Ernest Leroy Wilkinson (May 4, 1899 – April 6, 1978) was an American academic administrator, lawyer, and prominent figure in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). He was president of Brigham Young University (BYU) from 1951 to 1971, simultaneously overseeing the entire LDS Church Educational System (CES). He is credited with the expansion of BYU. Under his presidency, the student body increased six times to over 25,000 students due to the university's physical growth and his aggressive recruiting policies; the number of colleges at the university increased from five to thirteen, and the number of faculty members increased four-fold. Wilkinson focused on recruiting more faculty and convincing current faculty to receive education outside the university. As a result, the number of teachers with doctorate degrees increased from 50 to 500. Associate and doctoral programs were created for BYU.
The J. Reuben Clark Library (now the Harold B. Lee Library (HBLL)) was built, and library resources were expanded by 500%. The number of buildings on the BYU campus increased from 6 to over 300, an increase in floor space of about 4.2 million square feet. Wilkinson initiated the construction of various student housing options to accommodate over 6,000 students, and increased the number of student religious congregations. During his 20-year presidency, the number of congregations increased from 1 student branch to 98 wards and 10 stakes for LDS students. The BYU Honor Code was also more clearly established, and a strict dress code was added.
Wilkinson was a strongly conservative Republican. He unsuccessfully ran for the U.S. Senate in 1964, while he was president of BYU. Prior to his career in education, he was a lawyer in Washington, D.C. and New York City, his most well-known and lucrative case being a $32 million settlement from the U.S. government for the Ute Indian Tribes.
Background and education Wilkinson was born in Ogden, Utah, one of seven children of Robert Brown Wilkinson and Annie Cecilia Anderson. Robert Wilkinson was a Scottish immigrant who arrived in the United States as a young boy, later married Annie Anderson, and worked for the Southern Pacific Railroad for 25 years, where he supported the union; according to family, he once ran for mayor of Ogden as a Socialist candidate.
Growing up, Wilkinson associated mostly with older boys and men, as there were few boys his age. He became involved in cockfighting, buying a few cocks with the money he made from delivering the Deseret News, but stopped after police started arresting offenders.
To cultivate his faith as a member of the LDS Church, Wilkinson's mother suggested he attend Weber Academy in Ogden, which was then owned by the church. Before his graduation, he won the Dr. Edward S. Rich oratorical contest with his speech "American Ideals". He graduated from Weber Academy in 1917, and continued his studies at the expanded Weber Academy, then known as Weber College, where he organized the Public Service Bureau (a service organization), was editor of the yearbook, and was president of the student body for two years. He competed in forensics meets and won the state championship with his team. He received the Lewis Efficacy Medal for students excelling in scholarship and public service, and was class valedictorian. After a year at Weber College, he became a member of the Student Army Training Corps unit located at BYU. He attributed his success to what he learned at Weber Academy and became interested in the idea of offering a religiously affiliated education to more LDS youth. After the war, he became a regular student at BYU and, among other things, edited the weekly newspaper White and Blue, and was president of his senior class. He and a few colleagues received special recognition when they beat the Princeton debate team. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree at BYU in 1921.
He married Alice Valera Ludlow, a native of Spanish Fork, whom he had met while they were both students at BYU. They were married in the Salt Lake Temple on August 16, 1923. The ceremony was performed by James E. Talmage. Alice was elected vice president of the student body with Wilkinson as her campaign manager and had studied drama at BYU. The Wilkinsons had five children.
Career After graduation, Wilkinson began teaching English and speech at Weber College. During this time, Wilkinson began to take an active interest in politics. He ran as a Democrat for county auditor and lost.
Law School In 1923, Wilkinson was involved with the campaign of William H. King for United States Senate. King invited Wilkinson to be his secretary (administrative assistant) in Washington D.C. He agreed so that he could take evening classes at George Washington University. When he arrived in Washington D.C., he was informed by King's current secretary that he was to arrange for another position for him. He was offered the position of assistant architect of the Capitol Building. Uninterested in architecture, Wilkinson found a job as a teacher of a business high school teaching shorthand and typing, still able to attend law school at night. He earned a law degree from George Washington University summa cum laude in 1926. He was admitted to the Washington D.C., Utah, and New York bar associations. He studied at Harvard Law School on scholarship for his graduate studies. Even though five years of teaching were prerequisite for entering in the doctoral program, he was granted exception from Dean Roscoe Pound of the law school due to his academics at George Washington University. In 1927, Wilkinson graduated from Harvard Law School with a Doctor of Juridical Science.
Teaching law He initially accepted a position teaching law at the University of California, but quickly resigned in order to pursue another offer to teach at the more prestigious New Jersey Law School, the largest law school in the United States at the time, where he taught from 1927 to 1933. After aiding Hughes, Schurman, and Dwight law firm with a challenging tax problem, he was invited to join their law firm in New York City. He began practicing there as well as teaching at New Jersey Law School, where he was known as a notoriously difficult professor.;
Practicing law After working for future Supreme Court chief justice Charles Evans Hughes, and working with Moyle & Wilkinson in Washington D.C., Wilkinson opened up a private firm in 1940 where he practiced for 11 years. One case involved a young, American soldier in Japan who was sentenced to death for accidentally killing a child in a motorcycle accident. He succeeded in lowering the sentence to only the time in jail that the man had already served. Even though he received no compensation for the case, he considered it the most gratifying case he ever worked on. He served as attorney for the Ute Indian Tribes in their suit to be compensated for land never paid for by the U.S. government as part of the Treaty of 1880. In 1950, this suit was upheld by the United States Court of Claims and as a result, the Ute tribes were awarded $32 million. Due to Wilkinson's work, the Indian Claims Commission was signed in 1946 by Harry S. Truman. This opened up more claims to be filed and prosecuted by Wilkinson, making his firm the most active in the country for tribal cases. Wilkinson's share of the Ute Indian settlement as the plaintiff's attorney made him independently wealthy and allowed him to give up his law practice to pursue his interests in education. When he became the 7th president of BYU, Wilkinson created a new law firm: Wilkinson, Cragun, and Barker. He was the senior partner, but management was left to his brother, Glen Wilkinson, Cragun, and Barker.
Political Wilkinson was heavily interested in politics. Influenced by his socialist father from a young age, his viewpoints shifted to conservatism in his adult years. During the Cold War, LDS Church leaders were particularly fearful of the influence of communism in the United States. This was manifest in their choice of strictly conservative Wilkinson as the next BYU president. LDS Church leader Stephen L. Richards hoped in Wilkinson's inauguration that Wilkinson would, "implant in youth a deep love of country and a reverential regard for the Constitution of the United States." Wilkinson made it clear that he supported the Republican party and disliked communism. Some students at BYU criticized his "unabashed partisanship". Despite his interest in politics during the beginning of his presidency at BYU, he did not seriously consider running for the U.S. Senate. Though his law career had taught him how to navigate federal bureaucracy, he did not feel that he had the skills to win a congressional race. In addition, he was more concerned, at the time, in the work he could accomplish in Utah as BYU president rather than in Washington. Several times during the 1950s and 1960s, Wilkinson approached church president David O. McKay for his permission to run for public office. He was advised not to run until 1964 when he was given a one-year leave of absence to run for the senate. In his absence, duties of the president and chancellor were taken up by Earl C. Crockett and Harvey L. Taylor, respectively. In 1964, Wilkinson won the Republican Party nomination for the United States Senate, defeating Sherman P. Lloyd. Wilkinson lost in the general election to incumbent Senator Frank Moss. Within a month after his defeat, Wilkinson returned to BYU, but members of the Board of Trustees maintained that Harvey Taylor remain chancellor. As consolation, Wilkinson was granted a $20,000 salary, the largest salary of any BYU employee at the time.
BYU presidency The First Era: 1951–1957 Beginnings After Howard S. McDonald resigned from his position as BYU president, Christian Jensen served as interim president for about ten months. In 1949, at a dinner for Jensen, Wilkinson gave a speech asserting the ways in which he believed BYU could excel. He expressed that he had high aspirations for the school and believed in the values of combining a spiritual and secular education. After the dinner, Wilkinson was invited to share his ideas with the church's First Presidency and the Board of Trustees. The favorite candidate of J. Reuben Clark to fill the vacancy of BYU president was the vocally conservative Wilkinson, who lobbied LDS Church leaders to be appointed as president of BYU and was offered the position in July 1950. Wilkinson refused to be paid a salary, which attracted church officials in the aftermath of tense financial negotiations with previous president, McDonald. In September 1950, Wilkinson changed the members of the board of trustees from local members to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles with the First Presidency serving as president and vice presidents, respectively, of the board. Wilkinson wanted a direct line of communication to McKay, the church president at the time. Wilkinson would frequently counsel directly with McKay, avoiding the Board of Trustees. From 1951 to the end of 1952, Wilkinson had no official assistants besides William F. Edwards, the dean of the College of Commerce, and William E. Berrett, a professor of religion. At the end of 1952, Harvey L. Taylor became Wilkinson's first administrative assistant. Wilkinson was considered by most of his subordinates difficult to work with, citing him as dictatorial and inconsiderate. At 5'5", his nicknames among colleagues were "Little General" or "Little Napoleon". Aware of his difficulty getting along with his employees, he claimed he "[didn't] have time to be polite".
Unification and CES