Rennie Davis

Chicago Seven

The Chicago Seven were seven defendants charged with conspiracy, inciting to riot, and other charges related to nonviolent and violent protests that took place in Chicago, Illinois on the occasion of the 1968 Democratic National Convention.

The original eight protester/defendants, indicted by the grand jury on March 20, 1969, included Davis, Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, David Dellinger, Tom Hayden, John Froines, Lee Weiner, and Bobby Seale. Seale's case was separated from the others during the early part of the trial. The Chicago Seven defense attorneys were William Kunstler and Leonard Weinglass of the Center for Constitutional Rights. The judge was Julius Hoffman. The prosecutors were Richard Schultz and Tom Foran. The trial began on 24 September 1969, and on 9 October the United States National Guard was called in to join the Chicago police for crowd control as demonstrations grew outside the courtroom.

Divine Light Mission

In the early 1970s Davis became a follower of Guru Maharaj Ji (Prem Rawat), and was a spokesperson and speaker at the widely publicized Millennium '73 event organized by Divine Light Mission in the Houston Astrodome. He described the arrival of Guru Maharaj Ji as,

The greatest event in history…. If we knew who he was, we would crawl across America on our hands and knees to rest our heads at his feet.

Texas Monthly cited Davis as stating: "This city is going to be remembered through all the ages of human civilization." An Op-ed in The San Francisco Sunday Examiner speculated on whether Davis had undergone a lobotomy, and suggested, "If not, maybe he should try one."

Foundation for a New Humanity

Davis later became a venture capitalist and lecturer on meditation and self-awareness. He is the founder of Foundation for a New Humanity, a technology development and venture capital company commercializing breakthrough technologies.

In an article published in the Iowa Source in 2005, Davis said:

If you were to do a survey of what causes misery on earth, it would tend to fall into three broad categories. One, we can call systems: the economy, AIDS, terrorism--things that are 'systems' in nature. The second would be a list of everybody to blame: Bush is the cause of my misery, my ex-wife, my boss. The third would be things that come utterly out of left field: a tornado through town, a tsunami, events that are not in our apparent control. What this huge list would have in common--something everybody would agree with — is that the cause of misery are things outside ‘myself’. But the cause of our misery is absolutely, positively not at all what we believe it to be. This is not a new view. Certainly saints and philosophers in every generation have basically argued if you want to change the world, you have to change yourself.