Phillip Markey

Phillip Markey (August 1, 1913 - January 7, 2003)^[1] was an American lawyer from Milwaukee, Wisconsin who served one term as a Progressive member of the Wisconsin State Assembly.^[2]

Background

Markey was born in Milwaukee on August 1, 1913. He attended the Fourth Street School, the Ninth Street School, Lincoln High School, Milwaukee State Teachers College, and Marquette University. He received his LL.B. degree from the University of Wisconsin Law School and was admitted to the bar in 1940. He worked for the Smith Steel Company and the Sivyer Steel Company.

Legislature

In 1942 Markey was narrowly declared victor in a five-way race, after a recount,^[3] winning election as a Progressive to succeed Socialist Ben Rubin in Milwaukee County's Sixth Assembly district (the Sixth Ward of the City of Milwaukee): he polled 1458 votes, to 1448 for African American Republican Cleveland Colbert, 917 for Democrat Charles Bennett, 652 for Independent Progressive Joseph Alberti, and 109 for Socialist Robert Repas. He was assigned to the standing committee on printing.^[4]

Markey ran for re-election in 1944 as a Republican, and was defeated in a three-way race by African American Democrat Le Roy Simmons, although he did finish ahead of the Progressive candidate.^[5] He ran again in the 1946 Republican primary election for the chance to face Simmons (by this time Wisconsin's Progressives had merged back into the Republican Party), but was unsuccessful, coming in second in a five-way race.^[6]

After the legislature

After leaving the Assembly, Markey went back to the practice of law in Milwaukee, where he had been practicing since 1939. In 1951, the Supreme Court of Wisconsin ruled that he and his brother Maurice (also a lawyer) had been guilty of unprofessional conduct. While they were not disbarred, they were reprimanded, and their licenses to practice were suspended until they paid the costs of the proceeding against them, which, the Court noted, "it appears will involve a considerable sum".^[7]

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