Léonard Joseph Léon Faucher (; 8 September 1803 – 14 December 1854) was a French politician and economist.
Biography
Faucher was born at Limoges, Haute-Vienne. When he was nine years old the family moved to Toulouse, where the boy was sent to school. His parents were separated in 1816, and Léon Faucher, who resisted his father's attempts to put him to a trade, helped to support himself and his mother during the rest of his school career by designing embroidery and needlework. As a private tutor in Paris he continued his studies in the direction of archaeology and history, but with the revolution of 1830 he was drawn into active political journalism on the Liberal side. He was on the staff of the Temps from 1830 to 1833, when he became editor of the Constitutionnel for a short time. A Sunday journal of his own, Le Bien public, proved a disastrous financial failure; and his political independence having caused his retirement from the Constitutionnel, he joined in 1834 Le Courrier français, of which he was editor from 1839 until 1842, when the paper changed hands.
thumb|right|Caricature of Faucher
Faucher was an early member of the Société d'économie politique organized in 1842 by Pellegrino Rossi. He belonged in policy to the dynastic Left, and consistently preached moderation to the more ardent Liberals. On resigning his connection with the Courrier français he gave his attention chiefly to many economic questions. He advocated a customs union between the Latin countries to counterbalance the German Zollverein, and in view of the impracticability of such a measure narrowed his proposal in 1842 to a customs union between France and Belgium.He helped to organize the Bordeaux association for free-trade propaganda, and it was as an advocate of free trade that he was elected in 1847 to the chamber of deputies for Reims.