Felix Cordova Davila
Félix Lope María Córdova Dávila (November 20, 1878 – December 3, 1938) was a political leader and judge from Puerto Rico who served as Puerto Rico's fourth Resident Commissioner in Congress and later as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico.
[edit]Public office
Córdova Dávila then took on a succession of local offices in Puerto Rico. He was appointed by Governor William Hunt as judge of the municipal court of Caguas in 1904 and then served as judge of the municipal court of Manati from 1904 to 1908. He served as district attorney for Aguadilla in 1908, as judge of the district court of Guayama from 1908 to 1910; judge of the district court of Arecibo from 1910 to 1911; and judge of the district court of San Juan, Puerto Rico from 1911 to 1917. (The district courts on which Córdova Dávila were part of Puerto Rico's local court system, and should not be confused with the federal court or United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico.) On January 12, 1912, Córdova was one of nine attorneys and judges who founded Puerto Rico's first law school under US rule, operating out of the Ateneo Puertorriqueño, serving as its first Civil Code professor. This first school was eventually transformed into the University of Puerto Rico School of Law.
On July 16, 1917, Córdova Dávila who was a member of the Union of Puerto Rico was elected to serve as Resident Commissioner from Puerto Rico to the United States, succeeding Luis Muñoz Rivera, who had died the preceding November and had recommended him as his successor in office. The duties of the Resident Commissioner included representing Puerto Rico as a non-voting delegate to the United States House of Representatives. Córdova Dávila was re-elected to four-year terms as Resident Commissioner in 1920, 1924, and 1928.
As he opened his congressional office, Luis Muñoz Marín, the son of his predecessor, asked to be hired as his clerk. Duty-bound to Muñoz Rivera, Córdova Dávila hired him immediately. In his memoirs, Puerto Rico's future first elected Governor, wrote pleasantly about his two months working in Congress. The Resident Commissioner, on the other hand, in a letter a friend, Epifanio Fernández Vanga, stated that "(Muñoz Marín) has natural talent but lacks the education to perform at this task...everything was disorganized...and my office's image was being affected".