300 EMORY WASHBURN. 



EMORY WASHBURN. 



Emory Washburn, Governor of Massachusetts, and Professor in 

 the Harvard Law School, was born during the first year of the present 

 century, amid the simple life of one of the hill towns in the interior of 

 the Bay State. He received a collegiate education first at Dartmouth 

 and afterwards at Williams Colleges, from which he graduated iu 1817 ; 

 he studied law at the Law School of Harvard College, and entered upon 

 the practice of his profession in his native town of Leicester. In a few 

 years, he removed to Worcester, where for many years he possessed 

 the confidence of the tribunals and the community, and had, perhaps, 

 the largest practice in this, the central county of the State, at a bar 

 always eminent for the character and ability of its members. He was 

 sent to the Massachusetts House of Representatives both from Leicester 

 and from Worcester ; and was subsequently elected to the State Senate, 

 for Worcester County. Soon after he was appointed a judge of the 

 Court of Common Pleas, an office which he held for four years ; and 

 in 1853 he was elected Governor of the State. In 1854, the degree 

 of Doctor of Laws was conferred on him by his Alma Mater, and also 

 by Harvard College. During this period of active life, in addition to 

 his arduous professional and official duties, he gave freely of his time 

 and support to all the best interests of society. 



From such a career, at the ripe age of fifty-six, he became a Professor 

 in the Law School at Cambridge, and remained in that position for 

 twenty years. To it he brought the fruit of a long and ho'iiorable life ; 

 to it he brought also the character which had made that life so truly 

 honored, besides that warmth of the most abounding personal sympathy, 

 and that devotion to his work which seemed more the prompting of 

 his nature than the command of duty. These twenty years were the 

 crown and glory of his life. And when, a year ago, at the ripe age of 

 seventy-six, he resigned his chair^ because he felt that it might better be 

 filled by a younger man, his associates could discover no abatement of 

 force in mind or body. And such an active nature could not remain 

 idle or be spared from the public service. After an interval of fifty 

 years since his first election, he was returned to the Legislature of his 

 native State by his fellow-citizens of Cambridge, and there with all the 

 vigor of a youth he entered upon the arduous duties of Chairman of the 

 Judiciary Committee of the House. While full of activity in manifold 

 ways, both in public official duties, in private life, and in numerous 

 associations for the promotion of the best interests of society, and amid 

 friends and home, he received the last summons, and, through a short 



