The
6 February 1934 crisis was an
anti-parliamentarist street demonstration in Paris organized by multiple
far-right leagues that culminated in a riot on the
Place de la Concorde, near the seat of the
French National Assembly. The police shot and killed 15 demonstrators. It was one of the major political crises during the
Third Republic (1871–1940). Frenchmen on the left feared it was an attempt to organize a
fascist coup d'état. According to historian Joel Colton, "The consensus among scholars is that there was no concerted or unified design to seize power and that the leagues lacked the coherence, unity, or leadership to accomplish such an end."