Bernice King Net Worth

What is Bernice King's Net Worth?

Bernice King is a minister and lawyer who has a net worth of $1.5 million. Bernice King is the youngest child of civil rights leaders Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King. She serves as the CEO of both the not-for-profit organization the King Center and the Christian consulting firm First Kingdom Management, both based in Atlanta, Georgia. King has been involved in a number of controversies relating to legal and family disputes and her history of anti-LGBTQ rights advocacy.

Early Life and Education

Bernice King was born on March 28, 1963 in Atlanta, Georgia to civil rights leaders Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King. She is the younger sister of siblings Yolanda, Martin III, and Dexter. A week after Bernice turned five, her father was assassinated. A number of further tragedies followed over the ensuing years, including the drowning of her uncle Alfred and the murder of her grandmother Alberta. After viewing a documentary about her late father, "Montgomery to Memphis," as a teenager, King had an emotional breakdown and decided to become a minister like her father. She graduated from Douglass High School in Atlanta and went on to attend Grinnell College in Iowa. King ended up returning to Atlanta to finish her undergraduate education at Spelman College, graduating in 1985 with a psychology degree. She subsequently went to graduate school at Emory University, earning both Master of Divinity and Juris Doctor degrees.

Ministry

After receiving her Master of Divinity degree in 1990, King was ordained at Ebenezer Baptist Church, making her only the second woman ever to be ordained there. Later, she published a collection of her sermons and speeches entitled "Hard Questions, Heart Answers." King went on to become an elder at New Birth Missionary Baptist Church, serving in that role from 2002 to 2011. It was there that she delivered her mother's eulogy in 2006.

Public Speaking

King began public speaking at the age of 17, when she was invited to speak at the United Nations. When she was 19, she made her first major speech, in Chicago; she would go on to give many more speeches in the city after that. Elsewhere, King has spoken at such places as Liberty University, the Staples Center, the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum, Seminole State College of Florida, and Fontbonne University.

King Center

In early 2012, King became the CEO of the King Center, a not-for-profit organization founded by her mother in 1968. Through the Center, she works to promulgate her father's philosophy of nonviolence and to encourage its practice in all sectors of society.

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

Having played a significant role in reforming the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, which was once led by her father, King was elected president of the SCLC in 2009. However, she experienced discord with the group, and felt that her leadership suggestions were being ignored. Finally, in early 2010, King declined the presidency.

Anti-LGBTQ Rights Advocacy

Despite all of her work as a proponent of civil rights, King is notorious for her past advocacy against LGBTQ rights. In late 2004, she participated in a march in Atlanta opposing same-sex marriage, calling for it to be constitutionally banned. King continued opposing LGBTQ rights until 2015, when she seemingly reversed her stance in the wake of the US Supreme Court's legalization of gay marriage.

Legal Issues

King has been wrapped up in a score of legal issues over the years. In 2008, she and her brother Martin III sued their brother Dexter for allegedly mismanaging funds from the King Center. He countersued, and in 2009 the suits were settled out of court. King and Martin also got into a long dispute with Dexter over the relinquishing of family photos and other documents to the media.

In 2013, the Kings were sued by Harry Belafonte, who demanded to be named the owner of three documents they had given him. The following year, the parties reached a compromise letting Belafonte retain possession of the documents. Around this time, King was sued by her brothers for allegedly "secreting and sequestering" their father's Nobel Peace Prize and his Bible, which they wanted to sell. Because the brothers had gained sole control of their father's property according to a 1995 agreement, King was ordered by a judge to give up the items for temporary placement in a safety deposit box.