As he encouraged students to use their future profession to “right the wrongs of injustice,” Charles Becton, president of the North Carolina Bar Association, examined the visions of Martin Luther King Jr. in a Jan. 14 keynote address at Elon Law in a commemorative program sponsored by the Black Law Students Association.
Becton’s talk came on the eve of what would have been King’s 80th birthday. In the address, which examined the progress, or lack thereof, in the ideas the minister advocated during the late 1950s and 1960s.
“It is the lawyer’s job as a social engineer to right the wrongs of injustice,” Becton said to about 100 students, faculty and community members. “Surveys show that people feel better about lawyers who do pro bono work, public service work.”
While the legislature sets aside $100 million a year for criminal legal services, it only sets aside $2 million a year for civil work. “Legal Aid of North Carolina can only help 20 percent of those eligible for its legal services,” Becton said of the statewide program that assists low-income residents with legal services.
That makes the work lawyers do for the impoverished that much more important. “King died as he lived, fighting until his last breath for equality,” Becton said. “Can you imagine what he would have done in the past 41 years?
“He was never dissuaded from preaching his message … Our future is wrapped in how seriously we take this voice, this vision, this way.”
Becton has practiced law with the Raleigh firm of Becton, Slifkin & Bell since 1990. Prior to that, he served on the N.C. Court of Appeals, where he was named the N.C. Appellate Judge of the Year in 1985. He is also a member of the American Bar Association, the National Bar Association, the North Carolina Association of Black Lawyers and the North Carolina Academy of Trial Lawyers.
Becton graduated from Howard University in 1966 and earned his law degree from Duke University three years later. He also received an LL.M from the University of Virginia School of Law in 1986.
A man honored throughout his career with numerous awards from regional and national organizations, Becton and his wife, Brenda, have three adult children.