James Wilford Garner

James Wilford Garner (November 22, 1871 – December 9, 1938) was an American political scientist who was professor of political science at the University of Illinois.

Early life and education

James Wilford Garner was born in Pike County, Mississippi in 1871 to W. O. and Martha A. Garner.

He graduated from the Mississippi Agricultural and Mechanical College in 1892. He taught in Mississippi high schools from 1892 to 1896. He studied history and political science at the University of Chicago (Ph.M., 1900), after which he taught history at Bradley Polytechnic Institute.

He studied at Columbia University (Ph.D., 1902), where he was a member of the Dunning School. His dissertation, Reconstruction in Mississippi, though critical of Reconstruction, was regarded by W. E. B. Du Bois as the fairest of the works of the Dunning School.

Career

He was professor of political science at the University of Pennsylvania in 1902–1903. He became professor of political science at the University of Illinois in 1904. He was editor in chief of the American Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology (1910–1911). He was head of the American Political Science Association in 1924.

He was Hyde lecturer in the French universities (1921) and Tagore lecturer in the University of Calcutta (1922). He lectured for a semester at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, Switzerland. In 1928, he lectured at New York University. In 1929, he lectured at French and English universities as a visiting professor for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.