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François Felix Faure

François Felix Faure was born in Paris on the 30th of January 1841, being the son of a small furniture maker. His father succeeded in educating him for a business career. When ten years old young Faure entered the Institution Bousquet at Chaillot and afterward passed two years in England. Returning to France he served for three years as a tanner's apprentice at Amboisc and then was engaged by a large leather firm at Havre, where he soon established a business for himself which became well known. At the breaking out of the Franco-Prusian War (1870) he was a ship-owner and president of the Chamber of Commerce at Havre. He served in the war as a captain in the Garde Mobile, and for bravery was rewarded with the cross of the Legion of Honor. Having started as a tanner and merchant at Havre, he acquired considerable wealth. In 1879 he was chosen to arbitrate the boundary dispute between Colombia and Costa Rica.

Faure was elected to the National Assembly on the 21st of August 1881, and took his seat as a member of the Left, interesting himself chiefly in matters concerning economics, railways and the navy.

Faure was Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies and Commerce in Gambetta's cabinet (14 Nov 1882 - 26 Jan 1882). Faure served as Under-Secretary for Marine and the Colonies in Ferry's cabinet (22 Sep 1883 - 28 Apr 1885), and Under-Secretary for Marine and the Colonies in M. Tirard's ministry (5 Jan 1888 - 19 Feb 1888). In 1893 Faure was made vice-president of the chamber.

When the autumn session of 1892 began all other questions were overwhelmed by the bursting of the Panama scandal. The company associated for the piercing of the Isthmus of Panama, undertaken by M. de Lesseps, the maker of the Suez Canal, had become insolvent some years before. Fifty millions sterling subscribed by the thrift of France had disappeared. Unhappily it was true that ministers and members of parliament had been subsidized by the Panama company. After the Panama scandal and the vanishing of the "two hundred and fifty million francs," cabinets were formed and cabinets fell with symptomatic and alarming rapidity.

On the first day of 1893 M. Ribot formed his second cabinet, which survived till the end of March, when he was succeeded by his minister of education, M. Charles Dupuy, an ex-professor who had never held office till four months previously. M. Dupuy, having taken the portfolio of the interior, supervised the general election of 1893, which took place amid the profound indifference of the population, except in certain localities where personal antagonisms excited violence. An intelligent Opposition would have roused the country at the polls against the regime compromised by the Panama affair. Nothing of the sort occurred. The election of fifty Socialists as deputies, however, was worth noting. Later Casimir Perier became Prime Minister. He had a revered name, was capable, and he was wealthy, but his Ministry did not last six months, and in May 1894, Dupuy returned to power.

In 1894 Faure obtained cabinet rank as Minister of Marine [not Minister of Marine and Colonies] from 30/05/1894 to 01/07/1894 in the second ministry of Charles Dupuy and from 01/07/1894 to 26/01/1895 in the third administration of M. Dupuy. Faure was one of the least-known politicians who had held office. No notable accomplishments appear associated with his ministerial service.

The story of the constant fluctuations in French politics is so familiar that the trite remark, "It is the unexpected which always happens in France," has come to be almost accepted as a part of the political philosophy of the nation» Hence it may not be considered an extraordinary circumstance that another ministry, the thirty-fourth, had gone out and yet another president, the fifth, had resigned ; nor yet that a new president had been elected, and a new ministry formed, all within the radius of a threatening situation.

Because the Chamber of Deputies refused to sustain the ministry and ordered by a vote of 253 to 225 the appointment of a commission to investigate the way in which the agreement of 1883 was made guaranteeing the payment of interest on the bonds of two railroads, Premier Depuy and his colleagues in the ministry resigned on Monday, 15 January 1895. On the day following President Casimir-Perier formally resigned his office. The overthrow of the ministry was thought to have operated directly to bring about this action on the part of the president and his personal disposition in the premises was evidenced by a single sentence in his letter of resignation in effect that the chief of state was powerless under the conditions of the office to defend himself against the attacks of his enemies. He said the office was endowed with too many responsibilities and not sufficient powers. The resignation of the ministry caused general surprise ; that of the president astounded all France.

On Friday, four days after M. Perier resigned the presidency, the president of the Senate, acting under the provisions of the constitution convened a meeting at Versailles of the National Assembly, consisting of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate, for the purpose of electing a president of the Republic. On the second ballot François Felix Faure, minister of marine in the Dupuy Cabinet, was elected, receiving 430 votes. M. Brisson, president of the Chamber of Deputies, was supported by the Radicals and Socialists and received 361 votes. The principal cause of Faure's elevation was the determination of the various sections of the moderate republican party to exclude M. Brisson, who had had a majority of votes on the first ballot, but had failed to obtain an absolute majority. To accomplish this end it was necessary to unite among themselves, and union could only be secured by the nomination of some one who offended nobody. M. Faure answered perfectly to this description. After much casting about, the new president selected M. Alexander Ribot to form a new Cabinet.

M. Faure, the new president, was fifty-four years of age, a man of large practical experience, possessed of able executive powers and in political life his career of fourteen years has been marked by conservatism. He served as minister of commerce and marine in four ministries, the last being that of Premier Dupuy. He had been attached to the Moderate Republican group and his election to the presidency was regarded as a triumph for the Moderate party over the Radical and Socialist elements in French politics.

The selection was a good one, and introduced to the presidency a type of politician unfortunately rare under the Third Republic - a successful man of business. Felix Faure had a fine presence and polished manners, and having risen from a humble origin he displayed in his person the fact that civilization descends to a lower social level in France than elsewhere.

He was recognized as an astute politician, but not a great statesman. In 1895 underhand attacks were made on his social standing, and in December of that year he issued a statement in which he said that in 1841 his father-in-law had been found guilty of malversation [professional or public misconduct] and that he had married the daughter with full knowledge of the facts of the case. He also stated that at the time of his election to the presidency he had apprised the foreign ambassadors of these facts and that no power had protested. This action met with general approval.

His fine presence and his tact on ceremonial occasions rendered the state some service when in 1806 he received the Tsar of Russia at Paris, and in 1897 returned his visit, after which meeting the momentous Franco-Russian alliance was publicly announced. His popularity was undermined over the Fashoda conflict, an unsuccessful confrontation with Great Britain in the Sudan (1898). Faure opposed reopening the Dreyfus Affair, a 12-year social and political controversy (1894-1906), resulting from false conviction of an army captain of Jewish origin. The latter days of M. Faure's presidency were embittered by the Dreyfus affair. At a critical moment in the proceedings his death occurred suddenly, from apoplexy, on the 16th of February 1899. With all his faults, and in spite of no slight amount of personal vanity, President Faure was a shrewd political observer and a good man of business.