A majority of the Committee had decided in the winter of 1793–94 that the Hébertist party would have to perish or its opposition within the Committee would overshadow the other factions due to its influence in the Commune of Paris.

Robespierre also has personal reasons for disliking the Hébertists for their "atheism" and "bloodthirstiness", which he associates with the old aristocracy.

In early 1794, he breaks with Danton, who has more moderate views on the Terror, and has Camille Desmoulins protest against it in the third issue of Le Vieux Cordelier.

Robespierre considers an end of the Terror as meaning the loss of political power he hopes to use to create the Republic of Virtue.

Subsequently, he joins in attacks on the Dantonists and the Hébertists, charging his opponents with complicity with foreign powers.

From February 13 to March 13, 1794, Robespierre had withdrawn from active business on the Committee due to illness.

On March 15, he reappears in the Convention.

Hébert and nineteen of his followers are arrested on March 19 and guillotined on March 24.