After serving in the New York State Assembly, he moved to Niagara Falls, and in 1888, he formed a co-partnership with his former legal assistant, Frank A. Dudley, under the firm name of "Ely & Dudley." In 1893, Morris Cohn Jr. was admitted to partnership which then became "Ely, Dudley & Cohn." The firm was dissolved in 1899, upon Ely's election to the Presidency of the Buffalo Railway and allied companies. During the first ten years of his legal career, Ely was a general practitioner, trying cases at circuit, acting as counsel, and arguing appeals. In 1886, he recovered the largest verdict awarded in Niagara County in an action for damages for personal injuries.
Business career
Ely later moved to Buffalo, and engaged in the organization and construction of Western New Yorks most prominent railroads and power companies. He was one of the original promoters and incorporators of the Niagara Falls Power Company, and was instrumental in securing the enactment of its charter. He was the chief promoter of the Buffalo & Niagara Falls Electric Railway, and was its first president. He was also actively engaged in the construction of the Buffalo & Lockport Railway and Lockport & Olcott Railways, and was the president of both companies. For many years, Ely was the Counsel for the Niagara Falls and Clifton Suspension Bridge, and was counsel and one of the incorporators, and director of the company, which constructed the Suspension Bridge across the Niagara River between Lewiston, New York and Queenston, Ontario in Canada. Ely was one of the founders and Trustees, of the "Niagara County Savings Bank", and was a Director and Counsel of many banking and manufacturing corporations, including: the Niagara Falls Power Company, the Manufacturers' and Traders' National Bank of Buffalo, Carter-Crume Company the Niagara Silver Company and Wm A. Rogers, Ltd. He was actively connected with almost all the large enterprises contributing to the building up of the cities Buffalo and Niagara Falls. He was heavily involved with the construction of approximately of irrigating canals in the Columbia River Valley, in the State of Washington. Ely was very interested in irrigation as an economic and social question and served as the vice-president for the State of New York of the National Irrigation Congress of the United States. In 1898, Ely conceived a plan to combine all of the electric railways in Buffalo, Niagara Falls, Tonawanda, Lockport and vicinity, together with the Niagara Falls & River Railway, on the Canadian side of Niagara River, and the Steel Arch Bridge, and Suspension Bridge, into one system. The plan was successfully carried out and all of the operating companies, with one exception, were consolidated into the International Railway Company, all the capital stock of which was owned and held by the International Traction Company, the holding company, both of which Ely was president. J.P. Morgan & Co. were the underwriters of the deal and the bankers for the International Traction Company. At the time, the company was associated with the leading figures in railroads, including Francis Lynde Stetson, Daniel S. Lamont, Victor Morawetz, Thomas DeWitt Cuyler, William B. Rankine, and others. The company owned and operated of urban and interurban electric railways as well as two bridges across the Niagara River At the time of his death, he was associated with the Street Railway Advertising Company of New York, the American Sales Book Company, and the F.N. Burt Company.
