CAMPUS

Businessman donates $1.5M to UA law school

Money will endow a chair of constitutional law

Staff report
The UA School of Law held a ribbon cutting to open the new, $15 million wing at the school's campus in Tuscaloosa AL, Sept. 29, 2006.   (Dan Lopez / The Tuscaloosa News)

A Florida businessman and attorney has given $1.5 million to endow a chair of constitutional law at the University of Alabama School of Law.

The gift is the latest by Hugh F. Culverhouse Jr., whose father, Hugh F. Culverhouse Sr., is the namesake of the Culverhouse College of Commerce and a graduate of the law school. The gift will establish the Hugh F. Culverhouse Jr. Chair in Constitutional Law and serve as a foundation for a center for constitutional studies.

“Mr. Culverhouse has proven himself a committed friend and supporter of the Capstone. We are incredibly grateful for his continued generosity, and we look forward to seeing the lasting impact of this gift in our students’ lives, on our campus and beyond,” UA President Stuart R. Bell said.

Culverhouse’s gift was inspired by his love of the Constitution, experiences as an attorney and his respect for the school’s Dean Mark E. Brandon.

“My love comes from being a trial lawyer since 1975 and seeing the document live in my work as a federal prosecutor and as a federal criminal defense attorney,” he said. “As I matured, I realized the importance of the Constitution in providing checks and balances in governing this nation. This document is ever moving in its interpretation and yet never moving in its principles.”

Culverhouse has donated more than $7 million to the business college as well as $2.5 million to the Crimson Tide Foundation, the fundraising arm of University of Alabama Athletics.