Jerome L. Wilson…At A Glance

Jerome Wilson’s career has been a mix of politics, journalism and the law. After serving as a lieutenant in the United States Air Force, where he received a Commendation Ribbon “for meritorious service” for his work as an Information Services officer in postwar Germany, Mr. Wilson settled in New York City. (A native of Washington, D.C., he was born on July 16, 1931 and graduated from Colgate University in 1953.)

Returning from the service in 1957, Mr. Wilson worked briefly in the Pubic Relations Department of a major American oil company. He resigned this position to become Assistant Public Relations Director of the National Urban League, an organization dedicated to equal rights for all Americans. While at the Urban League, he edited a 50-year commemorative advertising supplement in the New York Times.

Mr. Wilson got his start in politics by becoming active in the Democratic reform movement founded by Eleanor Roosevelt and other leading Democrats. He served as President of the Yorkville Democratic Club, a local reform club, and he became Chairman of the “Eastside Citizens for Kennedy and Johnson” in the 1960 Presidential campaign.

Mr. Wilson was next appointed Assistant to Manhattan Borough President Edward R. Dudley, serving as press secretary. Two years later, in 1962, at age 30, he was elected to the New York State Senate. He served in Albany for three terms. In the Senate his candidacies for re-election were rated as “Highly Qualified and Preferred” by the nonpartisan Citizens Union.

Mr. Wilson’s most notable accomplishment in the state legislature was leading the fight to change New York’s 178-year-old divorce law. This law permitted only one ground for divorce (adultery), which caused many New Yorkers seeking divorces to go out of state, or to manufacture elaborate scenarios to satisfy the state’s rigid, one ground standard. Through Mr. Wilson’s efforts, the state enacted five new grounds for divorce, the most important of which were a ground for cruelty and a “living apart” standard.

In 1966, having lost his Senate seat by reapportionment, Mr. Wilson became the Democratic-Liberal candidate for Congress on the east side of Manhattan (the so-called “silk stocking” district). In the campaign, Mr. Wilson vigorously opposed the Vietnam War and pointedly attacked President Johnson for failing to end the conflict. In the middle of the campaign, he was required to suspend campaigning, because someone had ordered the IRS to audit his tax returns.

Mr. Wilson’s candidacy was warmly endorsed by the New York Times which wrote in an editorial, dated June 30, 1966, “The Reform Democrats gained additional luster through the nomination of State Senator Jerome L. Wilson for Representative in the 17^th Congressional District.”

Also, his candidacy was widely supported by peace groups in the district and by anti-war leader Bella Abzug, who later became a member of Congress in her own right. Mr. Wilson, however, lost his own election to Congress by a thousand votes to the incumbent Congressman of the district, Theodore Roosevelt Kupferman. At the time, Mr. Wilson was living in a railroad flat on East 82^nd Street and had very modest means. The total expenditure of his campaign for Congress was $35,000.

Following his senate career, and his defeat for Congress, Mr. Wilson switched to journalism, and became an on-air, news correspondent for WCBS-TV, the CBS television affiliate in the Greater New York Metropolitan area. Mr. Wilson appeared regularly on the nightly news and election night broadcasts, covering New York City and state politics. Frequently, he appeared with Jim Jensen, the station’s principal anchorman. Ultimately, Mr. Wilson was appointed the Political Editor at the station.

Both while he was a State Senator and a television journalist, Mr. Wilson attended night school at the New York University School of Law. At the completion of his studies, he received a JD degree and was admitted to the practice of law in the State of New York.

Soon afterwards, Mr. Wilson left CBS to become a full-time attorney at the international law firm of Rogers & Wells. The name partner of the firm was former U.S. Secretary of State William P. Rogers.

Mr. Wilson worked at the law firm for over two decades, and held the position of Counsel in the firm. At the firm he represented a wide variety of clients, including Pan American World Airways, Avis, Edison Parking, Apollo Real Estate Advisors. He also represented a number of media organizations, including Newsday, The Associated Press, a coalition of NBC, ABC, and CBS, Court TV, the New York Newspaper Publishers Association and the National Enquirer.

Mr. Wilson also served as a registered New York State lobbyist and in that capacity helped pass New York State’s very protective Shield Law for journalists, as well as two legislative experiments in permitting news camera coverage of New York court proceedings. Much of Mr. Wilson’s work for the firm’s clients concerned matters involving New York State and other state governments.

Also, while at the firm, Mr. Wilson wrote over 50 articles for publications, such as Editor and Publisher, ABA Journal, New York Law Journal, National Law Journal and Legal Times. His articles frequently concerned the First Amendment, as it related to libel law and to commercial speech. Other articles concerned the Tenth and Eleventh Amendments and the tension between federal power and state sovereignty.

In representing one of the firm’s private equity clients in Connecticut, Landmark Partners, Mr. Wilson became the subject of a federal investigation in connection with the activities of Connecticut’s State Treasurer. Although federal prosecutors, after an extensive investigation, took no action against Mr. Wilson, the SEC brought a complaint against him for violating Securities Laws. Mr. Wilson settled the complaint with the SEC “without admitting or denying” the allegations and paid to the SEC a substantial amount ($50,000) to resolve the matter. The alternative would have been a prohibitively expensive court proceeding.

Leaving Rogers & Wells in 1999, Mr. Wilson next became Counsel to the New York Newspaper Publishers Association, the trade association of the daily newspapers in New York. Working with Diane Kennedy, the Association’s President, and registered as a lobbyist for the Association, Mr. Wilson helped to strengthen the state’s Freedom of Information Law, so that news reporters and other persons seeking state records could access them without unwarranted delay. He was also part of a successful lobbying effort for another new law that permitted successful litigants in Freedom of Information Law cases, including the press, to recover their legal fees.

Even though he enlisted more than 50 daily newspaper editorials calling for the bill’s passage, Mr. Wilson was unsuccessful in convincing the legislature to pass a bill that would have permitted news camera coverage of courtroom proceedings on a permanent basis.

Although he continues to be an active member of the Media Law Committee of the New York State Bar Association and the Communications Law Committee of the Bar Association of the City of New York, Mr. Wilson ceased representing the Newspaper Publishers Association at the end of 2007.

Mr. Wilson presently lives in Essex, Connecticut. He is a member of the Essex Library Association and the First Congregational Church of Old Lyme. Since coming to Connecticut, Mr. Wilson has arranged a number of public programs at the Essex Library, most notably the annual “Essex and the Sea” series, which is devoted to nautical topics.

He has also arranged a number of poetry readings at the First Congregational Church of Old Lyme, of which he is a member. These readings focused on the poetry of love, war, faith and politics, as well as the different seasons of the years. Mr. Wilson is also a member of the church’s Peace Community.

Mr. Wilson has written three unpublished volumes of his own sonnets and has written two collections of his own free verse. In addition, he has translated a collection of poems by the German romantic poet, Rainer Maria Rilke. In addition, he has also become deeply engaged in helping Americans to understand the European Union and has written a number of newspaper articles about this 27-member nation European organization. He has appeared on radio and before local audiences on the topic as well.

Mr. Wilson lives with his wife, the former Ursula Anna Throne. She is a native of Germany and a naturalized American, who is a lover of German opera.

Mr. Wilson has four daughters by a previous marriage. They are: Janet Wilson, a Los Angeles Times reporter; Sarah Wilson, a former Federal Court of Claims judge and Special Counsel to a law firm in Washington, D.C.; Marion Wilson, a special projects coordinator at Syracuse University and Emma Wilson, a staff assistant at the Portland (Maine) Art Museum.

Mr. Wilson also has two stepsons, Christian and Dirk Johnson of Chester, Connecticut, and Hamden Sydney, Virginia, respectively, and six grandchildren and four step-grandchildren.