Davis Sentenced To Term In Jail

Davis Sentenced To Term In Jail

Former Instructor At U-M To Appeal

GRAND RAPIDS - (AP) - Dr. Horace Chandler Davis, former University of Michigan mathematics instructor, was sentenced yesterday to pay $250 fine and serve six months in jail on being found guilty of contempt of Congress.

Federal Judge W. Wallace Kent suspended sentence for 30 days, however, granting a motion by Defense Attorney Philip Wittenberg, who said he would file an appeal within that time.

Davis, 30, continued on $1,000 bond, was indicted by a federal grand jury for refusing to answer questions May 10, 1954, addressed to him by a House un-American activities subcommittee in Lansing.

He pleaded the First Amendment in refusing to answer questions regarding his alleged Communistic activities while teaching at the U-M.

Davis was tried without jury last November before Judge Kent on the contempt of Congress charges. The judge, in an eight-page opinion delivered last June 26, found Davis guilty.

Before sentence was pronounced, Davis told the court, “I did not intend to defy the law ... I thought I was totally within the law.” In pre-sentence action, Judge Kent denied Wittenberg’s motion to have the indictment dismissed.

Davis, father of three children, currently is a mathematics instructor at Columbia University.