Successor To Breakey Pondered

Gov. William G. Milliken is expected to take from two weeks to a month to select a successor to the late Washtenaw Circuit Judge James R. Breakey Jr. After consideraron of several candidates and before the final decisión, the governor will seek the advice of an informal patronage committee. He is expected to choose a Republican with "qualifying experience," Lansing sources say. Among those considered eligible are: State Liquor Control Commission chairman Stanley G. Thayer of Ann Arbor. He sought the county's third circuit judgship in 1966 and was defeated by Judge John W. Conlin by about 24,000 votes to 17,000. He was appointed to the liquor control post by former Gov. George Romney 27 months ago. Thayer also was a "classmate" of Gov. Milliken when they entered the state Senate in 1961 to become part of the pro-Romney "Young Turks" in the Republican majority. Prosecuting Attorney William F. Delhey, who has held that office since Jan. 1, 1964, having been an assistant prosecutor for seven years before that. He is one of two prosecutors on the 29-member Michigan Commission on Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice. Probate Judge Ross W. Campbell who heads that court's estates and mental health división. He won office in April, 1967, in a special election, defeating Rodney E. Hutchinson, now a district judge, by about 500 votes. Senior district judges also considered eligible are Edward D. Deake of Ypsilanti and S. J. Elden of Ann Arbor. Deake, Ypsilanti municipal judge since 1953, was the top vote getter last November in the election of four district judges. Elden, Ann Arbor municipal judge since Jan. 1, 1967 by appointment of City Council and subsequent election in which he was unopposed, automatically became a district judge as of Jan. 1, 1969. ; - - - -