Post-war Service
After the war, Davie rose to prominence in North Carolina as a traveling circuit court lawyer and orator. He was elected to the North Carolina House of Commons on multiple occasions from 1786 through 1798. He served as a member of the Constitutional Convention of 1787 (leaving before he could sign the document) and argued for its passage at the North Carolina State Conventions in 1788 and 1789.
Davie served as Grand Master of the North Carolina Grand Lodge of Ancient Free and Accepted Masons from 1792 to 1798.
Davie was elected governor of North Carolina by the North Carolina General Assembly in 1798. During his administration, the state settled boundary disputes with South Carolina and Tennessee to the west. He resigned as the state's chief executive when President John Adams enlisted him in 1799 to serve on a peace commission to France, where bilateral negotiations resulted in the Convention of 1800.
Davie remained active in the state militia and in the newly-formed United States Army. He served in the state militia during the 1797 crisis with France (immediately preceding the Quasi-War) and was appointed brigadier general in the Army by President Adams. After his return to North Carolina, Davie continued to be active in Federalist politics. He ran unsuccessfully for the United States House of Representatives against Willis Alston in the 1804 election. (Alston, elected as a Federalist in 1798, joined the Democratic-Republican Party during the Jefferson administration).
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