Born in New Berlin, New York in 1820, Anson Burlingame spent his early years there and in the Midwest. He later moved to Boston to attend Harvard. Following his studies, Burlingame worked as “counsellor" in offices at the Old State House in the city, while living in Cambridge.1
Burlingame participated in the abolition movement and anti-slavery politics by the late 1840s and throughout the 1850s. The Liberator quoted him as saying, "We must have an anti-slavery Constitution, an anti-slavery Bible, and an anti-slavery God."2 He initially joined the Conscience Whig party, which demanded federal action to end slavery.
Burlingame then moved on to the Free Soil party, which dedicated itself to stopping the spread of slavery. Black activist and fellow Vigilance Committee member William Cooper Nell noted Burlingame's enthusiasm and oratory at local Free Soil meetings. He wrote about how Burlingame praised the "courageous and romantic escape of William and Ellen Craft..." and how he hoped "that when Thomas Sims should again fly for freedom, thousands of others might find it with him." 3 In a speech at Faneuil Hall, Burlingame protested the forced rendition of Sims. He argued that the rendition "put our fellow-citizens under practical martial law... our temples of justice in chains" all to send a man back "to the degradation of a slavery which kills out of a living body an immortal soul."4
Elected in 1852, Burlingame served as a Massachusetts state senator for one term as a member of the Know-Nothing Party. A couple of years later, he got elected to the United States House of Representatives, in which served until 1861. He owed his 1856 reelection to Congress, which defied expectations, to the Black voters of Boston.5
Following the brutal beating of Senator Charles Sumner by Congressman Preston Brooks in 1856, Burlingame gave his “Defense of Massachusetts" speech in Congress. In this powerful address, Burlingame attacked slavery, praised his state’s personal liberty laws that helped negate the Fugitive Slave Law, and showed his support of his state's efforts to settle Kansas with anti-slavery citizens to keep slavery from spreading there. He also strongly denounced the actions of Preston Brooks for his attack on Sumner and called Brooks' honor into question.6 In response, Brooks publicly challenged Burlingame to a duel. Burlingame quickly accepted and told Brooks to meet him on a specific date on the Canadian side of Niagra Falls. Hearing of Burlingame’s renown as a marksman and not wanting to travel through the Northern states, Brooks soon declined. This only enhanced Burlingame’s reputation as an anti-slavery hero in the North.7
Burlingame served in Congress until President Abraham Lincoln appointed him minister to China. He held this position for several years, helping to foster a cooperative relationship with China and the Western powers. Because of his efforts, China named him an imperial envoy in 1867. He traveled across the United States and the world on behalf of China. During this trip, he became ill and died in St. Petersburg, Russia.8
Sent back to the United States, his body laid in state at Faneuil Hall before being buried at Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge.9 A portrait of Anson Burlingame still hangs in Fanueil Hall today.
Source: U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service