Restrictions to Access

No restrictions. Open for research.

Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the Isaac Melson Meekins Papers #4062-z, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Alternate Form of Material

A microfilm copy of the 1905 journal is available.

Provenance

Received from Mary Meekins Gilbert of Elizabeth City, N.C., in 1975 and from Mia Davis of Raleigh, N.C., in January 2002 (Acc. 99162).

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.

• Diaries.
• England--Description and travel.
• France--Description and travel.
• Ireland--Description and travel.
• Judges--North Carolina--History--20th century.
• Meekins, Isaac Melson, 1875-1946.
• Meekins, William C., 1897-1967.
• North Carolina--Intellectual life--20th century.
• North Carolina--Politics and government--1865-1950.
• Political campaigns--North Carolina--History--20th century.
• Republican Party (N.C.)--History--20th century.
• Scotland--Description and travel.
• Travelers--Europe--Diaries.

Isaac Melson Meekins (1875-1946) of Elizabeth City, N.C., was a lawyer, U.S. district court judge, and Republican political leader. Meekins was admitted to the North Carolina bar in 1896 began to practice law in Elizabeth City. He was appointed district judge of the U.S. Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina by President Calvin Coolidge in November 1924 and served until February 1945. He was a special U.S. district judge in New York, Illinois, and other states by order of Chief Justice William Howard Taft.

Meekins served as mayor of Elizabeth City in 1897 and as city attorney in 1898. He was appointed postmaster in 1903. From 1910 to 1914, he was the assistant U.S. attorney of the Eastern District. A member of the Republican state committee from 1900 to 1918, he was the Republican candidate for governor in 1924. In 1936, the Republican state committee endorsed his nomination for president of the United States.

Meekins married Lena Allen of Wake Forest in 1896. They had five children: William Charles (1897-1967), Mahalah Melson (d. 1925), Jeremish Charles (d. 1912), Isabella James (m. Dr. Joseph J. Combs, Raleigh), and Mary Purefoy (m. Oliver F. Gilbert, Elizabeth City).

From the Dictionary of North Carolina Biography.

The collection includes a journal, 1905, kept by judge, lawyer, and Republican Party leader Isaac Meekins of Elizabeth City, N.C., on a trip to Ireland, Scotland, England, and France, with Dr. William Louis Poteat; a volume containing an expense account, January-February 1922, kept by Meekins as manager for Enemy Insurance Company; and clippings, 1924-1925, related to Meekins's gubernatorial campaign and his appointment as U.S. District Court judge in 1924; a letter, 1933, from Meekins to his daughter, Mary Purefoy Meekins, conveying his library to her and describing his reading habits; and a speech, 1936?, by an unknown author to the North Carolina Republican Convention, seconding the nomination of William C. Meekins " ... to lead that great corps of Republican candidates over the roads and this great labyrinth of highways in the state of N.C. and plant the banner of the Grand Old Party at the door of the Capital in Raleigh ... ."