Colonel William A. Phillips

Chalmers Pangburn Wylie (November 23, 1920 – August 14, 1998) was an American politician and lawyer from Ohio, who served in various public offices in that state before serving thirteen terms as a member of the United States House of Representatives from 1967 to 1993.

Biography

Wylie was born in Norwich, Ohio, and grew up in Pataskala, a small community east of Columbus. He attended Otterbein College in Westerville and Ohio State University in Columbus. He earned his Juris Doctor at Harvard Law School in 1948.

Wylie enlisted in the United States Army as a private, and eventually attaining the rank of first lieutenant while serving with the 30th Infantry Division in Europe during World War II. He remained in the U.S. Army Reserve after the war, attaining the rank of lieutenant colonel.

He was:

• assistant attorney general of Ohio from 1951 to 1954
• assistant city attorney of Columbus, Ohio, from 1949 to 1950
• elected city attorney of Columbus, Ohio, from 1953 to 1956
• administrator of the Bureau of Workman's Compensation for the State of Ohio in 1957
• appointed first assistant to the Governor of Ohio in 1957
• elected president of Ohio Municipal League
• elected to three terms in the State Legislature of Ohio, 1961–1967
• elected as a Republican for 13 terms to the United States Congress (January 3, 1967 – January 3, 1993)

In addition to his public service, Wylie worked in private practice as an attorney from 1957 until 1968, which he resumed in Columbus after leaving Congress until his death there.[1]

The Chalmers P. Wylie VA Ambulatory Care Center in Columbus is named in his honor.

Opposition to Playboy's Braille edition

In 1981, Republican Senator Mack Mattingly had unsuccessfully attempted to remove sections of Playboy Magazine's braille edition, which was produced using federal funds through the Library of Congress. During appropriations discussions in July 1985, Wylie successfully passed a motion in the House to reduce the budget of the Library of Congress by $103,000, which was the exact amount it cost to produce the braille edition of Playboy, subsequently leading to the discontinuation of the magazine. This would be later reversed by a 1986 ruling in federal district court from Judge Thomas Hogan, who ruled that Congress' actions were a violation of the First Amendment. Production of the Playboy braille edition resumed in January 1987.^[1]

References

• United States Congress. "Chalmers Wylie (id: W000781)". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
• Appearances on C-SPAN