Benjamin L. Crump receives honorary degree and encourages students to share their knowledge with those less fortunate

During the May 14 UDC Commencement, President Ronald Mason Jr. and the Board of Trustees awarded Benjamin L. Crump, who gave the Commencement address, an honorary Doctor of Laws degree. This award recognizes Crump’s significant accomplishments in defending the rights of and seeking justice for minorities and other marginalized citizens, helping to establish new legislation and practices to effect change, and reaching historic settlements and verdicts.

An attorney, Crump is also the founder and principal owner of Ben Crump Law. Among dozens of accomplishments, he has been recognized with the NAACP Thurgood Marshall Award, the SCLC Martin Luther King Servant Leader Award, the American Association for Justice Johnnie Cochran Award and the Alpha Kappa Alpha Eleanor Roosevelt Medallion for Service.

When asked what this new distinction means to him, Crump said he was “thankful.”

“I have a lot of dear colleagues and friends who graduated from UDC, so I am very heartened to receive this recognition,” said Crump. “I think that this University uplifts our communities and our culture. It enables our next generation of children to have an equal opportunity at achieving life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

Crump, who graduated from Florida State University and received his law degree from FSU College of Law, is president of the National Civil Rights Trial Lawyers Association. He previously served as president of the National Bar Association. His book, “Open Season: Legalized Genocide of Colored People,” reflects on the landmark cases he has battled and how discrimination in the courthouse devastates real families and communities.

“Without a struggle, there can be no progress. Based on precedent, what they taught me in the first year of law school, is that Black people have been able to overcome being defined as three-fifths at the founding of this country. Black people have overcome the Dred Scott decision by the Supreme Court. We overcame reconstruction, carpet baggers, the legacy of sharecropping and Plessy v. Ferguson—where things were separate and unequal. We overcame Jim Crow Jr. And, more recently, Jim Crow Jr. Ph.D. Esquire. That tells me that no matter what the enemies of inequality throw at us, we will be alright.”

The civil rights leader and advocate said that he is convinced that things in America will improve. “I know it’s going to get better. We will win this war. UDC is educating young minds that will help us win the war against inequality for our people.”

Crump advised UDC students to have the courage of their convictions and speak truth to power, even if “their knees are shaking.”

“Your ancestors have sacrificed so much for you to have this education. Think about the people who caught the early bus so that their grandchildren would be able to go to a great educational institution like UDC, and then be able to use that education to share it with those who are less fortunate,” he said. “There’s an old proverb that says that ‘education is of no value if you keep it amongst the educated.’ Take this great education from UDC back to those who are less fortunate and did not have the same opportunity. That is how we are going to lift our culture.”