BENJAMIN, JUDAH PHILIP Anglo American lawyer, of Jewish descent, was born a British subject at St. Thomas in the West Indies, on Aug. 11, 1811. After 1818 his parents lived in Charleston (S.C.). He went to Yale in 1825, but left there without taking a degree, and entered an attorvey's office in New Orleans, being admitted to the bar in 1832. To gether with John Slidell, he compiled a valuable digest of de cisions of the superior courts of New Orleans and Louisiana. In 1848 he was admitted a councillor of the Supreme Court, and in 1852 he was elected a senator for Louisiana. He withdrew from the Senate in 1861 to join Jefferson Davis's provisional govern ment as attorney-general, becoming afterwards his secretary of war (1861-1862), and chief secretary of State (1862-65). After the surrender at Appomattox he escaped from the coast of Florida, and after many vicissitudes reached England an exile.
The influence of English judges who knew his abilities and cir cumstances enabled him to be called to the bar on June 6, 1866. After working as pupil to C. E. Pollock, Benjamin joined the northern circuit, and a large proportion of his early practice came from solicitors at Liverpool who had correspondents in New Or leans. Having received a patent of precedence, he was, on Nov. 2, 1872, called within the bar as a queen's counsel. Benjamin had a power of marshalling facts and arguments that rendered him ex tremely effective, particularly before judges. He was less success ful in addressing juries. He retired in 1882 to a house in Paris, and died there on May 6, 1884.
His Treatise on the Law of Sale of Personal Property with Ref erences to the American Decisions and to the French Code and Civil Law—a bulky volume known to practitioners as Benjamin on Sales—is the principal text-book on its subject. Many of his American speeches have been published.