Revolutions of 1830 and 1848: Epic Fail?

This lesson's essential question asked if the revolutions of 1830 and 1848 were failures like historians say. The revolutions of these years often go unnoticed, as they did not bring as much changes at the French and American revolutions did. To learn the information needed to answer this essential question, we broke up into groups and each group was assigned a revolution. We would all analyze the resources given (all found here) and each group would create a quiz that would be given to the other groups to test their understanding of our revolution. My group was assigned the French revolution of 1830, which to my disappointment, was not the one in Les Misérables. 

When Louis XVIII was restored to the French Throne after the Congress of Vienna, there was trouble brewing. Ultra-royalists wanted to bring back the old absolutist regime, and liberals wanted extend suffrage, while radicals want a republic like in the 1790s. The working class just wanted afforable bread and better wages. When Louis died, his brother, Charles X was made king. Charles wanted absolutism, and six years after his coronation, in the July Ordinances he suspended the legislature, limited the right to vote, and restricted the press.  "Works published without authorization shall be immediately seized", wrote King Charles and His Ministers. Liberals and Radicals protested this, set up barricades, and ultimately took over Paris. They agreed on a constitutional monarchy and installed Louis Philippe as king. He was believed to be worthy, and the legislature described him as "devoted to the national and constitutional cause". However, he really only extended suffrage to the upper class, and favored the middle class at the expense of the workers. With this information, we created a quiz to be taken by our classmates after they read what we did. The quiz went pretty well, and most questions were answered correctly. Our question about whether or not the revolution was a success got mixed results, but overall it was accurate. 

To answer the essential question, I believe that the revolutions did not fail as much as many historians claim. The only revolution that truly failed was the Decembrist Revolt; the other revolutions at least had some effect., even if it was short lived. The Hungary Revolution briefly gained Hungarian independence but then the rebellion was crushed. The French Revolution of 1848 was somewhat a failure in the fact that many people died, as depicted in Les Mis,  however, it presumably involved significantly less singing. However, even though many people died in part of this revolution, it ultimately led to voting rights being secured for nine million people, compared to 200,000 before the revolution., and the election of a president. Even though the revolutions never met their goals, they still brought about change, and at the least, drew attention to their cause.