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> It's pretty likely Harvard has had an impact on your life in a lot of ways because a lot of people who govern you went there. And, in addition, because at le

> It's pretty likely Harvard has had an impact on your life in a lot of ways because a lot of people who govern you went there. And, in addition, because at least presently, anyone who didn't do Ivy+ is essentially never going to be a SCOTUS judge. The obvious objection is that given there are only 9 justices at a time, essentially nobody is ever going to be a SCOTUS judge anyway. But that misses the important gating function (as TFA puts it) which begins with Ivy+ schools. Yes, the chance that you or your neighbor will ever be a SCOTUS justice is essentially zero. But the 9 have to come from somewhere, and the current process essentially guarantees that they must have passed through Ivy+. It's far from clear that this is desirable. Now notice that the same issue applies to the other fields showing massive Ivy+ over-representation. As TFA says, maybe a gating function is required (sometimes), but the justification for it operating at 18 and not later (22, or later still) is weak to non-existent.

torstenvl 3y ago
What law schools are admitting 18yos? I don't know if it's intentional but you're conflating mutually exclusive lines of thought. The argument that such decisions should be made at age 22 instead of age 18 doesn't support — in fact contradicts — your argument that trajectories toward SCOTUS should not be related to law school admissions (which do indeed happen at age 22 instead of age 18).
- PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
  The argument is not about Harvard Law, it's about Harvard. Yes, 8 of the 9 went to Harvard or Yale Law. But 6 of the nine went to Harvard, Yale or Princeton as undergrads.
  - kevinventullo 3y ago
    In my mind, the latter is the more damning statistic.
Kon-Peki 3y ago
> And, in addition, because at least presently, anyone who didn't do Ivy+ is essentially never going to be a SCOTUS judge. For your example, you need to do a post-graduate degree (law) from the Ivy+. This article is talking about the gating functions of the undergraduate admissions departments. The graduate school admissions officers are far more likely to consider strong candidates from "normal" universities than their undergraduate admissions colleagues are to consider strong candidates from "normal" public high schools. Also, consider Harvard Extension. People shit on it constantly and call it the backdoor, not-so-honest way to get associated with Harvard. But in reality, it is more of a front door into a "make of it what you will" program. A significant number of the people that actually graduate use it to get into high-quality PhD programs that would have otherwise completely ignored them based on their past and their lack of "proper" pedigree. In my mind, the undergraduate portions of these universities are pretty much lost causes. But their graduate schools are far more meritocratic and, much more importantly, fixable without burning everything to the ground. Because if you want to burn it all down and start over you are going to have to fight against all the rich and powerful people, and probably aren't going to win.
- PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
  > For your example, you need to do a post-graduate degree (law) from the Ivy+. This article is talking about the gating functions of the undergraduate admissions departments. 6 of the 9 nine current justices did undergrad at Harvard, Yale or Princeton.
  - Kon-Peki 3y ago
    25% of the current Ivy+ SCOTUS judges did not go to an Ivy+ for undergrad? With additional reforms of the graduate programs would you expect that future numbers would increase or decrease? EDIT - for some reason it will not allow me to reply to your reply... There are 8 current judges from Ivy+ law schools and 6 of them went to Ivy+ undergrad programs. That's how I got to 25%. I guess I question why increasing the number of judges on the Supreme Court would change the percentage of (non-Ivy+ undergrad --> Ivy+ JD) justices. I would think that the only way to do that is to increase the number of non-Ivy+ undergrads admitted to the Ivy+ JD programs. I mean, increasing the number of balls you randomly draw from a bag of balls increases the odds of getting one of the rare balls. But increasing the proportion of rare balls in the bag such that they aren't rare anymore increases the probability more, with the added benefit for every formerly rare ball that wasn't selected for the bench.
fnordpiglet 3y ago
So, according to Wikipedia, 18 justices graduated Harvard, 9 Yale, and 39 some other law school. Yes, it helps to go to Harvard or Yale. But most justices didn’t.
- PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
  That's a good long term historical view, and provides some hope. However, the current court composition is what we face today, and there are members who will likely be on the court for 30 years or more. While the historical picture is more encouraging, it doesn't negate the significance of the current makeup.
  - fnordpiglet 3y ago
    I’d challenge that the person as an individual is more important than where they went to school. Perhaps there are others who were excluded due to not having gone to Harvard along the way, and in some abstract sense that’s unfair, but in a very real sense your school doesn’t make the person, the person is the person and they went to a school. I am curious if any of the justices are legacy students or if all were admitted via a standard merit based selection process. It so, and given Harvard law and Yale law are regarded top law schools on their own merit, what is specifically the issue? I would definitely expect a statistical weighting to the top schools in any field for the top positions in that field, no? What becomes concerning is when legacy students dominate the court. That is categorically unfair by structure, and it would speak to a hereditary elite in power. This was, as I’m sure you remember, the distinguishing factors of GWB vs Obama. Obama walked in those circles by earning his chair. GWB… well…
    - PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
      There's a somewhat solid argument that law school is of massively diminished relevance for SCOTUS than it is for, say, a fed appeals court judge. You can (and do) have very knowledgeable clerks providing appropriate factual legal guidance, but most SCOTUS decisions, by the very nature of the court, are not really tied into "what the law is". The core problem here, which TFA outlines at some length, is that while there is nothing particularly wrong with wanting "the best people for the job", it isn't clear that Ivy+ education is the right metric/gatekeeping to use for this task.

torstenvl 3y ago

What law schools are admitting 18yos? I don't know if it's intentional but you're conflating mutually exclusive lines of thought. The argument that such decisions should be made at age 22 instead of age 18 doesn't support — in fact contradicts — your argument that trajectories toward SCOTUS should not be related to law school admissions (which do indeed happen at age 22 instead of age 18).

PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
The argument is not about Harvard Law, it's about Harvard. Yes, 8 of the 9 went to Harvard or Yale Law. But 6 of the nine went to Harvard, Yale or Princeton as undergrads.
- kevinventullo 3y ago
  In my mind, the latter is the more damning statistic.

Kon-Peki 3y ago

> And, in addition, because at least presently, anyone who didn't do Ivy+ is essentially never going to be a SCOTUS judge. For your example, you need to do a post-graduate degree (law) from the Ivy+. This article is talking about the gating functions of the undergraduate admissions departments. The graduate school admissions officers are far more likely to consider strong candidates from "normal" universities than their undergraduate admissions colleagues are to consider strong candidates from "normal" public high schools. Also, consider Harvard Extension. People shit on it constantly and call it the backdoor, not-so-honest way to get associated with Harvard. But in reality, it is more of a front door into a "make of it what you will" program. A significant number of the people that actually graduate use it to get into high-quality PhD programs that would have otherwise completely ignored them based on their past and their lack of "proper" pedigree. In my mind, the undergraduate portions of these universities are pretty much lost causes. But their graduate schools are far more meritocratic and, much more importantly, fixable without burning everything to the ground. Because if you want to burn it all down and start over you are going to have to fight against all the rich and powerful people, and probably aren't going to win.

PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
> For your example, you need to do a post-graduate degree (law) from the Ivy+. This article is talking about the gating functions of the undergraduate admissions departments. 6 of the 9 nine current justices did undergrad at Harvard, Yale or Princeton.
- Kon-Peki 3y ago
  25% of the current Ivy+ SCOTUS judges did not go to an Ivy+ for undergrad? With additional reforms of the graduate programs would you expect that future numbers would increase or decrease? EDIT - for some reason it will not allow me to reply to your reply... There are 8 current judges from Ivy+ law schools and 6 of them went to Ivy+ undergrad programs. That's how I got to 25%. I guess I question why increasing the number of judges on the Supreme Court would change the percentage of (non-Ivy+ undergrad --> Ivy+ JD) justices. I would think that the only way to do that is to increase the number of non-Ivy+ undergrads admitted to the Ivy+ JD programs. I mean, increasing the number of balls you randomly draw from a bag of balls increases the odds of getting one of the rare balls. But increasing the proportion of rare balls in the bag such that they aren't rare anymore increases the probability more, with the added benefit for every formerly rare ball that wasn't selected for the bench.

fnordpiglet 3y ago

So, according to Wikipedia, 18 justices graduated Harvard, 9 Yale, and 39 some other law school. Yes, it helps to go to Harvard or Yale. But most justices didn’t.

PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
That's a good long term historical view, and provides some hope. However, the current court composition is what we face today, and there are members who will likely be on the court for 30 years or more. While the historical picture is more encouraging, it doesn't negate the significance of the current makeup.
- fnordpiglet 3y ago
  I’d challenge that the person as an individual is more important than where they went to school. Perhaps there are others who were excluded due to not having gone to Harvard along the way, and in some abstract sense that’s unfair, but in a very real sense your school doesn’t make the person, the person is the person and they went to a school. I am curious if any of the justices are legacy students or if all were admitted via a standard merit based selection process. It so, and given Harvard law and Yale law are regarded top law schools on their own merit, what is specifically the issue? I would definitely expect a statistical weighting to the top schools in any field for the top positions in that field, no? What becomes concerning is when legacy students dominate the court. That is categorically unfair by structure, and it would speak to a hereditary elite in power. This was, as I’m sure you remember, the distinguishing factors of GWB vs Obama. Obama walked in those circles by earning his chair. GWB… well…
  - PaulDavisThe1st 3y ago
    There's a somewhat solid argument that law school is of massively diminished relevance for SCOTUS than it is for, say, a fed appeals court judge. You can (and do) have very knowledgeable clerks providing appropriate factual legal guidance, but most SCOTUS decisions, by the very nature of the court, are not really tied into "what the law is". The core problem here, which TFA outlines at some length, is that while there is nothing particularly wrong with wanting "the best people for the job", it isn't clear that Ivy+ education is the right metric/gatekeeping to use for this task.