Black enrollment at Harvard Law lowest since 1960s after affirmative action ruling

Harvard Law School is reporting its lowest Black student enrollment since the 1960s just one year after the Supreme Court’s decision to end race-conscious college admissions. 

Only 19 first-year Black students enrolled in this year’s class, compared to 43 from last year, according to an analysis this week by The New York Times.

The steep decline follows the Supreme Court’s 2023 decision to ban affirmative action in college admissions. Harvard was a defendant named in one of the lawsuits brought by Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA), an anti-affirmative action conservative group led by Edward Blum. 

The school also saw nearly a decline in Hispanic students, falling from 63 last year to 39 this year, while enrollment of white and Asian students increased.

The decline also impacted the Ivy League institution's undergraduate admissions. 

Black students last year made up 18 percent of Harvard’s first-year undergraduate students, but this year account for only 14 percent. 

And Harvard wasn’t the only school to see a decline in enrollment. 

University of North Carolina, another defendant SFFA named, had only nine first-year Black students this year, a drop from 13 last year. Hispanic student enrollment dropped from 21 to 13 students. 

The decline in students of color at the prestigious schools appears to confirm concerns civil rights groups had about inequities in higher education, including barriers to top institutions, surrounding the high court ruling.  

“Affirmative action has been a beacon of hope for generations of Black students,” Wisdom Cole, national director of youth and college for the NAACP, said at the time. “It stood as a powerful force against the insidious poison of racism and sexism, aiming to level the playing field and provide a fair shot at a high-quality education for all.”

The Legal Defense Fund called the decision “an unconscionable blow” toward efforts to advance educational opportunities for students of color, and the ACLU argued the movement to end affirmative action is  “part of a larger effort to rewrite our nation’s history, erase the lived experiences of people of color, and obstruct our full and equal participation in our democracy.”

Still, a spokesperson for Harvard Law told The New York Times the school “remains committed both to following the law and to fostering an on-campus community and a legal profession that reflect numerous dimensions of human experience.”

And despite the drop at some of the nation’s top schools, Black student enrollment in law school increased by about 3 percent this fall, according to the American Bar Association.