

topographic name for someone who lived near a meadow or a patch of arable land or a habitational name from any of the many places named with Old English leah ‘wood’, ‘glade’, as for example Lee in Buckinghamshire, Essex, Hampshire, Kent, and Shropshire, and Lea in Cheshire, Derbyshire, Herefordshire, Lancashire, Lincolnshire, and Wiltshire.
reduced Americanized form of Ó Laoidhigh ‘descendant of Laoidheach’, a personal name derived from laoidh ‘poem’, ‘song’ (originally a byname for a poet).[http://www.ancestry.com/facts/lee-name-meaning.ashx]
According to the U.S. Census (2000), Lee was the 22nd most popular surname in the U.S. with approximately 605,860 persons. Of those, 40.09% were white, 37.83% were Asian or Pacific Islander, and 17.41% were African-American.U.S. Census Bureau