H. Bradley Jones; Legal Scholar

H. Bradley Jones, a nationally prominent tax lawyer who helped found what its attorney members called simply “The Group,” a band of legal scholars who fought successfully for the right of professional people to incorporate, died Saturday at St. John’s Medical Center.

He was 69 and his family said he died after a short illness.

A 1945 graduate of Harvard Law School, Jones’ civic and professional affiliations fill more than two single-spaced pages of his professional resume while his writing and speaking credits involve nearly four more.

Most of his activities took place in corporate board rooms or before tax and appellate courts. But in 1982 he briefly became a public figure when he spoke out on what he and many colleagues saw as potential devastation in federal tax-increase legislation, specifically its effect on private pension and health plans.

Jones warned at the time that without incentives to set up private pension plans, professionals who are already incorporated would dissolve their corporations, leaving their employees without retirement and health rograms.

Years earlier he had been the driving force behind “The Group,” having written an article for the autumn, 1958, Fordham Law Review that became a rallying call for the incorporation movement.

Survivors include his wife, Mary, two daughters, a son and four grandchildren.

A funeral service will be held at 11 a.m. Thursday at All-Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena.