Even leaving aside his earlier accomplishments and service, the contributions of Wayne Leys as a scholar, professor, and valued colleague at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, would require special acknowledgment and praise. Lewis E. Hahn, a colleague, has appropriately described him as a cooperative and creative person who, from a generous store of knowledge and a fertile mind, had something to contribute on a wide range of problems. a person of courage and conviction, he would not sidestep controversy when principles were threatened. He added a significance to the common efforts of the philosophy staff, and his example of quiet reasonableness, especially in times of stress and difficulty, continues to provide both encouragement and direction.
Having joined our staff in January, 1964, Leys worked selflessly for the department and his many students, graduate and undergraduate, until his death March 7, 1973, at the age of 67. in a joint effort with S. S. Rama Rao Pappu, a student from India, Leys prepared the centennial volume Gandhi and America's Educational Future (Southern Illinois Univ. Pr., 1969). This inquiry is a reflection of Leys's open, experimental, and truth-seeking spirit.
It was, of course, only one of the nine books he wrote. Three earlier books, Ethics and Social Policy (1941), Ethics for Policy Decisions(1952), and Philosophy and the Public Interest (with Charner Perry, 1959, all reflect Leys's major concern to relate ethics to public policy. Leys conceived of such policy as including all significant decisions made by politicians, administrators, judges, lawyers, and ordinary citizens. His purpose was to bring the deliberative ethical questions to bear on the exciting and complicated issues of social policy for the sake of a balanced, reasonable judgment.