- William H. J. Ely
William Harvey Johnson Ely (
September 8 ,1891 –March 2 ,1942 ) was an Americanjurist and Democratic Party politician fromNew Jersey who served as a State Senator and the state administrator for theWorks Progress Administration . He was the Democratic candidate forUnited States Senate in 1938.Ely was born in
Rutherford, New Jersey , the son of Captain Addison Ely and Emily Johnson. His father was a leading lawyer and Democratic politician in Rutherford who had moved fromWestfield, Massachusetts , where the family had long-standing ties. Ely was the second cousin of Massachusetts GovernorJoseph B. Ely , since they shared a greatgrandfather, Rev. Elihu Ely (1777-1839), son of Captain Levi Ely (1732-1780). [ [http://books.google.com/books?id=l84UAAAAYAAJ "Genealogical and Personal Memoirs Relating to the Families of the State of Massachusetts"] , Vol. 2 (1910), pp. 665-8.] [ [http://books.google.com/books?id=vdgDAAAAYAAJ "Scannell's New Jersey's First Citizens and State Guide"] , Vol. 2 (1919), pp. 143-4.] [ [http://books.google.com/books?id=EdoMAAAAYAAJ "Genealogical History of Hudson and Bergen Counties, New Jersey"] (1900), pp. 365-6.]He attended the
University of Michigan andNew York University Law School , receiving his LL.B. degree in 1913. He served as alieutenant in theNational Guard on the Mexican border in 1916 and was with theUnited States Army Motor Transport Corps duringWorld War I . He married Mary E. Rogers ofPaterson, New Jersey onApril 30 ,1917 , and they had three sons and two daughters. [http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F40917FE3F58167B93C1A91788D85F468485F9 "William H. J. Ely, Jersey Ex-Leader"] , "The New York Times ",March 3 ,1942 .]In 1924 he was named a district judge in the Second Judicial District of Bergen County, and he served on the bench for five years. He began his political career in 1926 as a member of the Rutherford Borough Council. He was elected to the
New Jersey Senate in 1931, the first Democrat from Bergen County to serve in the Senate in sixteen years. He was defeated for reelection in 1934.In 1935 he was appointed the State WPA Administrator. He resigned two years later to run for the open seat in the
United States Senate created by the resignation ofA. Harry Moore . In the 1938 election he faced RepublicanWilliam Warren Barbour , who had served in the Senate from 1931 to 1937. Ely campaigned as a "100 per cent" supporter of the Roosevelt administration. He was seen as in the pocket of notorious political bossFrank Hague of Jersey City, and a few days before the election referred to Hague as "my leader." Ely lost to Barbour by a margin of 112,508 votes.He died at the age of 50 in 1942 at his home in Rutherford after suffering a stroke.
References
External links
[http://politicalgraveyard.com/bio/ely.html#RPR18BEKG William Harvey Johnson Ely] at
The Political Graveyard
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