finished his studies at the Union Theological Seminary. In 1922 he obtained a doctorate in sociology from Columbia University. Academia From 1921 to 1924, Davis worked as an associate professor of Sociology at Dartmouth College. There, he also advocated for organized labor. He investigated and published findings on a strike in Manchester, New Hampshire. The Federal Coal Commission asked him to investigate operations of West Virginia coal mines. He also served as chairman of the Social Service Commission of the Congregational Church. In 1924, he founded the Jerome Davis Research fund to support students at Oberlin who "worked with labor" to facilitate "mutual understanding and cooperation in the field of industry." From 1924 to 1936, Davis was appointed a Gilbert L. Stark professor of "practical philanthropy" at the Yale Divinity School. He helped organize labor forums for the New Haven Trades Council. He developed labor ideals adopted by the Congregational and Christian Churches of America. He chaired the Social Service Commission of Protestant churches in Connecticut. From 1924 to 1936, he also chaired the Legislative Commission on Jails of the State of Connecticut for twelve years. He used a $50,000 Federal grant to review Connecticut prisoner records, with findings published in 1932. In 1928, Davis was a member of the American Society for Cultural Relations with Russia, part of VOKS (Russian "Vsesoiuznoe Obshchestvo Kul'turnoi Sviazi s zagranitsei" — Всесоюзное общество культурной связи с заграницей, All-Union Society for Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries). When he did not receive tenure at Yale, the decision was controversial and was widely believed to be a result of his socialism. The National Education Association, the American Federation of Labor, and the American Association of University Professors investigated the case. Yale denied permission to US Supreme Court Justice Ferdinand Pecora and US Senator Gerald P. Nye to speak on campus for fear of their support for Davis. American Federation of Teachers From 1936 to 1939, Davis served as president of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT). During his second term (1936–1937), Davis joined Lovestoneites and others in trying to lead the AFT out of the AFL and into the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO). However, the Communist Party USA, although it supported the CIO as a policy, itself did not want certain AFL unions like the AFT to leave, because the CPUSA might lose influence in the AFL. In the late 1930s, Davis (along with Denis