DAVIS, Angela Yvonne

(b. 26 January 1944, in Birmingham, Alabama), activist within the Black Liberation Movement during the 1960s, and an establishment triple threat: a black woman espousing Communism.

Davis was the eldest of four children of B. Frank and Sally E. Davis, both of whom had been teachers. Her father also owned a service station. Both the era and the area in which Davis grew up were hotbeds in the civil rights movement; homes were being bombed and violence was commonplace. When Davis was offered a scholarship by the American Friends Service Committee to study at Elizabeth Irwin High School in New York City, she accepted. She joined Advance, a Communist youth group, while living there.

Davis attended the Sorbonne, University of Paris in her junior year of college. She graduated magna cum laude with a degree in French literature from Brandeis University in 1965. During her final year Davis studied with Herbert Marcuse, and the noted left-wing political philosopher became her mentor. She began graduate studies in philosophy in Germany between 1965 and 1967, but elected to return home to attempt to help in the growing Black Liberation Movement. By then Marcuse had moved to the University of California, San Diego, and Davis continued her doctoral studies there.

While attending UCSD Davis became active in various political organizations. She helped to found the Black Students Council on campus. She also worked with groups in Los Angeles. Davis became a member of the Communist Party of the United States of America (CPUSA) in July 1968. She allied with the Che-Lumumba Club, an African-American section of the Los Angeles party named for Che Guevara, the Marxist intellectual pivotal in the Cuban revolution, and Patrice Lumumba, the first prime minister of the Republic of Congo. Davis accepted a teaching position at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), as assistant professor of philosophy, thinking it the perfect job to hold while she finished her dissertation. She was soon revealed as a Communist, generating calls for her dismissal.

Davis had become interested in the plight of a group of African-American prisoners known as the Soledad Brothers. George Jackson, John Clutchette, and Fleeta Drumgo were incarcerated in California's Soledad Prison, and had been charged with the murder of a white guard and were facing the death penalty. Supposedly framed for the killing because they were militants, they were considered emblematic of all that was wrong with treatment of African Americans in the justice system. Davis corresponded with Jackson and eventually became close to his family, but it was while working on behalf of the Soledad Brothers that she heard of the decision to dismiss her from her post at UCLA. Davis was finally dismissed from teaching in 1969. The board of regents pointed to Davis's political activities as "unbecoming" conduct. Then governor Ronald Reagan, well known for his hatred for Communists, instigated her firing. A court reinstated her briefly, but her contract expired and was not renewed in 1970. Davis had reportedly achieved an "excellent" rating as a teacher, and the American Association of University Professors censured the university.

While Davis was involved with the Soledad Brothers and busy with her research, her seventeen-year-old brother Jonathan decided to draw attention to the plight of African Americans in prison by attempting to take over a courtroom in Marin County on 7 August 1970, where a prisoner was being tried for the assault of a prison guard. Guns supposedly registered in Davis's name were used in a misguided attempt to free the man on trial and two of his inmate witnesses, and to draw attention to their cause. As the men attempted to flee with hostages, a San Quentin guard opened fire. Jonathan Jackson, Judge Harold Haley, and two prisoners were killed.

Davis was charged with kidnapping, conspiracy, and murder. She evaded arrest, and went underground. Davis was placed on the Federal Bureau of Investigation's (FBI) Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list. Davis was arrested in New York City on 13 October 1970. With these capital charges, there was a possibility that, if convicted, she might be given the death penalty. Her attorneys fought extradition, but Davis was moved to California in December 1970 to stand trial. After her arrest, Davis was incarcerated for about sixteen months. She told Essence, "there were many, many times when I was scared to death.… When I first got arrested, they wouldn't let me see a lawyer, and I thought they were going to kill me."

A "Free Angela Davis" campaign was mounted with support from clergy prominent in the civil rights movement, such as the reverends Jesse Jackson and Ralph Abernathy, as well as political leaders such as Congressman Ronald Dellums, who represented California's Oakland Congressional District from 1970 to 1998. Singer Aretha Franklin also announced her support, saying she would provide bail for Davis. She was, however, out of the country at the time and unable to provide her signature in person. The support for Davis extended abroad. However, Davis was keen to use her notoriety to draw attention to other political prisoners. She spoke frequently about Black Panthers Bobby Seale and Ericka Huggins and others. By the time of her trial in San Jose, supporters from around the world were writing the judge and holding events in her behalf. Immediately before her trial, the California Supreme Court abolished the death penalty. Davis was acquitted on 4 June 1972.

"They were the most painful years of my life," Davis told Essence magazine of that turbulent period of her life. She said she was radicalized "mainly because of what was happening to other people. It seemed before we had the chance to mourn the death of one of us, another was killed." Davis said she had support from her entire family during this period, including from her mother. "She never thought about not supporting me. She started speaking out all over the country."

The UCLA philosophy department unsuccessfully attempted to bring Davis back on the faculty in 1972. At the time of her dismissal Ronald Reagan swore Davis would never again teach at a University of California campus, but Davis has taught at the University of California at Santa Cruz since 1992 and is a tenured professor within the history of consciousness department. She received an appointment as the University of California Presidential Chair in African American and Feminist Studies, an honor she held between 1994 and 1997. She lectures frequently and remains a vocal critic of racism in the criminal justice system. Among the books Davis has written are If They Come in the Morning: Voices of Resistance (1971), and The Angela Y. Davis Reader, a collection of her writings edited by Joy James (1998). Ralph Abernathy calls Davis "one intellectual who did not hide out in a library or behind a desk. She transformed her mental principles into an active commitment of struggle against injustice."

For information about Davis, see her autobiography, Angela Davis: An Autobiography (1974). Information about her trial is in Reginald Major, Justice in the Round: The Trial of Angela Davis (1973). Articles that contain biographical information about Davis include: "Angela Davis' Firing: An Evil Act," The Sun-Reporter (27 July 1970); "Attack Against Angela: An Attack Against All," The Sun-Reporter (17 Oct. 1970); "Angela Free," The Sun-Reporter (10 June 1972); "The Case Of Angela," Sacramento Observer (26 Feb. 1975); "Angela Davis—Profiled by Maya Aneglou (sic)," Sacramento Observer (26 Feb. 1975); "Angela Davis Tells of Her Life," Portland Skanner (13 Nov. 1975); John Christopher Kim Fisher, "Angela Davis Today: Brutal Beginnings in the South," The Sun-Reporter (24 May 1979), and "Last of a Series: Angela Davis, The Person," The Sun-Reporter (7 June 1979); Paula Giddings, "Angela Davis," Essence (June 1989); and Kevin Chappell, "Where Are the Civil Rights Icons of the '60s?" Ebony (Aug. 1996).

Linda Dailey Paulson