John W. Davis
14th United States Solicitor General
In office August 1913 – November 1918
President	Woodrow Wilson
Preceded by	William Marshall Bullit
Succeeded by	Alexander C. King
6th United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom
In office 1918–1921
President	Woodrow Wilson
Preceded by	Walter Hines Page
Succeeded by	George Brinton McClellan Harvey
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from West Virginia's 1st district
In office March 4, 1911 – August 29, 1913
Preceded by	William P. Hubbard
Succeeded by	Matthew M. Neely
Personal details
Born	John William Davis (1873-04-13)April 13, 1873 Clarksburg, West Virginia
Died	March 24, 1955(1955-03-24) (aged 81) Charleston, South Carolina
Nationality	American
Political party	Democratic
Spouse(s)	Julia T. McDonald (1899–1900), Ellen G. Bassel (1912–1943)
Relations	John James Davis (father), Anna Kennedy Davis (mother), Cyrus Vance (nephew)
Children	Julia McDonald Davis
Alma mater	Washington and Lee University
Profession	Lawyer

John William Davis (April 13, 1873 – March 24, 1955) was an American politician, diplomat and lawyer. He served as a United States Representative from West Virginia (1911–1913), then as Solicitor General of the United States and US Ambassador to the UK under President Woodrow Wilson. Over a 60-year legal career, he argued 140 cases before the US Supreme Court.

Davis is best known as the Democratic Party nominee for President of the United States during the 1924 presidential election, losing to Republican incumbent Calvin Coolidge.

Family and early life[link]

Family background[link]

Davis's great-grandfather, Caleb Davis, was a clockmaker in the Shenandoah Valley. In 1816, his grandfather, John Davis, moved to Clarksburg in what would later become West Virginia, which had a population of 600–700 at the time, and ran a saddle and harness business. His father, John James Davis, attended Lexington Law School, which later became the Washington and Lee University School of Law, and by the age of twenty, had established a law practice in Clarksburg. John J. Davis was a delegate in the Virginia General Assembly, and after the northwestern portion of Virginia broke away from the rest of Virginia in 1863 and formed West Virginia, he was elected to the new state's House of Delegates and later to the United States House of Representatives.^[1]

John W. Davis's mother Anna Kennedy (1841–1917) was from Baltimore, Maryland. His maternal grandparents were "William" Wilson Kennedy and his wife Catherine Esdale Martin. Kennedy was a lumber merchant. Catherine was the daughter of Tobias Martin, dairy farmer and amateur poet, and his wife, a member of the Esdale family. The Esdales were members of the Religious Society of Friends, settled near Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. They had reportedly helped provide for the Continental Army under George Washington which had camped there in the winter of 1777–1778.^[2]

Early years[link]

Davis' Sunday School Teacher recalled "John W. Davis had a noble face even when small." His biographer went on to say that "[h]e used better English, kept himself cleaner, and was more dignified than most youngsters. He was also extraordinarily well-mannered."<^[3]

Education[link]

John W. Davis

Davis' education began at home, as his mother taught him to read before he had even memorized the alphabet. She then had him read poetry and other literature throughout the home library. After he turned ten, he was put in a class with older students to prepare him for the state teachers examination. A few years later, he was enrolled in a previously all-female seminary that doubled as a private boarding and day school. There he received nothing less than a 94 for grades.^[4]

Davis entered Washington and Lee University at the age of sixteen. He graduated in 1892 with a major in Latin. He joined the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity, participated in intramural sports, and "took calico^{[disambiguation needed ]}" by attending mixed parties.^[5]

He would have started law school directly after graduation, but he lacked funds. Instead, he became a school teacher for Major Edward H. McDonald of Charles Town, West Virginia. Davis taught McDonald's nine children and his six nieces and nephews, one of whom, Julia, nineteen at the time, would become Davis's wife. Davis fulfilled a nine-month contract with McDonald, but then returned home to Clarksburg and apprenticed at his father's law practice, where for fourteen months he copied documents by hand, read cases, and did much of what other aspiring lawyers did at the time.^[6]

He graduated with a law degree from Washington and Lee University School of Law in 1895 and was elected Law Class Orator.^[7] His speech gave a glimpse of his advocacy skills:

[The] lawyer has been always the sentinel of the watchtower of liberty. In all times and all countries has he stood forth in defense of his nation, her laws and liberties, not, it may be, under a shower of leaden death, but often with the frown of a revengeful and angry tyrant bent upon him.

Fellow classmates of 1895, shall we... prove unworthy?^[3]

Washington & Lee legacy[link]

Washington and Lee University School of Law has shown great pride in Davis. In 1947, W&L began awarding the John W. Davis Prize to the graduating law student with the highest GPA.^[8] The law school has also named its intramural Moot Court Competition after Davis.^[9]

Early legal career[link]

After graduating from law school, Davis obtained the three signatures necessary to receive a law license, and joined his father in practice in Clarksburg, in what was called Davis and Davis, Attorneys at Law. Davis lost his first three cases before his fortunes began to turn. Before Davis had completed his first year of private practice, he was asked to come back to Washington & Lee Law School as an assistant professor, starting in the fall of 1896. At the time, the law school had a faculty of two, and Davis became the third. At the end of the year, Davis was asked to return but demurred. He decided that he needed the "rough & tumble" of private practice.^[10]

Family connections[link]

He married Julia T. McDonald June 20, 1899, but she died on August 17, 1900. They had a daughter, Julia McDonald Davis, who married Charles P. Healy and then William M. Adams. On January 2, 1912, Davis married Ellen G. Bassel, who died in 1943.

Davis was the uncle and adoptive father of Cyrus Vance, Secretary of State under Jimmy Carter. His daughter Julia was one of the first two female journalists hired by the Associated Press in 1926. Julia married William McMillan Adams, president of Sprague International. He was the son of Arthur Henry Adams, president of the United States Rubber Company. Both father and son were aboard the luxury liner RMS Lusitania when it was sunk by a German submarine in 1915. Arthur died, his son survived. Julia and William were divorced, both remarried, she twice, and then they remarried in their old age. William had two sons, John Perry and Arthur Henry II. Julia died in 1993 with no natural children but claimed six "by theft and circumstance."

Political and diplomatic career[link]

Davis (right) and Secretary of State Robert Lansing in 1917

His father had been a delegate to the Wheeling Convention, which had created the state of West Virginia, but he had also opposed the abolitionists, Radical Republicans, and opposed ratification of the 15th Amendment. Davis acquired much of his father's conservative politics, opposing women's suffrage, Federal federal child-labor laws and anti-lynching legislation, Harry S. Truman's civil rights program, and defended the State's rights to establish the poll tax by questioning whether uneducated non-taxpayers should be allowed to vote. Additionally, as much as he was opposed to centralism in politics he was opposed to concentration of capitalism by supporting a number of early progressive laws regulating Interstate commerce and limiting the power and concentration of corporations. Consequently, he felt distinctly out of place in the big business controlled Republican Party and maintained his father's staunch allegiance to the Democratic Party, even as he later represented the interests of conservative business interests opposed to the democratic centralism of New Deal. Davis ranked as one of the last Jeffersonians, as he supported states' rights and opposed a strong executive (he would be the lead attorney against Truman's nationalization of the steel industry).

"John W. Davis for President" campaign button

He represented West Virginia in the US House of Representatives from 1911 to 1913, where he was one of the authors of the Clayton Act. Davis also served as one of the managers in the successful impeachment trial of Judge Robert W. Archbald. He served as US Solicitor General from 1913 to 1918 and as ambassador to the United Kingdom from 1918 to 1921. As Solicitor General, he successfully argued in Guinn v. United States for the illegality of Oklahoma's "grandfather law". That law exempted residents descended from a voter registered in 1866 (i.e. whites) from a literacy test which effectively disenfranchised blacks. Davis's personal posture differed from his position as an advocate. Throughout his career, he could separate his personal views and professional advocacy.

Davis was a dark horse candidate for the Democratic nomination for President in both 1920 and 1924. His friend and partner Frank Polk managed his campaign at the 1924 Democratic National Convention.

He won the nomination in 1924 as a compromise candidate on the one hundred and third ballot. His denunciation of the Ku Klux Klan and his prior defense of black voting rights as Solicitor General under Wilson cost him votes in the South and among conservative Democrats elsewhere. He lost in a landslide to Calvin Coolidge, who did not leave the White House to campaign.

Davis was a member of the National Advisory Council of the Crusaders, an influential organization that promoted the repeal of prohibition. He was the founding President of the Council on Foreign Relations, formed in 1921, and a trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation from 1922 to 1939. Davis also served as a delegate from New York to the 1928 and 1932 Democratic National Conventions.

The Business Plot[link]

Davis was implicated by retired Marine Corps Major General Smedley Butler in the Business Plot, an alleged political conspiracy in 1933 to overthrow United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in testimony before the McCormack-Dickstein Committee, whose deliberations began on November 20, 1934 and culminated in the Committee's report to the United States House of Representatives on February 15, 1935. Davis was not called before the committee because "The committee will not take cognizance of names brought into the testimony which constitute mere hearsay."

Legal career[link]

John W. Davis

Davis was one of the most prominent and successful lawyers of the first half of the 20th century, arguing 140 cases before the US Supreme Court. His firm, variously titled Stetson Jennings Russell & Davis, then Davis Polk Wardwell Gardiner & Reed, then Davis Polk Wardwell Sunderland & Kiendl (now Davis Polk & Wardwell), represented many of the largest companies in the United States in the 1920s and following decades. From 1931 to 1933, Davis also served as president of the New York City Bar Association.

The last twenty years of Davis's practice included representing large corporations before the United States Supreme Court challenging the constitutionality and application of New Deal legislation. Davis lost many of these battles.

Appearances before the US Supreme Court[link]

Davis argued 140 cases before the US Supreme Court during his career. Some of these were as Solicitor General, but more were as a private lawyer. Lawrence Wallace, who retired from the Office of the Solicitor General in 2003, argued 157 cases during his career but many believe that few attorneys have argued more cases than Davis.^[11] Daniel Webster and Walter Jones are believed to have argued more cases than Davis, but they were lawyers of a much earlier era.^[12]

Youngstown Steel case[link]

One of Davis' most influential arguments before the Supreme Court was in Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer in May 1952, when the Court ruled on Truman's seizure of the nation's steel plants.

While Davis wasn't brought into the case until March 1952, he was already familiar with the concept of a presidential seizure of a steel mill. In 1949, the Republic Steel Company, fearful of advice given to President Truman by Attorney General Tom C. Clark, asked Davis for an opinion letter on whether the President could seize private industry in a "National Emergency." Davis wrote that the President could not do so, unless such power already was vested in the President by law. He further went on to opine on the Selective Service Act of 1948's intent, and that seizures were only authorized if a company did not sufficiently prioritize government production in a time of crisis.

Arguing for the steel industry, Davis orated for eighty-seven minutes before the Court. He described Truman's acts as an "'usurpation' of power, that were 'without parallel in American history.'"^[13] The Justices allowed him to proceed uninterrupted, with only one question from Justice Frankfurter, who may have had a personal feeling against Davis relating to his 1924 presidential campaign.^[14] It had been predicted that the President's actions would be upheld, and the injunction would be lifted, but the Court decided 6–3, to uphold the injunction stopping the seizure of the steel mills.

Washington Post writer Chalmers Roberts subsequently wrote that rarely "has a courtroom sat in such silent admiration for a lawyer at the bar" in reference to Davis' oral argument. Unfortunately, Davis did not allow the oral argument to be printed because the stenographic transcript was so garbled he feared it would not be close to what was said at the Court.^[15]

Of particular note in the case is that one of the Justices was Tom Clark, who as Attorney General in 1949 had advised Truman to proceed with the seizure of Republic Steel. Yet in 1952, Justice Clark voted with the majority, even though he did not concur in the opinion; in direct opposition to his previous advice.^[16]

Brown vs. Board of Education[link]

Davis' legal career is most remembered for his final appearance before the Supreme Court, in which he unsuccessfully defended the "separate but equal" doctrine in Briggs v. Elliott, a companion case to Brown v. Board of Education. Davis, as a defender of racial segregation and state control of education, uncharacteristically displayed his emotions in arguing that South Carolina had shown good faith in attempting to eliminate any inequality between black and white schools and should be allowed to continue to do so without judicial intervention. He expected to win, most likely through a divided Supreme Court, even after the matter was re-argued after the death of Chief Justice Fred M. Vinson. After the Supreme Court unanimously ruled against his client's position, he returned the $25,000 ($218,797 as of 2012),^[17] that he had received from South Carolina, although he was not required to do so, but kept a silver tea service that had been presented to him.^[18] He declined to participate further in the case, as he did not wish to be involved in the drafting of decrees to implement the Court's decision.^[18]

Death and legacy[link]

Davis had been a member of the American Bar Association, the Council on Foreign Relations, Freemasons, Phi Beta Kappa, and Phi Kappa Psi. He was a resident of Nassau County, New York and practiced law in New York City until his death in Charleston, South Carolina at the age of 81. He is interred at Locust Valley Cemetery in Glen Cove, New York.

The John W. Davis Federal building on West Pike street in Clarksburg, West Virginia is named after Davis.

The John W. Davis dormitory at Washington and Lee University is named for him.

In the 1991 television film Separate But Equal, a dramatization of the Brown case, Davis was portrayed by the famed actor Burt Lancaster in his final film role.

Electoral history[link]

West Virginia's 1st congressional district, 1910:^[19]

• John W. Davis (D) – 20,370 (48.88%)
• Charles E. Carrigan (R) – 16,962 (40.71%)
• A. L. Bauer (Socialist) – 3,239 (7.77%)
• Ulysses A. Clayton (Prohibition) – 1,099 (2.64%)

West Virginia's 1st congressional district, 1912:^[20]

• John W. Davis (D) (inc.) – 24,777 (44.97%)
• George A. Laughlin (R) – 24,613 (44.67%)
• D. M. S. Scott (Socialist) – 4,230 (7.68%)
• L. E. Peters (Prohibition) – 1,482 (2.69%)

1924 Democratic presidential primaries

• William McAdoo – 562,601 (56.05%)
• Oscar W. Underwood – 77,583 (7.73%)
• James M. Cox – 74,183 (7.39%)
• Unpledged – 59,217 (5.90%)
• Henry Ford – 49,737 (4.96%)
• Thomas J. Walsch – 43,108 (4.30%)
• Woodbridge Nathan Ferris – 42,028 (4.19%)
• George Silzer – 35,601 (3.55%)
• Al Smith – 16,459 (1.64%)
• L. B. Musgrove – 12,110 (1.21%)
• William Dever – 1,574 (0.16%)
• James A. Reed – 84 (0.01%)
• John W. Davis – 21 (0.00%)

United States presidential election, 1924

• Calvin Coolidge/Charles G. Dawes (R) – 15,723,789 (54.0%) and 382 electoral votes (35 states carried)
• John W. Davis/Charles W. Bryan (D) – 8,386,242 (28.8%) and 136 electoral votes (12 states carried)
• Robert M. La Follette, Sr./Burton K. Wheeler (Progressive) – 4,831,706 (16.6%) and 13 electoral votes (1 state carried)

See also[link]

• Brown v. Board of Education
• Guinn v. United States
• Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer

References[link]

• Harbaugh, William Henry (1973). Lawyer's lawyer: the life of John W. Davis. Oxford [Oxfordshire]: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-501699-8. 

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: John W. Davis

• John W. Davis at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
• International Home of the English-Speaking Uni
• CFR Website – Continuing the Inquiry: The Council on Foreign Relations from 1921 to 1996 The history of the Council by Peter Grose, a Council member.
• Website of Davis Polk & Wardwell, law firm of which Davis was a member and which bears his name today
• Political Graveyard

v t e United States Solicitors General Bristow • Phillips • Goode • Jenks • Chapman • Taft • Aldrich • Maxwell • Conrad • Richards • Hoyt • Bowers • Lehmann • Bullitt • Davis • King • Frierson • Beck • Mitchell • Hughes • Thacher • Biggs • Reed • Jackson • Biddle • Fahy • McGrath • Perlman • Cummings • Sobeloff • Rankin • Cox • Marshall • Griswold • Bork • McCree • Lee • Fried • Starr • Days • Dellinger (acting) • Waxman • Barbara Underwood (acting) • Olson • Clement • Garre • Kneedler (acting) • Kagan • Katyal (acting) • Verrilli

v t e United States Ambassadors to the United Kingdom Ministers Plenipotentiary to the Court of St. James's 1785–1811 John Adams 1785–1788 Thomas Pinckney 1792–1796 Rufus King 1796–1803 James Monroe 1803–1807 William Pinkney 1808–1811 Jonathan Russell (chargé d'affaires) 1811–1812 Envoys Extraordinary and Ministers Plenipotentiary to the Court of St. James's 1815–1893 John Quincy Adams 1815–1817 Richard Rush 1818–1825 Rufus King 1825–1826 Albert Gallatin 1826–1827 James Barbour 1828–1829 Louis McLane 1829–1831 Martin Van Buren 1831–1832 Aaron Vail (chargé d'affaires) 1832–1836 Andrew Stevenson 1836–1841 Edward Everett 1841–1845 Louis McLane 1845–1846 George Bancroft 1846–1849 Abbott Lawrence 1849–1852 Joseph R. Ingersoll 1852–1853 James Buchanan 1853–1856 George M. Dallas 1856–1861 Charles Adams, Sr. 1861–1868 Reverdy Johnson 1868–1869 John Lothrop Motley 1869–1870 Robert C. Schenck 1871–1876 Edwards Pierrepont 1876–1877 John Welsh 1877–1879 James Russell Lowell 1880–1885 Edward J. Phelps 1885–1889 Robert Todd Lincoln 1889–1893 Ambassadors Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the Court of St. James's 1893–present Thomas F. Bayard, Sr. 1893–1897 John Hay 1897–1898 Joseph Choate 1899–1905 Whitelaw Reid 1905–1912 Walter Page 1913-1918 John W. Davis 1918–1921 George Harvey 1921–1923 Frank B. Kellogg 1924–1925 Alanson B. Houghton 1925–1929 Charles G. Dawes 1929–1931 Andrew W. Mellon 1932–1933 Robert Bingham 1933–1937 Joseph P. Kennedy 1938–1940 John G. Winant 1941–1946 W. Averell Harriman 1946 Lewis W. Douglas 1947–1950 Walter S. Gifford 1950–1953 Winthrop W. Aldrich 1953–1957 John Hay Whitney 1957–1961 David K. E. Bruce 1961–1969 Walter H. Annenberg 1969–1974 Elliot L. Richardson 1975–1976 Anne Armstrong 1976–1977 Kingman Brewster, Jr. 1977–1981 John J. Louis, Jr. 1981–1983 Charles H. Price II 1983–1989 Henry E. Catto, Jr. 1989–1991 Raymond G. H. Seitz 1991–1994 William J. Crowe 1994–1997 Philip Lader 1997–2001 William Stamps Farish III 2001–2004 Robert H. Tuttle 2005–2009 Louis Susman 2009–

Look up John or john in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

John is a common English name and surname:

• John (given name)
• John (surname)

John may also refer to:

People[link]

Religious figures[link]

• John Hyrcanus, ruler of Judea 134–104 BC
• John the Baptist (c. 7 BC – c. 30 AD), regarded as a prophet and the forerunner of Jesus Christ
• John the Apostle (c. 6 – c. 100 AD), one of the twelve apostles of Jesus
  • John the Evangelist, alleged author of the Fourth Gospel, traditionally identified with the Apostle
  • John of Patmos, the Seer of the Book of Revelation, traditionally identified with the Apostle
  • John the Presbyter, an obscure figure either identified with or distinguished from the Apostle, the Evangelist and John of Patmos
• John Mark, possibly the same as Mark the Evangelist
• Pope John of Alexandria (disambiguation), 19 Patriarchs of Alexandria
• Saint John (disambiguation), various people

Popes and Antipopes[link]

• Pope John or Antipope John (disambiguation), a Roman Catholic papal name
• Pope John I
• Pope John II
• Pope John III
• Pope John IV
• Pope John V
• Pope John VI
• Pope John VII
• Pope John VIII
• Pope John IX
• Pope John X
• Pope John XI
• Pope John XII
• Pope John XIII
• Pope John XIV
• Pope John XV
• Antipope John XVI
• Pope John XVII
• Pope John XVIII
• Pope John XIX
• Pope John XX, a numbering never actually used
• Pope John XXI
• Pope John XXII
• Pope John XXIII
• Antipope John XXIII

Rulers and other political figures[link]

• John of Austria (disambiguation) (three people)
• John of Bohemia (1296–1346), called John the Blind, king from 1310
• John of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, better known as Hans of Denmark (1455–1513)
• John of England (1166–1216), king and younger brother of Richard I
• John I of Hungary or János Szapolyai (1487–1540), king from 1526
• John II Sigismund Zápolya (1540–1571), king of Hungary and Prince of Transylvania
• John of Poland (disambiguation), three people
• John of Scotland also known as John de Balliol (c. 1249–1314), king from 1292–1296
• Infante João, Duke of Valencia de Campos (1349–1397)
• Infante João of Portugal (1400–1442), Lord of Reguengos de Monsaraz
• Infante John of Coimbra, Prince of Antioch (1431–1457)
• Infante John, Duke of Viseu (1448–1472), 3rd Duke of Viseu, 2nd Duke of Beja, King Manuel I's older brother
• João, Crown Prince of Portugal (1537–1554)
• Infante João, Duke of Beja (1842–1861)

• Iohannes (consul 456), a politician of the Eastern Roman Empire
• Iohannes (consul 467), a politician of the Eastern Roman Empire, advisor to Emperor Zeno
• John the Scythian, a general and politician of the Eastern Roman Empire, consul in 498
• John the Hunchback, a general and politician of the Eastern Roman Empire, consul in 499

Others[link]

• John of Antioch (chronicler), a chronicler of the 7th century

Fictional characters[link]

• John Arbuckle, fictional character in the comic strip, Garfield
• Dr. John Watson (Sherlock Holmes), best friend of Sherlock Holmes
• John Clayton, English name of Tarzan
• John Carter (character), Edgar Rice Burroughs' protagonist in a series of novels set on Mars
• John (John and Gillian), appearing in the Doctor Who TV comic strip
• John (Tomorrow People), appearing in the children's science-fiction TV series The Tomorrow People
• John from Cincinnati, eponymous TV character
• John, the head of the Visitors force in the science-fiction franchise V
• Red John, the antagonist of The Mentalist
• Dr. John Michael "J.D." Dorian, of the TV sitcom Scrubs
• John Sheppard (Stargate), a US Air Force officer on the TV series Stargate Atlantis
• John Bosley (Charlie's Angels), in the 1976-1981 television series Charlie's Angels
• Detective John Munch, on the TV series Law & Order
• Master Chief (Halo) (John-117), main character in the Halo video game series
• Big Boss (Metal Gear), whose real name is John, one of the main characters from the video game series Metal Gear Solid
• John Marston, the protagonist of Red Dead Redemption

Books of the Bible[link]

• Gospel of John
• 1 John
• 2 John
• 3 John

Songs[link]

• "John" (song), by French singer Desireless
• "John" (Lil Wayne song)
• "john", an iamamiwhoami song

Other[link]

• John Doe, generic name for a male whose identity is either unknown or withheld
• John, slang for a person who patronizes prostitutes
• John, slang for toilet
• John (ship), which disappeared off the coast of Australia in 1806
• Tropical Storm John (disambiguation), tropical cyclones appearing in the eastern Pacific Ocean
• John the bookmaker controversy, a cricket betting scandal in 1994–95 in which Australian cricketers were involved with an Indian bookmaker identified only as "John"
• John the Ripper, a password strength checking program (the executable program is simply "john")
• John, a 1927 play by Philip Barry

See also[link]

• All pages beginning with "John"
• All pages with titles containing "John"
• Yahya
• Johnny (disambiguation)
• Jon
• Ivan (disambiguation)
• Yohannan

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

Davis may refer to:

• Davis (surname), a Welsh surname meaning 'son of David'
• Davis Bertans (born 1992), a Latvian professional basketball player
• Davis Bloome, fictional character in Smallville
• Davis Cup, premier international team event in men's tennis
• Davis LLP, Canadian law firm
• Davis Motomiya, fictional character in Digimon
• Davis Quinton, fictional character in Corner Gas
• University of California, Davis, also known as "UC Davis"
• Georgie Davis, Dutch singer, artist name of Kees Rietveld

Places

• Antarctica
  • Davis Station, Australian base
• Canada
  • Davis, Saskatchewan
• United States
  • Davis, California, the largest city with the name
  • Davis, Illinois
  • Davis, Massachusetts, abandoned mining village
  • Davis, Oklahoma
  • Davis, South Dakota
  • Davis, West Virginia
  • Hopeful, Alabama, formerly Davis
  • Train stations
    • Davis (CTA), elevated public transit station in Evanston, Illinois
    • Evanston Davis Street (Metra), commuter railroad station in Evanston, Illinois
    • Davis (MBTA station), subway station in Somerville, Massachusetts

See also[link]

• Mount Davis (disambiguation)
• David (disambiguation)

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

John Coltrane
John Coltrane, live at Birdland
Background information
Birth name	John William Coltrane
Also known as	"Trane"
Born	(1926-09-23)September 23, 1926 Hamlet, North Carolina, US
Died	July 17, 1967(1967-07-17) (aged 40) Huntington, New York, US
Genres	Avant-garde jazz, bebop, hard bop, post-bop, modal jazz, free jazz
Occupations	Saxophonist, composer, bandleader
Instruments	Tenor, soprano, and alto saxophone, bass clarinet, flute
Years active	1946–1967
Labels	Prestige, Blue Note, Atlantic, Impulse!, Pablo
Associated acts	Alice Coltrane, Miles Davis Quintet, Thelonious Monk, Pharoah Sanders, Eric Dolphy
Website	johncoltrane.com

John William Coltrane (September 23, 1926 – July 17, 1967) was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career, Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes in jazz and later was at the forefront of free jazz. He organized at least fifty recording sessions as a leader during his recording career, and appeared as a sideman on many other albums, notably with trumpeter Miles Davis and pianist Thelonious Monk.

As his career progressed, Coltrane and his music took on an increasingly spiritual dimension. His second wife was pianist Alice Coltrane, and their son Ravi Coltrane is also a saxophonist. Coltrane influenced innumerable musicians, and remains one of the most significant tenor saxophonists in jazz history. He received many posthumous awards and recognitions, including canonization by the African Orthodox Church as Saint John William Coltrane. In 2007, Coltrane was awarded the Pulitzer Prize Special Citation for his "masterful improvisation, supreme musicianship and iconic centrality to the history of jazz."^[1]

Biography[link]

Early life and career (1926–1954)[link]

Coltrane's first recordings were made when he was a sailor

John Coltrane was born in Hamlet, North Carolina on September 23, 1926, and grew up in High Point, NC, attending William Penn High School (now Penn-Griffin School for the Arts). Beginning in December 1938 Coltrane's aunt, grandparents, and father all died within a few months of each other, leaving John to be raised by his mother and a close cousin.^[2] In June 1943 he moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He enlisted in the Navy in 1945, and played in the Navy jazz band once he was stationed in Hawaii. Coltrane returned to civilian life in 1946 and began jazz theory studies with Philadelphia guitarist and composer Dennis Sandole. Coltrane continued under Sandole's tutelage until the early 1950s. Originally an altoist,^[3] during this time Coltrane also began playing tenor saxophone with the Eddie Vinson Band. Coltrane later referred to this point in his life as a time when "a wider area of listening opened up for me. There were many things that people like Hawk, and Ben, and Tab Smith were doing in the '40s that I didn't understand, but that I felt emotionally."^[4]

An important moment in the progression of Coltrane's musical development occurred on June 5, 1945, when he saw Charlie Parker perform for the first time. In a DownBeat article in 1960 he recalled: "the first time I heard Bird play, it hit me right between the eyes."^[3] Parker became an early idol, and they played together on occasion in the late 1940s.

Contemporary correspondence shows that Coltrane was already known as "Trane" by this point, and that the music from some 1946 recording sessions had been played for Miles Davis—possibly impressing the latter.^[5]

There are recordings of Coltrane from as early as 1945. He was a member of groups led by Dizzy Gillespie, Earl Bostic and Johnny Hodges in the early- to mid-1950s.

Miles and Monk period (1955–1957)[link]

The rivalry, tension, and mutual respect between Coltrane and bandleader Miles Davis was formative for both of their careers

Coltrane was freelancing in Philadelphia in the summer of 1955 while studying with guitarist Dennis Sandole when he received a call from trumpeter Miles Davis. Davis, whose success during the late forties had been followed by several years of decline in activity and reputation, due in part to his struggles with heroin, was again active, and was about to form a quintet. Coltrane was with this edition of the Davis band (known as the "First Great Quintet" - along with Paul Chambers on bass, Philly Joe Jones on drums, and Red Garland on piano - to distinguish it from Davis's later group with Wayne Shorter) from October 1955 through April 1957 (with a few absences), a period during which Davis released several influential recordings which revealed the first signs of Coltrane's growing ability. This First Quintet, represented by two marathon recording sessions for Prestige in 1956 that resulted in the albums Cookin', Relaxin', Workin', and Steamin', disbanded in mid April due partly to Coltrane's heroin addiction.^[5]

During the later part of 1957 Coltrane worked with Thelonious Monk at New York’s Five Spot, a legendary jazz club, and played in Monk's quartet (July–December 1957), but owing to contractual conflicts took part in only one official studio recording session with this group. A private recording made by Juanita Naima Coltrane of a 1958 reunion of the group was issued by Blue Note Records in 1993 as Live at the Five Spot-Discovery!. More significantly, a high-quality tape of a concert given by this quartet in November 1957 surfaced, and in 2005 Blue Note made it available on CD. Recorded by Voice of America, the performances confirm the group's reputation, and the resulting album, Thelonious Monk Quartet with John Coltrane at Carnegie Hall, is widely acclaimed.

Blue Train, Coltrane's sole date as leader for Blue Note, featuring trumpeter Lee Morgan, bassist Paul Chambers, and trombonist Curtis Fuller, is often considered his best album from this period. Four of its five tracks are original Coltrane compositions, and the title track, "Moment's Notice," and "Lazy Bird", have become standards. Both tunes employed the first examples of his chord substitution cycles known as Coltrane changes.^[5]

Davis and Coltrane again[link]

Coltrane rejoined Davis in January 1958. In October of that year, jazz critic Ira Gitler coined the term "sheets of sound" to describe the style Coltrane developed during his stint with Monk and was perfecting in Davis' group, now a sextet. His playing was compressed, with rapid runs cascading in hundreds of notes per minute. He stayed with Davis until April 1960, working with alto saxophonist Cannonball Adderley; pianists Red Garland, Bill Evans, and Wynton Kelly; bassist Paul Chambers; and drummers Philly Joe Jones and Jimmy Cobb. During this time he participated in the Davis sessions Milestones and Kind of Blue, and the live recordings Miles & Monk at Newport and Jazz at the Plaza.^[5]

At the end of this period Coltrane recorded his first album for Atlantic Records, Giant Steps, made up exclusively of his own compositions. The album's title track is generally considered to have the most complex and difficult chord progression of any widely-played jazz composition. Giant Steps utilizes Coltrane changes. His development of these altered chord progression cycles led to further experimentation with improvised melody and harmony that he would continue throughout his career.^[5]

"Giant Steps" noicon One of Coltrane's most acclaimed recordings, "Giant Steps" features harmonic structures more complex than were used by most musicians of the time. Problems listening to this file? See media help.

First albums as leader[link]

Coltrane formed his first group, a quartet, in 1960 for an appearance at the Jazz Gallery in New York City. After moving through different personnel including Steve Kuhn, Pete La Roca, and Billy Higgins, the lineup stabilized in the fall with pianist McCoy Tyner, bassist Steve Davis, and drummer Elvin Jones. Tyner, from Philadelphia, had been a friend of Coltrane's for some years and the two men long had an understanding that the pianist would join Coltrane when Tyner felt ready for the exposure of regularly working with him. Also recorded in the same sessions were the later released albums Coltrane's Sound and Coltrane Plays the Blues.

Still with Atlantic Records, for whom he had recorded Giant Steps, his first record with his new group was also his debut playing the soprano saxophone, the hugely successful My Favorite Things. Around the end of his tenure with Davis, Coltrane had begun playing soprano saxophone, an unconventional move considering the instrument's near obsolescence in jazz at the time. His interest in the straight saxophone most likely arose from his admiration for Sidney Bechet and the work of his contemporary, Steve Lacy, even though Miles Davis claimed to have given Coltrane his first soprano saxophone. The new soprano sound was coupled with further exploration. For example, on the Gershwin tune "But Not for Me", Coltrane employs the kinds of restless harmonic movement (Coltrane changes) used on Giant Steps (movement in major thirds rather than conventional perfect fourths) over the A sections instead of a conventional turnaround progression. Several other tracks recorded in the session utilized this harmonic device, including "26–2," "Satellite," "Body and Soul", and "The Night Has a Thousand Eyes".

First years with Impulse Records (1960–1962)[link]

In the 1960s, Coltrane and fellow saxophonist Ornette Coleman lead the controversial "New Thing" movement into avant-garde and free jazz

In May 1961, Coltrane's contract with Atlantic was bought out by the newly formed Impulse! Records label.^[6] An advantage to Coltrane recording with Impulse! was that it would enable him to work again with engineer Rudy Van Gelder, who had taped both his and Davis's Prestige sessions, as well as Blue Train. It was at Van Gelder's new studio in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey that Coltrane would record most of his records for the label.

By early 1961, bassist Davis had been replaced by Reggie Workman while Eric Dolphy joined the group as a second horn around the same time. The quintet had a celebrated (and extensively recorded) residency in November 1961 at the Village Vanguard, which demonstrated Coltrane's new direction. It featured the most experimental music he'd played up to this point, influenced by Indian ragas, the recent developments in modal jazz, and the burgeoning free jazz movement. John Gilmore, a longtime saxophonist with musician Sun Ra, was particularly influential; after hearing a Gilmore performance, Coltrane is reported to have said "He's got it! Gilmore's got the concept!"^[7] The most celebrated of the Vanguard tunes, the 15-minute blues, "Chasin' the 'Trane", was strongly inspired by Gilmore's music.^[8]

During this period, critics were fiercely divided in their estimation of Coltrane, who had radically altered his style. Audiences, too, were perplexed; in France he was famously booed during his final tour with Davis. In 1961, Down Beat magazine indicted Coltrane, along with Eric Dolphy, as players of "Anti-Jazz" in an article that bewildered and upset the musicians.^[9] Coltrane admitted some of his early solos were based mostly on technical ideas. Furthermore, Dolphy's angular, voice-like playing earned him a reputation as a figurehead of the "New Thing" (also known as "Free Jazz" and "Avant-Garde") movement led by Ornette Coleman, which was also denigrated by some jazz musicians (including Miles Davis) and critics. But as Coltrane's style further developed, he was determined to make each performance "a whole expression of one's being".^[10]

Classic Quartet period (1962–1965)[link]

	"In a Sentimental Mood" noicon The romantic ballad features Coltrane with pianist Duke Ellington.
Problems listening to this file? See media help.

In 1962, Dolphy departed and Jimmy Garrison replaced Workman as bassist. From then on, the "Classic Quartet", as it came to be known, with Tyner, Garrison, and Jones, produced searching, spiritually driven work. Coltrane was moving toward a more harmonically static style that allowed him to expand his improvisations rhythmically, melodically, and motivically. Harmonically complex music was still present, but on stage Coltrane heavily favored continually reworking his "standards": "Impressions", "My Favorite Things", and "I Want to Talk about You."

The criticism of the quintet with Dolphy may have had an impact on Coltrane. In contrast to the radicalism of Trane's 1961 recordings at the Village Vanguard, his studio albums in 1962 and 1963 (with the exception of Coltrane, which featured a blistering version of Harold Arlen's "Out of This World") were much more conservative and accessible. He recorded an album of ballads and participated in collaborations with Duke Ellington on the album Duke Ellington and John Coltrane and with deep-voiced ballad singer Johnny Hartman on an eponymous co-credited album. The Impulse compilation Coltrane for Lovers is largely drawn from these three albums. The album Ballads is emblematic of Coltrane's versatility, as the quartet shed new light on old-fashioned standards such as "It's Easy to Remember". Despite a more polished approach in the studio, in concert the quartet continued to balance "standard" and its own more exploratory and challenging music, as can be seen on the Impressions album (two extended jams including the title track along with "Dear Old Stockholm", "After the Rain" and a blues), Coltrane at Newport (where he plays "My Favorite Things") and Live at Birdland both from 1963. Coltrane later said he enjoyed having a "balanced catalogue."

The Classic Quartet produced their most famous record, A Love Supreme, in December 1964. It is reported that Coltrane, who struggled with repeated drug addiction, derived inspiration for A Love Supreme through a near overdose in 1957 which galvanized him to spirituality.^[11] A culmination of much of Coltrane's work up to this point, this four-part suite is an ode to his faith in and love for God. These spiritual concerns would characterize much of Coltrane's composing and playing from this point onwards, as can be seen from album titles such as Ascension, Om and Meditations. The fourth movement of A Love Supreme, "Psalm", is, in fact, a musical setting for an original poem to God written by Coltrane, and printed in the album's liner notes. Coltrane plays almost exactly one note for each syllable of the poem, and bases his phrasing on the words. Despite its challenging musical content, the album was a commercial success by jazz standards, encapsulating both the internal and external energy of the quartet of Coltrane, Tyner, Jones and Garrison. The album was composed at Coltrane's home in Dix Hills on Long Island.

The quartet only played A Love Supreme live once—in July 1965 at a concert in Antibes, France. By then, Coltrane's music had grown even more adventurous, and the performance provides an interesting contrast to the original.

Avant-garde jazz and the second quartet (1965–1967)[link]

As Coltrane's interest in jazz became increasingly experimental, he added Pharoah Sanders to his ensemble

In his late period, Coltrane showed an increasing interest in avant-garde jazz, purveyed by Ornette Coleman, Albert Ayler, Sun Ra and others. In developing his late style, Coltrane was especially influenced by the dissonance of Ayler's trio with bassist Gary Peacock and drummer Sunny Murray, a rhythm section honed with Cecil Taylor as leader. Coltrane championed many younger free jazz musicians, (notably Archie Shepp), and under his influence Impulse! became a leading free jazz record label.

After A Love Supreme was recorded, Ayler's apocalyptic style became more prominent in Coltrane's music. A series of recordings with the Classic Quartet in the first half of 1965 show Coltrane's playing becoming increasingly abstract, with greater incorporation of devices like multiphonics, utilization of overtones, and playing in the altissimo register, as well as a mutated return to Coltrane's sheets of sound. In the studio, he all but abandoned his soprano to concentrate on the tenor saxophone. In addition, the quartet responded to the leader by playing with increasing freedom. The group's evolution can be traced through the recordings The John Coltrane Quartet Plays, Living Space, Transition (both June 1965), New Thing at Newport (July 1965), Sun Ship (August 1965), and First Meditations (September 1965).

In June 1965, he went into Van Gelder's studio with ten other musicians (including Shepp, Pharoah Sanders, Freddie Hubbard, Marion Brown, and John Tchicai) to record Ascension, a 40-minute long piece that included adventurous solos by the young avant-garde musicians (as well as Coltrane), and was controversial primarily for the collective improvisation sections that separated the solos. After recording with the quartet over the next few months, Coltrane invited Pharoah Sanders to join the band in September 1965.

While Coltrane used over-blowing frequently as an emotional exclamation-point, Sanders would opt to overblow his entire solo, resulting in a constant screaming and screeching in the altissimo range of the instrument. The more Coltrane played with Sanders, the more he gravitated to Sanders' unique sound.

Adding to the quartet[link]

Percussionist Rashied Ali helped to augment Coltrane's sound in the last years of his life

By late 1965, Coltrane was regularly augmenting his group with Sanders and other free jazz musicians. Rashied Ali joined the group as a second drummer. This was the end of the quartet; claiming he was unable to hear himself over the two drummers, Tyner left the band shortly after the recording of Meditations. Jones left in early 1966, dissatisfied by sharing drumming duties with Ali. Both Tyner and Jones subsequently expressed displeasure in interviews, after Coltrane's death, with the music's new direction, while incorporating some of the free-jazz form's intensity into their own solo projects.

There are speculations that in 1965 Coltrane may have begun using LSD^[12][13]—informing the sublime, "cosmic" transcendence of his late period. After Jones's and Tyner's departures, Coltrane led a quintet with Pharoah Sanders on tenor saxophone, his second wife Alice Coltrane on piano, Jimmy Garrison on bass, and Rashied Ali on drums. Coltrane and Sanders were described by Nat Hentoff as "speaking in tongues". When touring, the group was known for playing very lengthy versions of their repertoire, many stretching beyond 30 minutes and sometimes even being an hour long. Concert solos for band members regularly extended beyond fifteen minutes in duration.

The group can be heard on several live recordings from 1966, including Live at the Village Vanguard Again! and Live in Japan. In 1967, Coltrane entered the studio several times; though pieces with Sanders have surfaced (the unusual "To Be", which features both men on flutes), most of the recordings were either with the quartet minus Sanders (Expression and Stellar Regions) or as a duo with Ali. The latter duo produced six performances which appear on the album Interstellar Space.

Death and funeral[link]

Coltrane died from liver cancer at Huntington Hospital on Long Island on July 17, 1967, at the age of 40. His funeral was held on Friday, July 21 at St. Peters Lutheran Church in New York City. The Albert Ayler Quartet and The Ornette Coleman Quartet respectively opened and closed the service. He is buried at Pinelawn Cemetery in Farmingdale, N.Y.

Biographer Lewis Porter has suggested, somewhat controversially, that the cause of Coltrane's illness was hepatitis, although he also attributed the disease to Coltrane's heroin use.^[14] In a 1968 interview Albert Ayler claimed that Coltrane was consulting a Hindu meditative healer for his illness instead of Western medicine, though Alice Coltrane later denied this.

His death surprised many in the musical community who were not aware of his condition. Miles Davis commented: "Coltrane's death shocked everyone, took everyone by surprise. I knew he hadn't looked too good... But I didn't know he was that sick—or even sick at all."^[15]

The Coltrane family reportedly remains in possession of much more as-yet-unreleased music, mostly mono reference tapes made for the saxophonist and, as with the 1995 release Stellar Regions, master tapes that were checked out of the studio and never returned.^{[citation needed]} The parent company of Impulse!, from 1965 to 1979 known as ABC Records, purged much of its unreleased material in the 1970s.^[16] Lewis Porter has stated that Alice Coltrane, who died in 2007, intended to release this music, but over a long period of time; her son Ravi Coltrane, responsible for reviewing the material, is also pursuing his own career.^{[citation needed]}

Instruments[link]

Coltrane played the clarinet and the alto horn in a community band before taking up the alto saxophone during high school. In 1947, when he joined King Kolax's band, Coltrane switched to tenor saxophone, the instrument he became known for playing primarily.^[5] Coltrane's preference for playing melody higher on the range of the tenor saxophone (as compared to Coleman Hawkins or Lester Young) is attributed to his start and training on the alto horn and clarinet; his "sound concept" (manipulated in ones vocal tracts- tongue, throat) of the tenor sax was set higher than the normal range of the instrument.^[17]

In the early 1960s, during his engagement with Atlantic Records, he increasingly played soprano saxophone as well. The cover of his album My Favorite Things features Coltrane playing soprano.^[5] Toward the end of his career, he experimented with flute in his live performances and studio recordings.

Religious beliefs[link]

Coltrane's second wife Alice performed with him and also challenged his spiritual beliefs

Coltrane was born and raised in a Christian home, and was influenced by religion and spirituality from childhood. His maternal grandfather, the Reverend William Blair, was a preacher at an African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church^[18][19] in High Point, North Carolina, and John's paternal grandfather, Reverend William H. Coltrane, was an A.M.E. Zion minister in Hamlet, North Carolina.^[18] John's parents met through church affiliation, and married in 1925.^[18] John was born in 1926. As a youth, John practiced music in the southern African-American church. In A Night in Tunisia: Imaginings of Africa in Jazz, Norman Weinstein notes the parallel between Coltrane's music and his experience in the southern church.^[20]