Burris, Roland W. (Roland Wallace), 1937-

Roland Wallace Burris (born August 3, 1937) is an American politician and attorney who is a former United States Senator from the state of Illinois and a member of the Democratic Party. In 1978, Burris was the first African-American elected to statewide office in Illinois, when he was elected Illinois Comptroller. He served in that office until his election as Illinois Attorney General in 1990. Since then, he has unsuccessfully run for office four more times.

Burris was born and raised in the small community of Centralia in southern Illinois. He was a 1955 graduate of Centralia High School and attended Southern Illinois University Carbondale, receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science in 1959. He was an exchange student on scholarship to study International Law at the University of Hamburg in Germany before earning his Juris Doctor degree from the Howard University School of Law in 1963. Burris worked as a federal bank examiner following graduation from law school and then as a bank vice president. From 1973 to 1976, he was director of the Illinois State Department of General Services in the cabinet of Governor Daniel Walker.

Burris made his first bid to be Illinois’s comptroller in 1976, losing in the Democratic Party primary to eventual winner Michael Bakalis. Two years later, when Bakalis sought the Illinois governorship, Burris successfully ran to succeed him as comptroller, serving from 1979 to 1991. In 1990, Burris was elected Illinois state attorney general and served until 1995. Burris made three bids for the Illinois governorship, in 1994, 1998, and 2002, coming up short each time. In 1995, he made an unsuccessful bid to be mayor of Chicago. He worked as a lawyer and political consultant during this time.

Governor Rod Blagojevich selected Burris to fill the unexpired term of former Senator Obama on December 31, 2008. After initially refusing to do so, the Illinois secretary of state approved the appointment on January 9, 2009, and the Senate considered Burris’s credentials in order three days later. Vice President Dick Cheney administered the oath of office to Burris in the Senate on January 15, 2009. Burris did not seek election to a full term, and he was succeeded in the Senate by Representative Mark Kirk, who won a November 2, 2010, special election to fill the remainder of the vacant term and a new six–year term at the same time. Kirk took the oath of office on November 29, 2010. Burris retired to his home in Chicago.