A Defense of Legacy Admissions, The Surprising Engine of Meritocracy

Last week, California Gov. Newson signed legislation banning legacy and donor preferences for all private colleges in the state, including Stanford and USC. As justification, he triumphantly declared: “In California, everyone should be able to get ahead through merit, skill, and hard work.”

Compelling reasoning indeed. Legacy is elitist. Legacy is unfair. Legacy is blatantly, on-its-face unmeritocratic.

And yet, legacy is a key engine of American meritocracy. For it furnishes the financial and social resources that integrate meritorious non-elites into the elite. Therefore, outlawing the practice is a monumental blunder, one that moves America towards a more unmeritocratic elite, a more unfair system, and a more dysfunctional society.