FAURE, f4r. FRANCOIS FELIX ( 1841-99). A French statesman, President of the French Re public from 1893 to 1899. He was born in Paris, learned the trade of a tanner, and removed early in life to Havre, where he entered the employ of a large leather firm, of which he became the con trolling partner. He was president of the Chamber of Commerce at Havre on the breaking out of the Franco-Prussian War. through which he served as a captain in the Garde Mobile. He did not enter political life until 1881, in which year he was elected to the Chamber of Deputies from Havre as a moderate Republican. In the same year he was appointed Under-Secretary of State for Commerce and the Colonies in the Gainbetta Cabinet—a position he held until the fall of the Ministry in January, 1882. He was appointed to the same position in the Cabinet of M. Ferry in 1883, and retained it until the lion of the Cabinet in March, 1885. In lowing October he was returned to the Chamber of Deputies, where he beeame the chief spokes man of the group known as Union Republicans. In the shert-lived Cabinet of Id. Tirard (Janu ary to February, 1888), he held for the third time the Under-Seeretaryship for Commerce and the Colonies. He continued to serve in the Chamber
of Deputies, being repeatedly elected its vice-presi dent. Upon the election of M. Casimir-Perier to the Presidency in 1894, M. Faure was appointed Minister of Marine in the Cabinet of M. Dupuy. He was occupying this position when Casimir P4'..rier suddenly resigned the Presidency in Jan uary, 1895, and Faure was elected to fill the vacancy.
M. Faure was not a great statesman, and his career as President was not a brilliant one. But he was conservative and safe. and in the first years of his administration, at least, popular with the working people, who recognized in him one of their own class. The four years (1895.98) were years of more than usual quiet in France, both in internal and foreign affairs. The Franeo-Rus Sian alliance was the only step of any importance in the R•public's foreign relations. and the un fortunate Fashoda affair was happily terminated. In 1s98 Ow agitation for a re-trial of Dreyfus caused •onsiderable feeling, the outcome of which President Faure, however. never knew. lie was stricken with apoplexy, and died on February Ifi, ism.