Three lavish "universal expositions" in , , and brought millions of visitors to Paris to sample the latest innovations in commerce, art, and technology. Paris was the scene of the first public projection of a motion picture, and the birthplace of the Ballets Russes , Impressionism , and Modern Art.
After the violent end of the Paris Commune in May , the city was governed by martial law under the strict surveillance of the national government. At the time, Paris was not actually the capital of France. The government and parliament had moved to Versailles in March once the Paris Commune took power, and they did not return to Paris until , although the Senate returned earlier to its home in the Luxembourg Palace. The end of the Commune left the city's population deeply divided.
Gustave Flaubert described the atmosphere in the city in early June "One half of the population of Paris wants to strangle the other half, and the other half has the same idea; you can read it in the eyes of people passing by. Several streets, particularly the Rue de Rivoli , had also been badly damaged by the fighting. Besides the cost of reconstruction, the new government was obliged to pay an indemnity of million francs in gold to the victorious German Empire as reparations for the disastrous Franco-Prussian War of The city's bankers and businessmen quickly raised the money, and the reconstruction was soon underway.
The destroyed Ministry of Finance on the Rue de Rivoli was replaced by a grand hotel, while the Ministry moved into the Richelieu wing of the Louvre Palace , where it remained until The one difficult decision was the Tuileries Palace, originally built in the 16th century by Marie de' Medici as a royal residence. The interior had been entirely destroyed by fire, but the walls were still largely intact. The walls remained standing for ten years while the fate of the ruins was debated.
Baron Haussmann , in retirement, appealed for a restoration of the building as a historic monument, and there was a proposal to turn it into a new museum of modern art. In , however, a new Chamber of Deputies more sympathetic to the Commune than previous governments decided that it was too much a symbol of the monarchy and had the walls pulled down.
