Macon Bolling Allen (born Allen Macon Bolling; August 4, 1816 – October 15, 1894) is believed to be the first African American to become a lawyer and to argue before a jury, and the second to hold a judicial position in the United States. Allen passed the bar exam in Maine in 1844 and became a Massachusetts

Justice of the Peace A justice of the peace (JP) is a judicial officer of a lower or ''puisne'' court, elected or appointed by means of a commission ( letters patent) to keep the peace. In past centuries the term commissioner of the peace was often used with the sa ...

in 1847. He moved to South Carolina after the American Civil War to practice law and was elected as a judge in 1873 and again in 1876. Following the

Reconstruction Era The Reconstruction era was a period in American history following the American Civil War (1861–1865) and lasting until approximately the Compromise of 1877. During Reconstruction, attempts were made to rebuild the country after the bloo ...

, he moved to Washington, D.C., where he continued practicing law.

Career

Becoming a lawyer

Born in Indiana as A. Macon Bolling, he moved to New England at some point in the early 1840s and changed his name to Macon Bolling Allen in Boston in January 1844. Soon after, Allen moved to Portland, Maine and studied law, working as an apprentice to General Samuel Fessenden, a local abolitionist and attorney. The Portland District Court rejected Fessenden’s first motion to admit Allen to the bar in April 1844, concluding Allen did not meet the state’s citizenship requirement (being a resident of Massachusetts at the time).Johnie D. Smith, ''Allen, Macon Bolling'', in Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience (Henry Louis Gates et al. eds., 2d ed. 2005). Allen tried again, pursuing admission by examination, a method that did not require citizenship. He faced a hostile examination committee, which Fessenden thought did not want Allen admitted.Letter from Samuel Fessenden to Samuel E. Sewall (July 5, 1844) (Robie-Sewall family papers, Massachusetts Historical Society), ''as reprinted in'' Daniel Hinchen,
Passing the bar: America’s first African-American Attorney
', Mass. Hist. Soc. (May 7, 2019). Nevertheless, Fessenden said, "his qualifications were not denied." Allen was granted his license to practice law in Maine on July 3, 1844, becoming the nation's first African American lawyer. He experienced difficulty finding legal work in Maine, likely because whites were unwilling to hire a black attorney and few blacks lived in Maine. Allen moved back to Boston, Massachusetts, and was admitted to the bar there in May 1845. He conducted a jury trial in October 1845 that is believed to be the first time an African American lawyer argued before a jury in the United States. The case was a contract dispute. Allen’s client, the defendant, lost, although the jury awarded lower damages than the plaintiff had requested. Allen encountered difficulties in Boston. Racial prejudice made it difficult for him to earn a living; in 1845, he wrote a letter to John Jay Jr. (the grandson of the country’s first Chief Justice) discussing the difficulty of finding clients in Boston and wondering whether he would do better in New York City, with its larger African American population. Four years later, Allen was attacked by four men in Boston, although their motivation is unclear. In 1852, Allen’s landlord pressed charges against him for allegedly ripping out parts of his apartment to burn as firewood. A jury acquitted him.

Judgeships in Massachusetts and South Carolina

After passing a rigorous qualifying exam for

for Middlesex County, Massachusetts in 1847, Allen became the second African American in the United States to hold a judicial position, following only Wentworth Cheswell (who in 1805 was elected as the Justice of the Peace for Rockingham County, New Hampshire), despite not being considered a full U.S. citizen under the Constitution at the time (although see the remarks about state citizenship in the above section as well as the holdings about Maine in Dred Scott). As Justice of the Peace, Allen would have handled minor crimes and small claims. Allen moved to

Charleston, South Carolina Charleston is the largest city in the U.S. state of South Carolina, the county seat of Charleston County, and the principal city in the Charleston–North Charleston metropolitan area. The city lies just south of the geographical midpoint o ...

, following the Civil War and opened a law office with two other African American attorneys,

William Whipper William Whipper (February 22, 1804 – March 9, 1876) was a businessman and Abolitionism in the United States, abolitionist in the United States. Whipper, an African American, advocated nonviolence and co-founded the American Moral Reform Socie ...

and Robert Elliott. Their firm, Whipper, Elliott, and Allen, is the first known African American law firm in the country. Among other cases, Allen represented several black defendants who were fighting death sentences. The

state legislature A state legislature is a legislative branch or body of a political subdivision in a federal system. Two federations literally use the term "state legislature": * The legislative branches of each of the fifty state governments of the United Sta ...

in 1873 elected Allen (choosing him instead of Whipper) to be a judge of Charleston County Criminal Court. He served for three years. In 1876, he was elected as probate judge for

Charleston County Charleston County is located in the U.S. state of South Carolina along the Atlantic coast. As of the 2020 census, its population was 408,235, making it the third most populous county in South Carolina (behind Greenville and Richland counties). ...

, South Carolina, defeating the white incumbent.

Later career

Allen moved to Washington, D.C., at the end of Reconstruction. He continued to practice law and was employed as an attorney in 1873 for a firm called the Land and Improvement Association.

Personal life

Allen and his wife, Emma Levy, had six children while living in the Boston area.Daphne B. Noyes,
Macon Bolling Allen, 1816-1894
', The Church of the Advent, . Two died in childhood. The family spent some of their Massachusetts years in Dedham, where a deed shows property owned by “Emma L. Allen … wife of Macon B. Allen.” After moving to South Carolina, Allen and Emma had another child. Emma died in 1870, along with another of the couple’s children. Allen married his second wife, Hannah Weston, at some point before 1880. Allen possibly suffered from dementia in his later years, and died in Washington in 1894, age 78.

Chronology

1816 Born in Indiana 1844 Changes his name in Boston to Macon Bolling Allen 1844 Admitted to the bar in Maine on July 3 1845 Admitted to the bar in Massachusetts on May 3 1846 Advertises Boston law practice in several editions of The Liberator 1847 Becomes a Justice of the Peace for Middlesex County 1868 Moves to Charleston, South Carolina, where he joins the first known African American law firm 1873 Elected judge of Charleston County Criminal Court 1876 Elected probate judge in Charleston County 1894 Dies in Washington, D.C. on October 10

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Allen, Macon Bolling 1816 births 1894 deaths African-American lawyers African-American history of Maine Lawyers from Portland, Maine Indiana lawyers 19th-century American lawyers