Joseph C. Woodcock, Jr. (November 20, 1925 – November 2, 1997) was an American Republican Party politician who served in the

New Jersey General Assembly The New Jersey General Assembly is the lower house of the New Jersey Legislature. Since the election of 1967 (1968 Session), the Assembly has consisted of 80 members. Two members are elected from each of New Jersey's 40 legislative districts f ...

, the New Jersey Senate, and as Bergen County Prosecutor. He served in the Assembly for six years, from 1962 - 1967, and in the State Senate for six years, from 1968 - 1973. Woodcock was defeated in 1973 for a third term in the Senate. After the election, he resigned his seat to become Bergen County Prosecutor. In 1977, Woodcock entered the NJ gubernatorial race but withdrew before the primary when Bergen County GOP party leadership failed to endorse him. The following year, Woodcock led an insurgent ticket of Republican candidates, challenging Bergen County GOP party leadership in the 1978 Republican Primary. He ran for the US House of Representatives, District 7 GOP nomination but was defeated by the party-endorsed candidate, Margaret Roukema, who ultimately lost to the Democratic incumbent in November. Woodcock was born in

Cliffside Park, New Jersey Cliffside Park is a borough in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the borough's population was 23,594,Cliffside Park High School Cliffside Park High School is a four-year comprehensive public high school that serves students in ninth through twelfth grade from Cliffside Park, in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States, operating as the lone secondary school of the Cli ...

and

Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's College, and was ...

. Woodcock earned his law degree at the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

and was a member of the

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

and

American Bar Association The American Bar Association (ABA) is a voluntary bar association of lawyers and law students, which is not specific to any jurisdiction in the United States. Founded in 1878, the ABA's most important stated activities are the setting of aca ...

s. He was also a member of the New Jersey Superior Court Ethics Commission. The son of a former Cliffside Park mayor, Woodcock served on the town council from 1957-58 and as the borough attorney in 1959. He also ran for mayor in 1959 but was defeated.

References

1925 births 1997 deaths 20th-century American politicians Cliffside Park High School alumni Politicians from Bergen County, New Jersey Republican Party members of the New Jersey General Assembly Republican Party New Jersey state senators Rutgers University alumni People from Cliffside Park, New Jersey {{NewJersey-politician-stub