Thomas Davidson

Thomas Davidson

Thomas Davidson (25 October 1840 – 14 September 1900) was born in Scotland. His brother was John Morrison Davidson.

'a Fabian of a very cautious type'

From "Memorials of Thomas Davidson, the wandering scholar":

As learner and instructor, and as a high-souled missionary of education, he carried out four notable experiments, and achieved success in all of them. They were the founding (i) of the "New Fellowship in London", (2) of the "New Fellowship in New York", (3) of the "Glenmore School of the Culture-Sciences", and (4) of the New York settlement for Russian Jews, the "Breadwinners' College". He was not completely satisfied with any of them and, having started one felt it his duty to pass on and organize another. But in carrying out this mission he had, as already said, no finished system to unfold.

He abjured finality, and rejected dogmas imposed on him, both ab ante and ab extra, until they were reconstructed anew within his own inner consciousness. He felt that he was " conscript and consecrated " to be a reformer of abuses of the intellect and the heart. An intense philanthropic passion urged him onward in this work and intellectual culture pursued selfishly, or in isolation, was abhorrent to him. He desired to enrich his fellow-creatures by all he thought and felt and did. To a certain extent a socialist, he was a Fabian of a very cautious type. Exceedingly conservative in his socialism, he held that the end of human existence was the freedom, the education, and the perfection of the individual, when his fetters were broken and all trammels withdrawn.

Morris Raphael Cohen Connection

From the University of Chicago Library Guide to the Morris Raphael Cohen Papers 1898-1981:

"Morris Raphael Cohen was born in Minsk, Russia, in 1880. The son of Abraham Mordecai and Bessie Farfel Cohen, Morris came to the United States at the age of twelve. His family eventually settled in New York City. In 1895 Morris took the entrance examination for the City College of New York and scored the highest grade. While a student at CCNY Cohen met Thomas Davidson who strongly influenced Cohen's burgeoning liberalism. Davidson founded the progressive "Breadwinners' College", where Cohen gained his initial teacher's training.

Morris married Mary Ryshpan in 1906. They had three children, Felix S., Leonora D., and Victor W.

Following Davidson's death in 1900, Cohen helped form the Thomas Davidson Society. Under the auspices of New York's Educational Alliance, the Society opened a night school. Among the supporters were William Harris, Charles Bakewell, Josiah Royce, and Percival Chubb. The public education system assumed control of the school in 1917.

Morris taught briefly in the New York public schools before becoming a mathematics instructor at CCNY. While teaching, Cohen took graduate courses at Columbia University. He left Columbia and CCNY to pursue his Ph.D. in philosophy at Harvard, which he received in 1906. He returned to New York and continued as mathematics instructor, despite his degree in philosophy, until 1912. After six years he transferred to the Philosophy Department. He stayed on at CCNY until 1938, enjoying stays as a visiting professor at Columbia, Yale, Yale Law School, Harvard, Stanford and elsewhere. To accommodate his wish to spend more time writing, Cohen took a position at the University of Chicago, where he carried a light, but influential, teaching load in the Philosophy Department, 1938-1941. Before his death in January, 1947, Cohen published numerous articles and books including Reason and Nature, 1931; Law and the Social Order, 1933; Preface to Logic, 1944; and Faith of a Liberal, 1945. Missing from the papers are drafts of his autobiography, A Dreamer's Journey.