Group Uses Supreme Court’s Own Words to Challenge Harvard’s Legacy Admissions

Ryan Bort
·2 min read
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The Supreme Court ruled last week that Harvard’s admissions process, which factored race into decisions about which candidates to accept, was unconstitutional. The college is still allowed to consider whether applicants are relatives of alumni, though, which has led a civil rights group to file a complaint in light last week’s decision.

Lawyers for Civil Rights filed the complaint on Monday, alleging that admitting applicants based on whether their relatives attended the university violates the Civil Rights Act. “Each year, Harvard College grants special preference in its admissions process to hundreds of mostly white students — not because of anything they have accomplished, but rather solely because of who their relatives are,” the complaint reads, going on to quote Chief Justice John Roberts’ majority opinion last week: “A benefit provided to some applicants but not to others necessarily advantages the former group at the expense of the latter.”

The complaint, filed with the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, notes that both 70 percent of applicants with relatives at Harvard and applicants whose relatives are Harvard donors are white. “The results of this preferential treatment are substantial,” the complain reads, noting that from 2014-2019 donor-related applicants were seven times more likely to be admitted, and legacy applicants were six times more likely to get into the nation’s most prestigious higher-learning institution.

The Supreme Court’s decision to end race-based affirmative action in college admissions drew harsh criticism, with many pointing out that race is only one of several factors outside of academic merit that universities consider. “So often, we just accept that money power, and privilege are perfectly justifiable forms of affirmative action, while kids growing up like I did are expected to compete when the ground is anything but level,” Michelle Obama wrote in response to the ruling.

President Biden said that he will ask the Department of Education to he’s asking the Education Department to scrutinize legacy admissions and other ways universities “expand privilege instead of opportunity.”

Democrats in Congress want to take action, too. Sen. Jeff Merkely (D-Ore.) and Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) said that they plan to reintroduce the Fair College Admissions for Students Act, which they first introduced last year, which would end legacy admissions at schools that accept federal funding. Bowman explained to Rolling Stone that legacy admission policies allow “big donors, the wealthy elite, and those who were able to attend certain higher education institutions” to secure admission spots for their family members, while simultaneously shutting “poor people and people of color out of the most prestigious institutions.”

“That is un-American, that is undemocratic, and that is unacceptable,” Bowman added.

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