Monique D. Davis

The Chicago Tribune reported on April 3, 2008 that Davis interrupted and criticized atheist activist Robert I. Sherman during his testimony before the House State Government Administration Committee in Springfield:

In August 2008, Blagojevich criticized Davis and nine other Chicago Democrats for, in his opinion, collecting dual salaries from the city of Chicago and from the state of Illinois as a lawmaker. Davis said she had retired from her education job three years previously.

In the 2007-2008 term, Davis served as chair of the Appropriations-General Services Committee, the vice-chair of the Elementary & Secondary Education Committee, the sub-co-chair of the Rapid Growth Districts & Special Education Issues Subcommittee and the sub-chair of the School Code Waivers, Elementary and Secondary Subcommittee. She was also a member of the Appropriations-Higher Education Committee, Committee of the Whole, Financial Institutions Committee, Public Utilities Committee and the Registration and Regulation Committee.

In 2004, Davis sponsored a bill to limit low-income household electricity or natural gas bills to no more than six percent of the household income. In 2005, Davis led the effort to secure funding for the Student Financial Assistance Outreach Center at Chicago State University when it was threatened with closure. Negotiations with Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich over his proposed budget for 2006 led to an agreement to fund the center in exchange for Democratic support on the budget. The center received $300,000. In 2006, Davis was re-elected to the Illinois House of Representatives' 27th district after she ran unopposed for re-election.

In 2003, Davis sponsored legislation which was signed into law and forced insurance companies that do business in Illinois to publish all records they have on historical insuring of slaves as property through the state's Department of Insurance. This made available a wealth of genealogical information to the descendants of slaves. Illinois became the second state to implement such a law, after California.

Davis and Illinois Senator Barack Obama co-sponsored a pair of successful bills in 2003. The first, House Bill 223, mandated that all police interrogations on homicide investigations be recorded. The bill was motivated by the release of thirteen suspects convicted of murder and sentenced to death who'd later been exonerated by DNA evidence. Previously interrogations could only be recorded with the suspect's permission. The second bill co-sponsored by the pair, Senate Bill 30, required police in Illinois to record the race of all people subjected to traffic stops, to provide information for efforts to eliminate racial profiling by police.

In 1995, after the resignation of Mel Reynolds from the Congress of the United States, Davis was a candidate in the Democratic primary for the by-election. Although Davis received endorsements from previous seat holder Gus Savage and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, Jesse Jackson was the eventual winner of the primary.

Monique Dionne Davis (née McKay; born August 19, 1936) is an American educator and Democratic member of the Illinois House of Representatives, representing the 27th District since 1987 (elected on November 4, 1986). Born in Chicago, Illinois, she trained as and worked as a teacher and an educational administrator in the Chicago Public Schools system before entering politics. She graduated from Chicago State University. She is a member of Trinity United Church of Christ.