Born on a farm near De Soto, Kansas, Lee moved to Missouri with his parents (Daniel Marion & Lucy [Howard] Lee, who settled near Virgil City in Vernon County in 1876. He attended the public schools of Virgil City and studied law.
Lee was an unsuccessful candidate for election in 1922 to the Sixty-eighth Congress and in 1930 to the Seventy-second Congress. He was elected as a Democrat to the Seventy-third Congress (March 4, 1933 โ January 3, 1935). He was an unsuccessful candidate for reelection in 1934 to the Seventy-fourth Congress.
After Congress
He resumed the practice of law until his retirement. He owned and operated The Southwestern, a Jasper County newspaper, and the Jefferson Hotel. He died in Joplin, Missouri on November 20, 1952, and was interred in Ozark Memorial Park.