Edgar Faure, 79; Versatile, Popular French Statesman

Edgar Faure, the erudite, versatile French statesman who served his government in every capacity but its presidency, died Wednesday.

The former premier who wrote mystery novels under the nom de plume “Edgar Sandy,” the politician credited with releasing Morocco from the French empire, and the former professor of Roman law who spoke fluent Russian, was 79.

He had undergone surgery several times in the last two months for pancreas, stomach and liver ailments, and had been in critical condition at Leannec hospital in Paris since March 22.

Within a few hours of his death reactions poured in from leaders of varying political stripe.

‘A Remarkable Man’

Socialist President Francois Mitterrand called him “a remarkable man who marked the history of our Republic.”

“He was one of the most lucid (men), envisaging the need for decolonization, promoting disarmament and better East-West relations,” Mitterrand said in a statement issued by the Elysee Palace.

Premier Jacques Chirac said Faure’s death was “a national event” and called him a “true modernist” whose “strong personality and extraordinary breadth of talent left their mark on his epoch.”

Jean-Marie Le Pen, leader of the extreme-right National Front, issued a statement praising Faure’s “intelligence and tolerance.”

Former President Valery Giscard d’Estaing said that Faure was one of France’s most “open-minded” political leaders, and that he had the strength of his convictions.

Popular Figure

Known nationally simply as “Edgar,” Faure was a revered intellectual and political figure. Bespectacled and balding, Faure at 19 had been one of the youngest people in French history to receive a doctor of law degree.

He practiced with the Paris Court of Appeal, and when World War II broke out in Europe he entered the French underground. He fled France with his first wife, Lucie Meyer, publisher of a political review, and during 1943 and 1944 he directed the legislative department of the French Committee of National Liberation, headed by Charles de Gaulle in Algiers.

At war’s end he was an associate prosecutor at the Nuremberg war crimes trials and returned home to serve as adviser to Pierre Mendes-France, then economic minister.

In 1947, he was elected to public office for the first time, serving as a deputy for the Jura (Radical Socialists) in eastern France.

Other Offices

From that time on, Faure served in the cabinets of numerous national leaders. He was secretary of state for finance in 1949, justice minister in 1951, finance minister again in 1952, 1954 and 1955, and foreign affairs minister under then-Premier Mendes-France in 1954.

In 1952 and 1955-56, he was the country’s second-highest-ranking official in the Fourth Republic, serving as prime minister.

He was one of a handful of French politicians to serve in both the Fourth Republic, which ended in 1958 and which saw 23 governments in less than 12 years, and the Fifth Republic, ushered in by De Gaulle.

While he was a professor of law at the University of Dijon, he was credited with establishing diplomatic relations between Paris and Beijing after he went there as De Gaulle’s personal envoy in 1963.

A Witty Man

Faure also was a witty man capable of winning arguments with guile and humor.

In 1956 he coined the phrase, “Let’s give Morocco independence within interdependence.” Most agreed that the words were meaningless, but Faure was nonetheless credited with France’s acknowledgment of the North African nation’s sovereignty.

A Renaissance man, Faure composed music and was a member of the elite Academie Francaise who wrote--in addition to his mysteries--books on such disparate topics as oil policy and contemporary China.

He was fluent in Russian and was said to have surprised a Soviet delegation by negotiating without a translator for four hours, stumbling only once--over the word corkscrew .

During the 1968 student uprising, he conceived the vast reforms put into practice in the late 1960s and early ‘70s that gave French universities greater independence.

Transcendent Polices

Faure’s policies transcended France’s traditional split between left and right, though he was a prominent member of the Socialist governments led by his close friend Mendes-France.

His political career extended for more than three decades and ended in 1981 when Mitterand’s Socialists took power, and he refused another government post.

His last official position was as an organizer of the grandiose celebrations that next year will mark the 200th anniversary of the French Revolution.