Wiley was born on June 21, 1929, in Morristown, New Jersey, to Katharine (née Pellett) and J. Burton Wiley. Wiley attended Morristown High School, graduating in 1947.[1][2] His father had been the district's superintendent of schools.[3] Wiley earned his undergraduate degree from Princeton University in 1951, graduating cum laude with a major in Politics.[4] In 1953, Wiley married Judith Alexander.[4] Wiley was awarded a law degree from Columbia Law School in 1954.[4] He served in the United States Army from 1954 to 1956.[4]
Legal career and civic involvement
Wiley worked as legal counsel to New Jersey Governor Robert B. Meyner.[5] He and Gov. Meyner formed the law firm of Meyner and Wiley.[6]
In the early 1970s, Wiley led a legal battle to stop Morris Township from building its own high school. Wiley was concerned that separate high schools in Morris Township and Morristown would create a system of de facto segregation, "[hastening] white flight from Morristown [and] dooming it to the same turmoil afflicting New Jersey’s urban centers." Wiley believed that "having 'a minority center and a white ring around it is nothing but a guarantee of an explosion...'" The court battle went all the way to the New Jersey Supreme Court, and resulted in the formation of a regional school district serving Morristown, Morris Township and (for high school) Morris Plains.[6]
In 1973, Wiley founded the law firm of Wiley, Malehorn and Sirota (later renamed Wiley, Malehorn, Sirota, and Raynes) in Morris Township. Wiley also founded Morris Cablevision, the county's first cable television company, the First Morris Bank and Trust, and the Morris County United Way. "Wiley spearheaded multi-million-dollar fund drives to secure and enhance public institutions that are bedrocks of the [greater Morristown, New Jersey] community: The Community Theatre (now the Mayo Performing Arts Center), the Morristown & Township Library and the historic Morristown Green."[6][2][7]
Political career
In the aftermath of the Watergate scandal in 1973, Wiley ran for the New Jersey State Senate in two separate but concurrent elections. One election was a special election in the 10th Legislative District (consisting of the entirety of Morris County) to fill the remaining term of Joseph J. Maraziti, who had been elected to the United States House of Representatives in the previous year. The other election was for a four-year term in the newly formed 23rd Legislative District (consisting of central Morris County municipalities).[8] In both elections, he faced RepublicanAssemblywoman Josephine Margetts. Wiley defeated Margetts in both elections (by two points in the special election and by six in the regular election), becoming the first Democrat to win a State Senate seat from Morris County in sixty years.[9][7]
Wiley was sworn into the Senate on November 12, 1973, serving two months of Maraziti's unexpired term from the at-large Morris County district.[10] Later, in his full Senate term, Wiley served as Chair of the Senate Education Committee, the Joint Committee on the Public Schools and the Senate Rules Committee. Wiley was responsible for drafting legislation which became the Public School Education Act of 1975, which established a state income tax in New Jersey that was specified as a source for school funding in addition to locally assessed property taxes.[11] He was named a top legislator by New Jersey Monthly magazine.[7]
Governor Brendan Byrne nominated Wiley to the New Jersey Supreme Court in 1975 following the retirement of Justice Frederick W. Hall.[12] His nomination was approved by the Senate, but was challenged by former Assemblyman David Friedland on the grounds that the State Legislature had voted to raise the salary of justices of the Supreme Court during Wiley's Senate tenure.[13][14] On February 11, 1977, after two years of appeals, the New Jersey Supreme Court rejected Wiley's nomination because of the pay raise, ruling that Wiley could not be appointed to serve on the Court until after his term of office expired.[13] According to The New York Times, the Constitution of the State of New Jersey provides that "no legislator may be appointed to a state job until after his term expires if the salary for the job was raised during the term."[13]Alan B. Handler was later appointed and confirmed to fill the vacancy on the Court.[12]
Wiley was defeated by Assemblyman John H. Dorsey, 54%-46%, in his 1977 re-election bid.[15]
Wiley ran for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination in 1985, focusing on the state's toxic waste problem as a campaign issue as he targeted incumbent Republican Governor Tom Kean.[16] Wiley also focused on the Kean administration's failure to provide state aid to public schools under the formula dictated by the Public Education Act of 1975 that Wiley had sponsored.[2] Wiley came in a distant fourth place with 8.6 percent of the vote in the Democratic primary; winner Peter Shapiro received 31.0%, State Senator John F. Russo received 26.6%, and Newark mayor Kenneth A. Gibson received 26.1%.[17]
Later life
At the age of 70, Wiley began writing poetry. He published three books of poetry: Hero Island (published in 2005), Mockingbird Come Home (published in 2007), and Latitudes (published in 2009).[18]
In 2012, he and his wife Judy sold their Morris County home and moved full-time to South Hero, Vermont, on Lake Champlain; they later moved to nearby Shelburne, Vermont. Wiley died on October 8, 2015, in Shelburne at the age of 86.[7] Wiley was survived by his wife, by their sons Jonathan and Benjamin, by their daughter Katherine, and by several grandchildren.[6]
^Coughlin, Kevin. "No clichés here: May 10 gala will salute living legend Steve Wiley. . . ‘Mr. Morristown’", MorristownGreen.com, May 4, 2012. Accessed October 12, 2015. "'By the time the court-ordered hearings were held, bitterness was all that most can remember. Wiley bore the brunt of many of the attacks because as a graduate of MHS in 1947 and the son of J. Burton Wiley, the former longtime superintendent of schools for the district, his friends and neighbors felt he should have been protecting their interests rather than the minorities he represented,' Marge said."
