Make a Gift

Ways to Give

Make a gift via mail:

Please always include the purpose or fund designation on your check memo line or in an accompanying note.

Check payable to:

UF Foundation
P.O. Box 14412
Gainesville, FL 32604-4412

If your gift is in memory of or in honor of someone, please simply indicate that on the memo line of the check.

Make a gift online:

Giving your gift online is often the easiest and fastest way to make a contribution to the Law School.

Click HERE to give. If you wish to give to a fund that is not listed, please click on College of Law Annual Fund (000331) and specify your designation in the “Notes” section.

If your gift is in memory of or honor of someone, please choose Law School Memorial Fund (012879) and indicate in the Memorial/Honorary Information section who your donation is in memory or honor of.

Make a gift by phone:

You may call the UF Foundation’s Gift Processing office at 1-877-351-2377(8:00 a.m. – 4:30 p.m. ET, Mon-Fri.). They can immediately process American Express, MasterCard, Visa, Discover and Diner’s Club donations with the strictest of confidence

Please be sure to designate your gift to the law school. If your gift is in memory of or in honor of someone, please simply indicate that on the phone.

Additional options:

Securities, Mutual Fund & Cash Wire Transfers:

Please contact Janet White 352-392-5920 or investments@uff.ufl.edu or click on the instruction pages below.

For Securities transfer instructions, please click here.
For Mutual Fund transfers, please click here.
(Please be aware that this process may take several weeks)
For Domestic Cash Wire transfers, please click here.
For Standard Stock Certificate instructions, please click here.

Other:

For gifts of tangible personal property, real property, trusts or annuities please call 352-392-1691 for specific instructions.

If you would like to speak directly with someone from the law school Office of Development & Alumni Affairs, please contact the following. Please leave a message if necessary and your call will be returned within 24 hours.

Office of Development & Alumni Affairs: 352-273-0640

The Florida Constitutional Law Endowment in memory of Justice Ben F. Overton was created by Judge Karen Miller in 2013. This fund supports lectures and presentations by Justices of the Florida Supreme Court at the Fredric G. Levin College of Law.

HISTORY

Justice Overton, who earned his B.S. in 1951 and his Juris Doctor in 1952 from the University of Florida, was the first merit appointment to the Florida Supreme Court. Throughout his career he was active in legal education and served as an Adjunct Professor at the Levin College of Law through December 2012, the month of his death. Although he resided at Oak Hammock at the University of Florida, a continuing care retirement community developed in cooperation with UF, he also considered the Florida Supreme Court “home.” Among the high points of his later years was hosting Justices of the Florida Supreme Court in Gainesville and taking his class to Tallahassee to hear oral arguments at the Florida Supreme Court.
Judge Miller, who earned her B.S. cum laude from New York University in 1974 and her Juris Doctor from New York Law School in 1977, served as Chief Administrative Law Judge of the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs, New York City’s business regulatory agency, before she retired to Oak Hammock at the University of Florida. Having accompanied Justice Overton on his excursions to Tallahassee and joined him in welcoming guests to Oak Hammock at the University of Florida, she created the endowment in memory of Justice Overton to ensure that the Levin College of Law continues to have the funding necessary to continue and enhance the interaction between its students and the Florida Supreme Court.

Judge Miller remembered the event that motivated the endowment.

Prior to a dinner at the home of Dean Robert Jerry and Lisa Jerry shortly after Justice Overton’s death, Justice Barbara Pariente and I were discussing a suitable memorial. Justice Pariente, who had been Justice Overton’s colleague on the Florida Supreme Court and who understood the importance to him of the interaction between his students and the Court, suggested the outline of what has become the Overton lectures. Dean Jerry, who has since retired, as has Dean Emeritus Jon Mills, who assumed responsibility for implementing the Overton lectures, were very supportive from the beginning. Since Dean Mills’ retirement, Professor Timothy McClendon, who assisted both Justice Overton and Dean Mills teaching Florida Constitutional Law and who co-authored the recent Florida Constitutional Law casebook, has continued the Overton lectures with the support of Interim Dean Merritt McAlister and CGR director, Professor Danaya Wright.

Justice Overton was a devoted jurist, educator, and ethical leader of the Florida legal profession. The Overton Lecture Series brings Florida Supreme Court Justices to the University of Florida, Levin College of Law, and serves to introduce students to the inner workings of the Court. CGR and the students of the College of Law extend our deepest gratitude to Judge Karen Miller for making the Overton Lectures possible in perpetuity.

You can watch an interview for the Florida Historical Society by Mary Adkins, professor emeritus of the UF Levin College of Law, with Justice Overton here.

Justice Overton was also interviewed for the Samuel Proctor Oral History Project and a transcript of his interview is available at the Smathers Library, and here.
Justice Overton sat on the Constitution Revision Commission of 1977-78 that proposed a right to privacy in the Florida Constitution. Although it failed as part of the Constitution Revision Commission recommendations, it passed in 1980 when proposed by the legislature. The bill was co-sponsored by our very own Jon Mills. The privacy provision prevailed by greater than 60%. Justice Overton then wrote a concurrence in a critical reproductive rights case in 1989 affirming that the privacy provision of the Florida Constitution included the right to obtain an abortion. That decision was overruled in Planned Parenthood of SW and Central Florida v. Florida. You can read about the role of Justice Overton, Jon Mills – director emeritus of CGR, and the history of the 1989 case here.