Roland Burris

Senator

• Born: August 3, 1937
• Birthplace: Centralia, Illinois

Politician

The first African American elected to statewide office in Illinois, Burris served three terms as state comptroller and one as attorney general. After some years in private law practice, he was appointed to President Barack Obama’s vacated seat in the US Senate, where he served from 2009 to 2010.

Area of achievement: Government and politics

Early Life

Roland Wallace Burris was born and grew up in Centralia, Illinois, a small city in the south-central part of the state. Centralia was founded as a hub for the Illinois Central Railroad, for which Burris’s father, Earl, worked. The railroad was a major conduit for Black southerners migrating to the North. As was the case in many towns in the southern Midwest, many public facilities in Centralia were segregated in Burris’s youth, by custom rather than law.

The local swimming pool was among the segregated facilities. The town’s branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) previously had tried but failed to open it to African Americans. In 1953, Earl decided to try again. He paid one hundred dollars—a huge amount for a man earning forty cents an hour—to an East Saint Louis lawyer to help with the project. Fifteen-year-old Burris became the guinea pig. On Memorial Day weekend, he and a group of friends bought tickets, went in and showered, and swam in the pool without incident. The pool thus was integrated peacefully.

However, the lawyer, himself an African American, did not appear to support the integration attempt. He never set foot in Centralia and absconded with the money. Earl fumed. He said black people would never progress if they acted so irresponsibly. Burris resolved then to become a lawyer, to be responsible, and even to become an elected official.

Burris attended Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, majoring in political science. He played football and was elected president of his fraternity. After finishing his degree, he spent a year in Hamburg, Germany, studying international law. He next enrolled in Howard University’s law school, from which he obtained a juris doctorate in 1963.

Life’s Work

Upon returning to Illinois, Burris took a job as a bank examiner for the US Treasury. This experience eventually led to his being hired as the first black vice president at the Continental Illinois National Bank, working with the trust and commercial lending departments. At the same time, Burris became a member of numerous community organizations. He compiled reports that prodded city officials into repairing potholes and broken pavement. Bill Cousins, a candidate for alderman, asked Burris to be his campaign manager. Cousins won, and Burris’s interest in politics was piqued. He ran for state representative in 1967 but lost and stayed with Continental Illinois for several more years.

In 1973, after helping Dan Walter, an “outsider” candidate, win the governorship, Burris was appointed to a cabinet post. As director of central management services, he was a watchdog on the state budget. Walker ultimately went to prison on charges involving fraud, but Burris was not implicated. He next served a brief term as executive director of the Reverend Jesse Jackson’s Operation PUSH, which burnished his credentials with the civil rights movement. At the same time, Jackson found Burris’s background in banking and administration added gravitas to his organization.

Burris still harbored an ambition for statewide elective office. In 1976, he made overtures to Chicago mayor Richard J. Daley’s notorious political machine, saying he wanted to run for state comptroller. His experience in public administration and banking seemed ideal for this low-profile electoral office. Burris won the position in 1978. He thus became the first African American to serve in a statewide electoral office in Illinois. The comptroller is responsible for auditing state agencies and making sure they conduct business efficiently and legally. Burris carried out these duties effectively despite the state’s long record of official malfeasance. He served three terms as comptroller.

In an era when Jackson’s bombastic style typified African American politicians, Burris projected a different image. He was low-key rather than flashy, a dependable performer and party supporter. He and his wife, Berlean, a university administrator, lived in a comfortable middle-class neighborhood on Chicago’s South Side. In 1990, Burris ran for attorney general of Illinois. Once elected, he refocused the office’s civil rights division, cracking down on racial profiling and domestic violence; he also prosecuted industrial polluters. However, his reputation was tarnished by controversy. Rolando Cruz, who had been convicted of murdering a young girl in 1983, later appeared to be the victim of prosecutors’ misconduct. Burris argued that he could not overturn the decisions of two juries and pressed for Cruz’s execution. Eventually, DNA evidence cleared Cruz; this was among the cases that prompted Governor George Ryan’s moratorium on the death penalty.

To what extent Burris’s intransigence in this high-profile case affected his later fortunes is not clear. However, he made three unsuccessful runs for Illinois governor, in 1994, 1998, and 2002, and a losing bid for mayor of Chicago in between. He retired to a private law practice but stayed heavily involved in lobbying and campaign design and in touch with the currents of state politics.

In 2008, a US Senate seat became vacant when Barack Obama was elected president. Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich, tasked with appointing a senator to complete the term, was charged with trying to sell the seat; the resulting scandal left few candidates willing to take the position. In a surprise move, Blagojevich named Burris to the Senate. Despite an uproar over the validity of the appointment, Burris did serve out the term as the junior senator representing Illinois.

Controversy continued to follow Burris even after he left office in 2010. According to reports, during a hearing for the trial of C. Gregory Turner, who was accused of illegally lobbying for the lifting of US sanctions against Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe's regime, in 2014, it was announced that Burris had been accused in 2012 of offering to promote an unnamed man's business through military contracts in exchange for the guarantee of a well-paying financial consultant position after the end of his term in the Senate. However, these allegations were never proven, and no charges had been filed against Burris. Still defending himself against the scandalous allegations regarding his appointment to the Senate seat years later, Burris also published a memoir in 2014 titled The Man Who Stood Up to Be Seated: A Controversial Appointment to the United States Senate; the Memoirs of Roland W. Burris. In the book, he claims that he was unfairly treated by the media during his appointment and time in the Senate due to their constant allegations of foul play. After leaving office, Burris continued practicing law in Chicago at his own firm, Burris & Associates.

In 2020, Burris recieved an induction into the National Association of State Auditors, Comptrollers, and Treasurers.

Significance

Burris’s low-key style and his background in the sober precincts of banking and administration served him well in the offices he held. His reputation for blandness might have made his reforms in the Attorney General’s Office less controversial than expected. In a state where political scandals are common, his relatively scandal-free record speaks well for his approach to politics. Once in office in the US Senate, he performed its duties responsibly, showing party and institutional loyalty.

Bibliography

Burris, Roland. “Sen. Roland Burris: I Have Always Had That Desire to be a Public Servant.” Interview by Kevin Chappell. Jet 8 June 2009: 8–10. Print.

Burris, Roland W. The Man Who Stood Up to Be Seated: A Controversial Appointment to the United States Senate; The Memoirs of Roland W. Burris. Colorado Springs: Hunter Heart, 2014. Print.

Freedlander, David. "Roland Burris: Ex-Senator Who Briefly Filled Obama Seat Still Nursing Wounds." Daily Beast. Daily Beast, 16 Feb. 2013. Web. 25 Apr. 2016.

Guess, John F., Jr. “Roland Burris.” National Minority Politics February 1994: 2. Print.

"Roland W. Burris." National Association of State Auditors, Comptrollers, and Treasurers, www.nasact.org/roland‗burris. Accessed 21 July 2021.

Toobin, Jeffrey. “The Replacement.” New Yorker 23 Mar. 2009: 34–41. Print.