Judge Meek
Judge Meek
Judge Meek
There is a story that chess skills played a role in the election of Abraham
Lincoln as President of the United States. The Ogden Standard, July 2, 1887,
discussing one Henry K. Enos, a prominent Wall Street banker, tells how his
father, Dr. Robert K. Enos of Ohio, was a local chess champion, and came to
the Republican convention of 1860 as a supporter of Salmon P. Chase, but
was primarily interested in denying the “radical Republican” William H.
Seward the nomination. Using his game-playing skills, during the third ballot
he picked the time for announcing the switch of a small bloc of voters to
Lincoln, giving him just enough votes to secure the nomination, “whereupon a
deafening roar of applause arose from the immense multitude, such as had
New Stories never been equalled on the American continent, nor since the day that the
walls of Jericho were blown down.” (Chicago Tribune, 1860).
about Old
An interesting story, connecting chess and politics in more than the usual
Chess Players metaphorical sense. But to my mind, the chess player who was most
responsible for Lincoln’s election was not Dr. Enos. Instead, it was a more
famous player who was bitterly opposed to what Lincoln stood for. I am
Jeremy P. Spinrad speaking of the president of the first American Chess Congress, Alexander
Beaufort Meek (1814-1865), better known as A.B. Meek or Judge Meek.
One reason for choosing Meek as a subject was to help myself understand
issues I have thought about since coming to live in Nashville. The city of
A much larger group, which might include people I know, is harder for me to
understand. These are people who were vocal opponents of integration, yet
seem to be decent people in all other ways. How could they have felt this way,
and have they changed their minds or merely stopped speaking openly about
their prejudice? Similar questions exist about supporters of slavery in the 19th
century.
Meek was trained for the law, and finished first in his class at the University
of Alabama in 1833 at the age of 19. He was gifted in many other areas,
including journalism, history, poetry, and politics. He was part of a group of
poets called the “Tuscaloosa Bards,” and publication of Meek’s poem “Red
Eagle” is listed as a milestone on a current web page of the state of Alabama’s
artistic and cultural development.
In addition to his fame in the arts, Meek had a distinguished career as a public
servant. He served as Attorney General of Alabama in 1836-37, and Assistant
Secretary of the Treasury under U.S. President James K. Polk. He became
Speaker of the Alabama House of Representatives. He is credited with leading
the way for the passage of a bill guaranteeing Alabama students their first free
public education. For this and other contributions, there are A.B. Meek
schools in Arley and Tuscaloosa.
Since Meek’s most famous poem, “Red Eagle,” is 2000 lines long, and since
his poetry does not do much for me in any case, I will give only a short part of
one of his most popular (though not, in his own opinion, one of his best)
poems, “The Mocking-Bird.” This was later set to music, as part of a series
called Songs of the South, which became quite well known.
I find Meek’s historical writings much more interesting. For example, Meek
tells (in his book on the history of the southwest) of how in 1817, some of
Napoleon’s greatest generals were given a land grant in rural Alabama, and
formed the small French colony of Marengo. The colonists included Marshal
Grouchy, General Lefebvre, Count Clausel, Count Real, the two Generals
L’Allemand, Generals Vandamme, Lakanal, Pennier, Garnier de Saintes, and
many subordinate officers. Their spouses, many accustomed to the opulent
court of Versailles, became simple farm wives. Famous soldiers from
Napoleon’s army were made subordinate to farmers in the local militia. The
agricultural life was eventually too quiet for the colonists, who dispersed back
to France and to various armies, and the story is known thanks only to Meek’s
writings.
“I. That he has, at divers times, from his boyhood up to this, his twenty-
eighth year, perpetrated sundry songs, sonnets, odes, epigrams, &c., of
an amatory, patriotic, bacchanalian and obituary character ... many of
which disfigure the rose-scented beauty of countless maidens’ albums;
but the most of which still slumber, where they ought to be, in his own
bachelor port-feuille.”
After listing eight such points (for those interested in looking at his literary
output, Meek here states a preference for “The Nuptial Fete” and his not-yet
completed “Red Eagle” over his more popular works from Songs of the
South), Meek concludes:
“1. That they are not sufficient, either at common law or by any of the
statutes of criticism, to constitute against him the crime of authordom,
for it is a well settled maxim, that ‘de minimis non curat Lex.’
Up to this point, I like and respect Meek, and I haven’t even gotten to his
chess. I am hardly alone in this sentiment; quite a few letters of this time
praise Meek, both as a writer and as a person. Here is some high praise for
Meek in a rave review of “Red Eagle,” which appeared in Southern Literary
Messenger, February 1856.
This article began with a scene from the Republican convention of 1860.
More important for the outcome of the election, however, was the Democratic
convention, where Meek was a delegate. It was Meek who read to the
convention the “Alabama Platform,” which declared that the territories (as
distinguished from the states) must be open to slavery, with slave-owners’
rights vigorously enforced. It was the rejection of this proposal that caused the
Southern delegates to walk out of the convention. The Democratic Party split
into two competing factions, the northern faction nominating Senator Stephen
Douglas of Illinois for President, the southern nominating the incumbent Vice-
President, John Breckenridge of Kentucky. Additionally, there was a short-
lived fourth party, the Constitutional Unionists. This split allowed Lincoln
and the more united Republicans to win the Presidency. Meek campaigned
hard for his candidate Breckenridge, not just locally in Alabama, but
nationally (see New York Times, Oct. 25, 1860). Ironically, although it
certainly was not his goal, by not supporting Douglas, who might well have
beaten Lincoln in a two-man race, the pro-slavery Alabama legislator helped
Lincoln win and ultimately end slavery.
In chess, Meek’s political skills were much more successful and put to much
better use. As a friend of the Morphy family, Meek was able to help persuade
Paul Morphy to play in the First American Chess Congress in 1857. If for
nothing else, Meek deserves to be remembered well for this, without which
chess history might have been substantially different. As Morphy’s
biographer David Lawson notes, Morphy twice sent telegrams to the congress
organizers saying he would not be able to attend; whether this was because of
Paul’s own reluctance or to objections by members of his family is not
completely clear. “However,” says Lawson, “Judge Meek, a close family
friend, brought a good deal of persuasive pressure to bear upon Paul’s family
in this matter,” and finally Morphy accepted the invitation, only about two
weeks before the congress was scheduled to begin (Paul Morphy: The Pride
and Sorrow of Chess, p. 48).
Morphy and Meek esteemed each other greatly; as Miron Hazeltine wrote in
the Macon Telegraph of May 2nd, 1867, recalling the appearance of the two
at the 1857 congress:
“At once it was evident that the tenderest ties of honor and friendship
existed between them. No father could watch with more tender
anxiety, or glory with more exultant pride in the triumphs of a favored
son, than this great man, in the victorious career of his protégé. And
the youthful hero in turn, reverenced his noble friend as a father could
not have been more reverenced.”
Meek is also given a very positive biographical description in the book of the
Fifth American Chess Congress, 1880, and a good general biography of Meek
is found in Reminiscences of Public Men in Alabama, for Thirty Years, by
William Garrett.
Morphy had played Meek before the congress, and their tournament games in
New York are well known. Morphy, of course, was many classes above Meek
as a player. Thus, I chose as my first Meek game one from the first round of
the tournament. There is a small mystery about this match between Meek and
William J.A. Fuller of Boston, which Meek won +3 –2. The Oxford
Encyclopedia of Chess Games gives only four of the games, with each
winning two; one game of the series is lost. Strangely, Meek seems to have
had White in all four games; the tournament book notes that this is odd, but it
appears they are simply giving us the actual record. The Meek-Fuller games
are not among the Congress’ best. In the following, Meek sets a trap that
Fuller falls into, leading to a queen-winning fork.
Meek-Fuller, First American Chess Congress, New York 1857: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3
Nc6 3.d4 exd4 4.c3 Nf6 5.e5 Qe7 6.cxd4 d6 7.Bb5 Bd7 8.0-0 dxe5 9.Bxc6
Bxc6 10.Nxe5 Bd7 11.Re1 Be6 12.Nc3 0-0-0 13.Be3 Nd5 14.Nb5 a6??
7.Nf6#
Played at the New York Chess Club September 29, 1859, between Hon. A.B.
Meek, President of the Mobile Chess Club, and William Schleiden, Esq.,
President of the German Chess Club, San Francisco: 1.e4 e5 2.f4 exf4 3.Nf3
g5 4.h4 g4 5.Ne5 h5 This move is now considered inferior to 5...Nf6. 6.Bc4
Nh6 7.d4 d6 8.Nxf7
18.Rxf6+! 1-0
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