# James D. Hardy Jr.

James D. Hardy Jr. (born 1934) is the former associate dean of the Louisiana State University Honors College and a professor of history at LSU since 1965. He earned his B.A. from Cornell University and his Ph.D. in history from the University of Pennsylvania.
Hardy's specialty is early modern European history, but he has published works in varying fields from geopolitics to the history of baseball.
Hardy teaches Western civilization, constitutional law, and geopolitics at LSU. Hardy's father, James D. Hardy Sr., Ph.D. (Johns Hopkins; physics), was a distinguished professor and researcher at Yale.
Dr. Hardy developed three laws for modern life from Greek philosophy. First, to live is to suffer. Second, for every important question in life there is no answer. Third, if there were an answer it would be love.

## Academic career

* Assistant instructor, University of Pennsylvania, 1958-1960
* Assistant professor of history, Union College, 1961–62 (replacement for a man on leave)
* Assistant professor of history, Bucknell University, 1962–65
* Assistant professor of history, Louisiana State University, 1965–68
* Associate professor of history, Louisiana State University, 1968–76
* Professor of history, Louisiana State University, 1976–present
* Associate director of honors, 1983-1993
* Associate dean, Honors College, 1993-2003
* Erich & Lea Sternberg Distinguished Honors Professor, 1997–98

### Teaching awards

* "Doc" Amborski Award for Teaching Excellence in Honors, 1982
* LSU Parents Association Distinguished Professor, 1985
* Tiger Athletic Foundation Distinguished Teaching Award, 1995
* "Doc" Amborski Award for Teaching Excellence in Honors, 1998

### State and professional educational committees

* Louisiana State Department of Education Committee on Social Science Fairs, 1970–76
* Louisiana State Department of Education Committee on the Revision of World History in the Schools, 1967–70
* "Principal Scholar" on Louisiana Council for the Humanities Grant, summer, 198
* Coordinator for National Collegiate Honors Symposium, New Orleans, 198

### Professional associations (by invitation)

* Senior Fellow, New Mexico Independence Research Institute, 2003
* Mackinder Forum: 2003–present

### International presentations (invited)

* James D. Hardy, Jr. and Leonard J. Hochberg, “Dilemmas of Justice and Geopolitics in the Athenian Maritime Empire: An Analysis of Thucydides’ The Peloponnesian War,” presented to the Mackinder Forum, New College, Oxford University, April 2004.

### Extra-mural teaching

* Louisiana Lagniappe Studies Unlimited, Instructor, 1997 - 2012

### Extra-mural professional service

* Track co-chair (with Professor Leonard Hochberg) on geopolitics and economics, 2004 Convention of International Academy of Business Disciplines (IABD)
* Referee for 2004 Convention presentations on geopolitics and economic for American Society for Competitiveness (ASC)
* Member, On-Site Board of the United States Civil War Center

### Extra-mural publications and service

* James D. Hardy, Jr., “Unfinished Work,” review of Paul A. Cimbala and Randall M. Miller, eds., The Freedmen's Bureau and Reconstructions: Reconsiderations (New York: Fordham University Press, 1999), Fall, 1999.
* James D. Hardy Dr., “Cavalier Justice,” review of Mark E. Neely, Jr., Southern Rights: Political Prisoners and the Myth of Confederate Constitutionalism (Charlottesville, VA: University of Virginia Press, 2000), June/July, 2000
* James D. Hardy Jr., “Duty First,” review of Russell Duncan, ed., Blue-Eyed Child of Fortune: The Civil War Letters of Colonel Robert Gould Shaw (Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2000) and Russell Duncan, Where Death and Glory Meet: Colonel Robert Gould Shaw and the 54th Massachusetts Infantry (Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2000), Winter, 2000.
* James D. Hardy Jr., “Big Dreams, Big Deals,” reviews of Charles Royster, The Fabulous History of the Dismal Swamp Company (New York: Knopf, 2000) and Stephen E. Ambrose, Nothing Like It In The World: The Men Who Built The Transcontinental Railroad, 1863–1869 (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2000), Spring, 2001
* James D. Hardy Jr., “Let us have peace,” review of Jean Edward Smith, Grant (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2001), Summer, 2001.
* James D. hardy Jr., “Garrison Reconsidered,” review of Don E. Fehrenbacher, The Slaveholding Republic: An Account of the United States Government's Relations to Slavery, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), Fall, 2001.
* James D. Hardy Jr., “A Meditation on American Politics,” review of George Anastaplo, Abraham Lincoln: A Constitutional Biography (New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999), Winter, 2001.
* James D. Hardy Jr., “Homeless, Friendless, Penniless,” review of Ronald Baker, ed., Homeless, Friendless, Penniless: The WPA Interviews with Former Slaves Living in Indiana (Indianapolis, IN: Indiana University Press, 2000), Winter, 2001 issue on the internet only.
* James D. hardy Jr., “The Question of Slavery,” reviews of Harriet C. Frazier, Slavery and Crime in Missouri, 1773–1865 (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2001) and Kathryn Grover, The Fugitive's Gibraltar: Escaping Slaves and Abolitionism in New Bedford, Massachusetts (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press) and Michael Vorenberg, Final Freedom: The Civil War, the Abolition of Slavery, and the Thirteenth Amendment (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001), Spring, 2002.
* James D. Hardy Jr., “Spin Doctor,” review of Harry J. Maihafer, War of Words: Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War Press (Washington: Brassey, 2001), Summer, 2002.
* James D. Hardy Jr., “Domestic Disturbance,” review of Daniel W. Stowell, In Tender Consideration of Women, Families and the Law in Abraham Lincoln's Illinois (Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2002), Fall, 2002.
* James D. Hardy Jr., “Bullets and Ballots,” review of Mark E. Neely, Fr., The Union Divided: Party Conflict in the Civil War North (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2002), Winter, 2002.
* James D. Hardy Jr., “Faces of Abe,” review of Frank J. Williams, Judging Lincoln (Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 2002), Spring, 2003.
* James D. Hardy Jr., “From Contract to Devotion,” review of Melinda Lawson, Patriot Fires: Forging a New American Nationalism in the Civil War North (Lawrence, KS: University of Kansas Press, 2003), Summer, 2003.
* James D. Hardy Jr., review of George B. Kirsch, Baseball in Blue and Gray (Princeton University Press, 2003) Fall, 2003.
* James D. Hardy Jr., reviews of Michael A. Ross, Justice of Shattered Dreams: Samuel Freeman Miller and the Supreme Court during the Civil War (Louisiana State University, 2003)and Robert Bruce Murray, Legal Cases of the Civil War (Stackpole Books, 2003), Winter, 2004.
* James D. Hardy Jr., review of Edward Steers, Jr., The Trial: The Assassination of President Lincoln and the Trial of the Conspirators (University Press of Kentucky, 2003), Spring 2004.

## Scholastic honors
### Scholarships

* New York State Scholarship, 1951–55
* Graduate assistant, University of Pennsylvania, 1956
* Assistant instructor, University of Pennsylvania, 1958–59
* Head assistant instructor, University of Pennsylvania, 1959–60
* Doctoral degree with "Honors", 1961

### Fellowships and grants

* Fels Fellowship, 1960–61
* Co-director, Longwood Foundation Special Historical Research Grant, 1962-1963
* Louisiana State University Graduate Council Research Grant, 1967
* Louisiana State University Graduate Council Research Grant, 1968