Henry's Lieutenants

Clifford Boles Longley

Clifford Boles Longley 1888-1954 "Edsel Ford thought that if his father were to die, most of the Fordfortune would pass to the government. He wanted to follow Longley's advice to have Mr. Ford's will changed with most of the property put in escrow." —Harry Bennett * Clifford B. Longley worked as attorney on the majority of important legal cases involving Henry Ford and the Ford Motor Company. First as a company employee and later with his own legal firm, he represented both the Henry Ford and Edsel Ford families. The law establishment founded by Longley is today a prominent Michigan legal institution. Clifford Boles Longley was born in Chicago on November 25, 1888. He was the son of William Hey Longley and Isabelle Maud Smoot Longley . The father was an executive of the American Playing Card Company . There were nine children in the family, of which all graduated from college—seven with degrees in engineering or law. Clifford attended public schools in Chicago, followed by graduation from Lewis Institute in 1907. In 1913, he received the LLB degree from the University of Michigan and was admitted to the Michigan Bar. Longley's first legal position was with Choate, Robertson, and Lehman of Detroit. He roomed at 34 Davenport and worked with this firm, located in the Dime Bank Building, for four years. He married Harriet Lawrence of Cleveland on September 16, 1916. They moved into a home at 1507 Second Avenue and were to have two children: James Lawrence and Mary Frances. Between 1917 and 1919, Longley was associated with Ward N. Choate in the practice of law. In 1919, Longley joined the legal department of Ford Motor Company and became legal counsel for the company from 1921 to 1929. One of Longley's first assignments with Ford concerned establishing the recapitalized Ford Motor Company as a Delaware corporation in *From Harry Bennett, We Never Called Him Henry (New York: Fawcett Publications, 1951), p. 87. 177 Henry's Lieutenants June 1920. This was a period of great business activity on the part of Henry Ford, who had bought out his minor stockholders and could push forward the vertical integration of his business. Longley became involved in such ventures as the purchase and operation of the DT&I Railroad, of which he was a director, the purchase of extensive lumber and iron ore properties in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, coalmining properties in West Virginia and Kentucky, as well as the acquisition of the Lincoln Motor Company by Ford in 1922. Of the many legal actions settled from 1921 to 1929, the highly publicized Aaron Sapiro and Herman Bernstein cases were most prominent . These cases resulted from derogatory articles printed in the Dearborn Independent, a weekly newspaper published by the Dearborn Publishing Company which was owned by Henry Ford. From 1925 to 1927, Longley was secretary of the Independent and active in the defense of Henry Ford. With several lawyers as assistants, Longley's everyday responsibilities included the legal aspects of contracts with dealers, the adjustment of patent or trademark infringements, personal injury cases against the company, miscellaneous property transactions for both Henry and Edsel Ford, the devising of investment programs for employees, and the interpretation of domestic and foreign government standards and regulations applying to the automotive industry. In 1924, Longley's home office staff at Highland Park consisted, besides himself, of J. M. Cahill, E. L. Davis, G. W. Flowers, R. E. Hefelich , T. J. Hughes, E. E. Juntunen, E. J. Matz, W. R. Middleton, and A. O'Reilly. Additional lawyers worked under Longley's direction in other parts of the country as warranted on local cases. DeLancy Nicoll, head of the firm Nicoll, Anable, Fuller, and Sullivan in New York seemed to be almost constantly involved in Ford Motor Company cases in that city. Foreign lawyers were needed, for example, in the establishment of Ford Motor Company of Brazil in 1923. Longley's assistant, Wallace Middleton, in a jovial note to Longley, who was then out of town, wrote: "When do you expect to return home? We have a few more hundred thousand matters requiring someone's attention." While on the staff of Ford Motor Company, Longley is listed in the Detroit City Directory between 1921 and 1927 as vice president of the Jervis B. Webb Company, living at 1624 Cedar Hill in nearby Royal Oak. In 1929, Longley left the Ford Motor Company as an employee and went into private practice as a consultant to Ford Motor...