political order? Think about these questions as you read the selections included in this feature. What traditional social and political structures did the National Assembly challenge? Which were left in place?