In Memoriam
Jane Lang Scheiber
The recent loss of Jane Scheiber has affected many ASLH members, who admired her smarts, drive, and skill as a scholar and adviser to many legal historians and our Society. We are grateful to Victoria Woeste, who in consultation with Harry Scheiber and others, has written this tribute.
Jane Lang Scheiber
September 3, 1937 – March 6, 2022
In Memoriam
On March 6, 2022, Jane Lang Scheiber of Orinda, California, passed away at home, after a valiant fight with cancer, at the age of 84. Born in New York City to the late Fannie and Bernard Lang, she graduated from The Brearley School and from Cornell University Phi Beta Kappa in 1958. While at Cornell, Jane met Harry N. Scheiber, a graduate student in history, and they married in 1958. Their long and loving marriage was also a life-long collaboration in historical and legal research and writing.
After teaching at the Columbus (Ohio) School for Girls from 1959-60, Jane became director of the Public Affairs Laboratory at Dartmouth College, where her husband taught history and where their two children were born. After the family moved to La Jolla, California, in 1971, Jane was named Associate Project Director of U.C. San Diego’s Courses by Newspaper, a national adult education program. She continued to expand her professional portfolio after the Scheibers moved to U.C. Berkeley. Between 1983 and 2009, Jane served first as Director of Development in UC Berkeley’s College of Chemistry and then as Assistant Dean of College Relations and Development. There she oversaw development activities that ultimately brought in more than $165 million. The money made possible a wide variety of capital projects: two new buildings, renovation of research facilities in two existing buildings, nineteen endowed chairs, thirty-nine different fellowship funds, twelve scholarship funds, and sixteen discretionary funds to support teaching and research. Her other innovations included the Industrial Friends Program and a College Advisory Board, both of which support College scholarly activities. Her distinguished career in academic administration spanned thirty-nine years and three universities.
And that was not all. Jane was also a prolific scholar. She edited or coedited ten books and wrote several scholarly articles and book chapters on civil rights and civil liberties in wartime. A 1970 publication on the segregation of black Americans during World War I, which shed critical light on President Wilson’s racism, was ahead of its time. She then developed a broad expertise on the experiences of Japanese-Americans during World War II that inspired a significant body of scholarly publications. She contributed to the online Densho Encyclopedia on Japanese Americans in Hawaii; she also edited an issue of Western Legal History on federal law in the Pacific and one for the Hawaii Law Review on Japanese-American citizens educated in Japan (kibei) who were considered suspect due to their Japanese military training. As a result, they were subjected to highly discriminatory treatment in Hawaii by federal authorities and the federal courts.
Her crowning scholarly achievement was Bayonets in Paradise: Martial Law in Hawai’i during World War II (University of Hawaii Press, 2016), co-authored with Harry. Based on years of archival research, the book represents the first comprehensive analysis of the imposition of martial law in Hawai’i between 1941 and 1944. Far less instilled in memory than the equally shameful internment of Japanese Americans on the mainland, the military rule of Hawai’i remained largely unexamined until Jane and Harry began their inquiries. They were determined to answer the questions of “why and how an unprecedented military rule occurred [in Hawai’i] and how stubbornly it clung to power” (book review, Law and History Review, 2018). The Scheibers argued that the military maintained its grip on territorial law and courts by resisting federal attempts to restore civilian rule. Even after President Roosevelt finally ordered an end to the military regime in 1944, the army maintained an office that continued to enforce military orders and military judicial authority. When a test case finally reached the Supreme Court in 1946, a 6-2 majority upheld the power of the territorial governor under a 1900 law to impose martial law “in case of rebellion or invasion,” but did not consider the question of whether the U.S. armed forces could do so. As a result, the Supreme Court has never definitively rebuffed the military’s abuse of the civilian population of Hawai’i. The Scheibers rightly call on us to consider critically our assumptions about the military’s ability to defend democracy, a matter that remains vitally relevant, as the events of January 6, 2021 attest. The academic publishing review journal Choice named Bayonets in Paradise an Outstanding Academic Book for 2017.
Upon her retirement in 2010, Jane was awarded Berkeley’s highest honor, the Berkeley Citation, given to “distinguished individuals . . . whose contributions to UC Berkeley go beyond the call of duty and whose achievements exceed the standards of excellence in their fields.” She was also named a research associate in the Center for the Study of Law and Society. An advocate of ocean law reform, she collaborated in the research, conference, and publication programs of UC Berkeley’s Law of the Sea Institute. Her boundless energy never dissipated; after her retirement, she continued to serve the College of Chemistry in the capacity of Special Assistant to the Dean. From that vantage she raised funds for existing development projects and burnished alumni relations with her customary personal touch.
Jane’s brilliance, kindness, graciousness, and ability to make everyone who knew her feel special will be missed by scores of colleagues and friends and especially by her surviving family, who loved her beyond measure: her husband Harry of 64 years and their children Susan ScheiberEdelman (Scott); and Michael Scheiber (Andrea). Jane took infinite delight and incalculable pride in granddaughters Emily, Sarah, and Julia Edelman and Francesca, Alexandra, and Simona Scheiber.
Both Scheibers were fixtures at ASLH meetings. During 2004-2005, when Harry served as president of the Society, Jane was deeply involved in shaping a fundraising campaign that would transform the operations of the Society. A Committee on the Future of the Society, chaired by Sarah (Sally) Barringer Gordon, was constituted in late 2003 to find income streams for the ASLH without raising dues. Jane became a vital force in the fundraising effort and was especially delighted when a broad range of members defied the conventional wisdom that ninety percent of the contributions would come from a small number of donors. ASLH proved that many legal historians working together could achieve just as much as a few deep pockets.
Jane wrote a financial plan for the campaign that started with lead gifts, then fanned out through mailings and announcements, and finally followed up with personal and institutional contacts to turn pledges into contributions. Senior members of the Society responded enthusiastically at the lead gifts stage, and the committee members executed the rest of Jane’s plan to the letter. Jane volunteered her services to the ASLH and dedicated dozens of hours to ensuring the success of the campaign. Sally relied on her for planning, strategy, and personal encouragement. As Sally wrote to Harry after Jane’s death, Jane always stressed that the secret to a successful endowment “is to persuade the donor of the value of the campaign’s goals.”
Two years’ hard work produced more than $550,000 in contributions to the Society’s general endowment, giving vital support to its annual meetings, publications, and outreach to early career scholars. Another program that has since become foundational for the ASLH, the Kitty PreyerAward, was Jane and Harry’s idea; they had used the concept at the Law of the Sea Institute both to honor esteemed colleagues and to boost the careers of young scholars. The ASLH campaign became a model for other specialized, small academic societies that faced similar fiscal pressures in the 2000s.
In a remarkable example of achieving the elusive career/family-life balance, Jane kept her scholarly career going after hours, on top of her full time job, her roles as mother and grandmother, and her devotion to Harry. During her last year, she achieved her goal of getting the Berkeley ocean law lecture fully endowed. Jane handled death on her own terms. True to form, she was more concerned about Harry’s health than her own, and, until the last few weeks made it impossible, she wrote characteristically generous and loving emails to family and friends. Grace and dignity were hallmarks of her character, and she leaves us all better off for having known her.
Victoria Woeste
