After graduating from Aurora High School, Alschuler spent some time as a general store clerk, he read law and was admitted to the Illinois Bar.

Unsuccessful in the 1892 election, on July 15, 1893, Governor John Peter Altgeld appointed him a member of the State Commission of Claims.

[5] Shortly after the gubernatorial election, he was the Democratic nominee for appointment by the Illinois General Assembly to the United States Senate, but on January 22, 1901, the Republican-majority elected Republican incumbent Shelby Moore Cullom for another six-year term.

[7][8] Alschuler received a recess appointment from President Woodrow Wilson on August 16, 1915, to a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit vacated by Judge Peter S. Grosscup.

[7] Alschuler was appointed to arbitrate between meatpacking unions in Chicago and employers after the President's Mediation Commission intervened in November 1917.