August 26, 1789

Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen

Constituent Assembly completes adoption of the Declaration of Rights

There was no single dramatic vote. The Assembly took the preamble and all 17 articles one at a time, across four sitting dates.

Four sittings, ending 26 August 1789

At Versailles on 26 August 1789, the National Constituent Assembly finished its article-by-article voting on the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. The voting had occupied four sitting dates: 20, 21, 25 and 26 August.

The Assembly had decided on 4 August that its constitution must be preceded by a declaration of rights.

Drafted by committee, then voted article by article

Five deputies — Mirabeau, Démeunier, La Luzerne, Tronchet and Redon — were charged with fusing the numerous submitted projects into a single text, and reported on 17 August. Lafayette and Sieyès had each put forward influential drafts of their own.

What emerged was a composite: a preamble and 17 articles, declaring natural rights, equality before the law, national sovereignty, legal safeguards, and freedoms of opinion and expression.

Adopted is not ratified

Article 17, the last of them, protected property while allowing expropriation for a legally established public necessity, and only with prior just compensation.

The Assembly's adoption was not royal ratification. Louis XVI accepted the Declaration on 5 October, under pressure from the Assembly and from the crowd that had come to Versailles.

Sources

Researched 23 Aug 2026 6 sources 2 audit passes

How this was checked

Researched from the web into a fact sheet, rewritten from that sheet, then audited against it by a different model. How the pipeline works →

What the sources leave uncertain

The date is secure, but “proclaimed” is imprecise. August 26 marks completion of the Assembly’s adoption; royal acceptance and formal promulgation were later stages.