Judith Kelleher Schafer

Judith Kelleher Schafer (December 12, 1942 – December 16, 2014) was an American historian who specialized in the study of slavery in the United States, particularly as it functioned in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Biography

A native of New Orleans, she earned her bachelor's degree from H. Sophie Newcomb College.[1] She graduated from Tulane with a master's in history,[1] and then completed her Ph.D. there in 1985, after her two children were grown and gone.[2] Her dissertation was The Long Arm of the Law: Slavery and the Supreme Court in Antebellum Louisiana, 1809–1862.[3] She eventually taught at Tulane University's history department, interdisciplinary studies institute, and law school.[4] Her first book, on slavery-related cases brought to the Louisiana Supreme Court in the antebellum era, won the Simkins Prize of the Southern Historical Association.[2] She was awarded the Garnie McGinty Distinguished Career Award by the Louisiana Historical Association in 2004,[5] and eventually became president of the Association.[1] She won the Gulf Coast Historical Association's Book Prize for 2011.[1] Schafer reported that the Louisiana Supreme Court was unique amongst the states: "One of the hardest things that Gov. Claiborne, the first governor, found was getting somebody qualified that would know Spanish, French and American law and to sort it all out."[6] Hurricane Katrina threatened the archival materials she used for her research but luckily "the library had been built as a bomb shelter during the cold war, and it didn't flood."[7] Schafer died in 2014 and was buried at Metairie Cemetery.[2] She was remembered as a "prolific, thorough, and imaginative scholar, with a keen eye for the telling detail and a fine way with words."[8]

Selected works

• Schafer, Judith Kelleher (1994). Slavery, the Civil Law, and the Supreme Court of Louisiana. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press. ISBN 9780807118450. OCLC 30075362.
• Schafer, Judith Kelleher (2003). Becoming Free, Remaining Free: Manumission and Enslavement in New Orleans, 1846–1862. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press. ISBN 9780807128626. OCLC 51297235.
• Schafer, Judith Kelleher (2009). Brothels, Depravity, and Abandoned Women: Illegal Sex in Antebellum New Orleans. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press. ISBN 9780807133972. OCLC 237048367.
• Schafer, Judith Kelleher (February 1981). "New Orleans Slavery in 1850 as Seen in Advertisements". The Journal of Southern History. 47 (1): 33–56. doi:10.2307/2207055. JSTOR 2207055.
• "The Long Arm of the Law: Slave Criminals and the Supreme Court in Antebellum Louisiana (Tul. L. Rev. 1247)". Tulane Law Review. 60 (6). 1986.
• Schafer, Judith (June 1, 1993). "Sexual Cruelty to Slaves: The Unreported Case of Humphreys v. Utz - Symposium on the Law of Slavery: Criminal and Civil Law of Slavery". Chicago-Kent Law Review. 68 (3): 1313. ISSN 0009-3599.

References

1. Tel; Doyal, Brandi (December 22, 2014). "Obituary: Judith Kelleher Schafer, former associate director of Murphy Institute, dies at age 72 • The Tulane Hullabaloo". The Tulane Hullabaloo. Retrieved 2024-01-16.
2. Times-Picayune, John Pope, NOLA com | The (December 19, 2014). "Judith Kelleher Schafer, 72, a historian of slavery and prostitution, dies". NOLA.com. Retrieved 2024-01-16.
3. Forret, Jeff (January 16, 2020). Williams' Gang: A Notorious Slave Trader and his Cargo of Black Convicts. Cambridge University Press. p. 375. ISBN 978-1-108-68199-5.
4. "19th-century brothels in New Orleans highlighted". The Marshall News Messenger. May 3, 2009. p. 14. Retrieved 2024-01-16.
5. "Tulane Lawyer" (PDF). Spring–Summer 2004. p. 19.
6. Hanson, Blake (March 1, 2013). "Louisiana Supreme Court celebrates bicentennial". WDSU. Retrieved 2024-01-16.
7. Epstein, David. "Where Are They Now?". Inside Higher Ed. Retrieved 2024-01-16.
8. Cairns, John (December 18, 2014). "Judith Kelleher Schafer (1942-2014)". | The Edinburgh Legal History Blog. Retrieved 2024-01-16.