Research Catalog

Benjamin J. Davis papers

Title
Benjamin J. Davis papers, 1949-1964.
Author
Davis, Benjamin J. (Benjamin Jefferson), 1903-1964.
Supplementary Content
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Available - Can be used on site. Please visit New York Public Library - Schomburg Center to submit a request in person.

r. 4Moving imageUse in library Sc Micro R-6129 r. 4Schomburg Center - Research & Reference

Available - Can be used on site. Please visit New York Public Library - Schomburg Center to submit a request in person.

r. 3Moving imageUse in library Sc Micro R-6129 r. 3Schomburg Center - Research & Reference

Available - Can be used on site. Please visit New York Public Library - Schomburg Center to submit a request in person.

r. 2Moving imageUse in library Sc Micro R-6129 r. 2Schomburg Center - Research & Reference

Available - Can be used on site. Please visit New York Public Library - Schomburg Center to submit a request in person.

r. 1Moving imageUse in library Sc Micro R-6129 r. 1Schomburg Center - Research & Reference

Details

Additional Authors
  • Foster, William Z., 1881-1961.
  • Dennis, Eugene, 1905-1961.
  • Jones, Claudia, 1915-1964.
  • Griswold, Erwin N. (Erwin Nathaniel), 1904-
  • King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968.
  • Robeson, Paul, 1898-1976.
  • Wilkins, Roy, 1901-
  • Patterson, William L. (William Lorenzo), 1890-1980.
  • Lowenfels, Walter, 1897-1976.
  • Aptheker, Herbert, 1915-2003.
  • Briggs, Cyril V., 1888-
  • Robeson, Eslanda Goode, 1896-1965.
  • Resnick, Sidney I.
  • Jackson, Esther.
Description
  • 2.3 lin. ft.
  • 4 microfilm reels.
Summary
Divided into four series, Correspondence, the Smith Act Trial, Writings and Printed matter, the Benjamin J. Davis, Jr. Papers document Davis's life and political career from 1949 to the time of his death.
Donor/Sponsor
Schomburg NEH Automated Access to Special Collections Project.
Alternative Title
Smith Act (Alien Registration Act of 1940)
Subjects
Note
  • Photographs transferred to the Photographs and Prints Division.
Access (note)
  • Researchers are restricted to microfilm copy.
Additional Formats (note)
  • Collection available on microfilm;
Biography (note)
  • Born in Dawson, Ga. in 1903, Benjamin Jefferson Davis, Jr. was a civil rights lawyer, a former New York City councilman, an author and editor, a Marxist theoretician and a leader of the Communist Party of the United States of America.
Processing Action (note)
  • Processed.
  • Cataloged.
  • Updated.
Call Number
Sc Micro R-6129
OCLC
NYPW91-A145
Author
Davis, Benjamin J. (Benjamin Jefferson), 1903-1964.
Title
Benjamin J. Davis papers, 1949-1964.
Access
Researchers are restricted to microfilm copy.
Additional Formats
Collection available on microfilm; New York Public Library; call number Sc Micro R-6129.
Biography
Born in Dawson, Ga. in 1903, Benjamin Jefferson Davis, Jr. was a civil rights lawyer, a former New York City councilman, an author and editor, a Marxist theoretician and a leader of the Communist Party of the United States of America. Davis joined the Communist Party in 1933 during his court defense of Angelo Herndon, a young African-American communist organizer who faced the death penalty in Georgia for leading a protest march of white and black unemployed workers. He later served as an editor and publisher to the "Daily Worker" and its weekly successor, "The Worker", and as a member of the editorial board of "Political Affairs," the theoretical journal of the Communist Party. He is also the author of an extensive autobiography and of several pamphlets on Communism and blacks.
Davis was elected to the New York City Council in 1943 as a Communist Party candidate. He was reelected in 1945, but was defeated in 1949 by a coalition candidate of the Republican, Democratic and Liberal parties. As an elected official, Davis organized several mass campaigns against police brutality and against segregation in education, housing and sports.
In 1949, Davis was one of eleven Communist leaders convicted of conspiring to overthrow the United States government. He went to jail in 1951 and spent three years and four months at the federal prison at Terre-Haute, Indiana. He continued to fight against racial discrimination during his incarceration, and filed two suits in the U.S. District Court to stop the segregation of African-American inmates in federal penitentiaries. At the end of his sentence, he served an additional two months at the Allegheny County Jail in Pittsburgh, Pa. for having refused, in 1953, to reveal the names of people belonging to the Communist Party's Commission on Negro Work. At the time of his death, Davis was again under indictment, under the McCarran Act, for his refusal to register as an agent of the Soviet Union.
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Finding Aid
Added Author
Foster, William Z., 1881-1961.
Dennis, Eugene, 1905-1961.
Jones, Claudia, 1915-1964.
Griswold, Erwin N. (Erwin Nathaniel), 1904-
King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968.
Robeson, Paul, 1898-1976.
Wilkins, Roy, 1901-
Patterson, William L. (William Lorenzo), 1890-1980.
Lowenfels, Walter, 1897-1976.
Aptheker, Herbert, 1915-2003.
Briggs, Cyril V., 1888-
Robeson, Eslanda Goode, 1896-1965.
Resnick, Sidney I.
Jackson, Esther.
Added Title
Smith Act (Alien Registration Act of 1940)
Research Call Number
Sc Micro R-6129
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