M.K. Gandhi, Attorney at Law

by DiSalvo, Charles R.

“The Petition of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi of Johannesburg in this Colony[,] Barrister at Law.” March 27, 1903, on file with the Incorporated Law Society of the Transvaal.

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  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I consider myself very fortunate to have had the help of many kind and generous people over the many years during which this book was written. I will start by thanking my research assistants, who helped me sift through more than ten thousand issues of South African newspapers. Without their assistance this book would not have been possible. I enjoyed the camaraderie and benefited from the analytic skills of Professors Tom Carney and Nameeta Mathur, who, as young history doctoral students at West Virginia University, served as my first researchers. They were followed by a long line of talented and dedicated students, almost all of them law students from West Virginia University: William Adams, Molly Aderholt, Amanda Alderman, John-Mark Atkinson, Matthew Becker, Sara Bird, Emily Bish, Phillip Cantrell (history, WVU), Amber Cook, Natalie Crites, Maura DiSalvo (history, Minnesota; law, Aberystwyth), Leslie Dillon, James Domzalski (law, Duke), Brad Dorsey, Matthew Elshiaty, Elizabeth Fayette, Jenny Flanigan, Sallie Godfrey, Sara Beth Harkless, Matthew Hickman, Philip Isner, Justin Jack, Heather Laick, Cassandra Means, Leslie Miller-Stover, Daniel Minardi, Leckta Poling, Christopher Prezioso, Wendy Radcliff, Steve Rao, Molly Russell, Jacob Shaffer, Stephanie Shepherd, Amy Skinner, Amanda Steiner, Woodrow Turner, Jason Wandling, and Tamara Williamson.

  The staff of the College of Law Library at West Virginia University, under the leadership of Camille Riley and Susan Wolford, was endlessly patient with my requests for assistance. I have also been privileged to work with the most cooperative and helpful secretaries, assistants, budget officers, and IT specialists. Those who have sat in the Dean’s chair at the West Virginia University College of Law gave me, year in and year out, the support I needed to complete this project: Teree Foster, John Fisher, and Joyce McConnell. I have Dean Carl Selinger to thank for nominating me to the professorship I hold; the research and travel assistance made possible by the Woodrow A. Potesta Professorship was key to this work.

  Professor Jonathan Klaaren of the University of the Witwatersrand was kind enough to put me in touch with one of his very capable law students, Joel Kimutai, for the purpose of unearthing the records of the Transvaal Law Society. Mary Bruce of the Kwa-Zulu Natal Law Society was enormously helpful in finding documents relating to the practice of law in Natal during Gandhi’s time. I am grateful to Burnett
Britton, Judith Brown, Margaret Chatterjee, E. S. Reddy, and Peter Spiller for generously lending their expertise along the way. Thanks to Sailaja Gullapalli of Gandhi Smriti & Darshan Samiti, Eric Itzkin, then Curator of Museum Africa, Rebecca Naidoo of the Durban Local History Museum, Antoinette Pieterse of the National Library of South Africa, Julie Preston of University College London, and Anupama Srivastava of the National Gandhi Museum for their assistance.

  For my introduction to the community of Gandhi scholars, I am in the debt of Professors Debjani Ganguly of the Australian National University and Tara Sethia of California State Polytechnic University at Pomona for inviting me to speak at Gandhi conferences at their respective institutions. It was at Cal-Poly Pomona that I met Professors Anthony Parel and Lloyd Rudolph, whose encouragement I have much appreciated. And it was at ANU that I met Tridip Suhrud, now the director of the Gandhi Sabarmati Ashram in Ahmedabad, India. Professor Suhrud was very kind in arranging my research stay at Sabarmati, where Amrut Modi, Kinnari Bhatt, and the very accommodating staff made me feel at home. Dr. V. K. Raju, ever thoughtful, and Dr. Tejas Shah provided me with logistical help for my visit.

  My West Virginia University colleagues graciously lent their substantive expertise, critical eyes, and moral support. I am most appreciative of our faculty and staff; they are like a second family.

  For their comments on the manuscript, I thank Robert Bastress, Forest Bowman, Allan Karlin, Paul Kellogg, George Record, John Rosenberg, Emily Spieler, and Renee Wolf.

  I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to the distinguished Gandhi scholar Thomas Weber, recently retired from his post at LaTrobe University in Melbourne, Australia. From early on, he has been unstintingly generous in offering both wise advice and much-appreciated encouragement. I cannot thank him adequately. Any mistakes in the manuscript should be attributed to my failure to consult Tom on an issue or to listen to him carefully enough when I did.

  Thanks go to Professor Michael Blumenthal for introducing me to Nat Sobel, to Nat for believing in the book, and to Nat’s associates Julie Stevenson and Adia Wright and co-agent Arabella Stein for their help. I am grateful to UCP’s Reed Malcolm for his enthusiasm for the manuscript and to Steven Baker, Stacy Eisenstark, Elena McAnespie, and Jessica Moll for their good work.