John Thomas Schedler, known as Tom Schedler, is a politician from suburban St. Tammany Parish, Louisiana, USA, who served as the District 11 Louisiana state senator from 1996 to 2008, when he was term-limited after twelve years. Thereafter, he was named chief deputy to Louisiana Secretary of State Jay Dardenne, a former Senate colleague of Schedler's from Baton Rouge. When Dardenne became lieutenant governor-elect, Schedler began acting as secretary of state. Dardenne's elevation to lieutenant governor was delayed formally and officially to November 22, 2010, to obviate a statutory requirement to hold a special election to fill the position of secretary of state. Thus on November 22, Schedler became the official secretary of state. Schedler narrowly won a full term as Secretary of State in the nonpartisan blanket primary held on October 22, 2011. He defeated Jim Tucker of Terrytown, the outgoing Speaker of the Louisiana House of Representatives, 449,370 to 440,872. Schedler carried only twenty-six of the sixty-four parishes, and his margin of victory could be attributed to his home parish of St. Tammany, which he won by greater than a two-to-one margin. 

January 24th, 1950 in New Orleans (Age 74)