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Obama deserves ASU honorary degree
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Barack Obama, then a candidate for president, greeted students and supporters at Arizona State University's Tempe campus on Oct. 19, 2007.
Bettina Hansen, Tribune
Arizona State University has handed out honorary doctorate degrees to pioneering scientists and college presidents, titans of oil and computer microchips, newspaper publishers and generous donors, a foreign communist educator and a successful movie director.
But no president of the United States has been deemed worthy of ASU’s recognition, not even the nation’s first black president. It’s an odd gap that besmirches the image of an excellent institution.
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An ASU academic committee has decided President Barack Obama won’t receive an honorary degree when he addresses this spring’s graduates at a May 13 ceremony, the Associated Press reported Wednesday. Honorary degrees are traditionally offered to commencement speakers as a way to call further attention to their contributions and to thank them for their appearance.
University spokeswoman Sharon Keeler said the committee decided Obama hasn’t served long enough in the White House to properly judge his legacy.
“His body of work is yet to come,” Keeler told the AP. “That’s why we’re not recognizing him with a degree at the beginning of his presidency.”
The University of Notre Dame has no such qualms and will offer Obama a honorary doctorate when he speaks to that college’s graduates on May 17. Perhaps Notre Dame has a better understanding of what Obama already has accomplished simply by reaching our nation’s pinnacle of political power and public service.
ASU has recognized a large number of politicians in the past 60 years. Some, such as former Govs. Rose Mofford and Ernest McFarland, clearly had moved into the twilight of their careers.
But others had much still to accomplish. Barry Goldwater received his honorary degree in May 1961, three years before his Republican nomination for president and only eight years into his three decades as a U.S. senator. Sandra Day O’Connor was similarly recognized just three years in her 25 years on the U.S. Supreme Court.
Of course, all of those people have deep Arizona roots, and Obama has no real ties to the state. But what connection did ASU have to other honorees such as L. Douglas Wilder, the first black governor of Virginia, or Kim Campbell, the first woman to be Canadian prime minister?
Obama almost certainly won’t speak at another ASU graduation, and no one knows if another president ever will either. The university should reconsider this arbitrary decision and honor Obama in May.
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