James H. Davis (congressman)

James Harvey Davis ( * December 24, 1853 in Walhalla, Pickens County, South Carolina; † 31 January 1940 in Kaufman, Texas ) was an American politician. Between 1915 and 1917 he represented the state of Texas in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Career

James Davis attended the public schools in Wood County, Texas, where he had moved with his parents. Between 1875 and 1878 he worked as a teacher. In 1878 he was elected as a judge in Franklin County, although he had completed at this time, no law school. After he had completed this and in 1882 was admitted to the bar, he began in Mount Vernon to work in this profession. At the time, Davis joined the Farmers' Alliance, for which he held talks advertising. Later, he was co-founder and from 1892 to 1900 Board Member of the Populist Party in Texas. In 1894 he ran unsuccessfully for Congress yet. In addition, Davis has worked in the newspaper business. Between 1886 and 1888 he was president of the Texas Press Association. In 1914 he rejected an appeal from the agricultural commissioner for the Philippines.

In the 1890s, Davis joined the Democratic Party. In the congressional elections of 1914 he was in the 17th electoral district of Texas in the U.S. House of Representatives in Washington DC chosen, where he became the successor of Daniel E. Garrett on March 4, 1915. Since he lost in 1916 in the primaries of his party against Garrett, he was able to complete only one term in Congress until March 3, 1917.

After the end of his time in the U.S. House of Representatives James Davis moved to Sulphur Springs, where he worked in agriculture. Since 1935 he lived in Kaufman. He died there on 31 January 1940 and was buried in Sulphur Springs. Davis was a member of the Ku Klux Klan in his later years.