Courtrooms and Classrooms: A Legal History of College Access, 1860?1960

A stunningly original history of higher education law.

Conventional wisdom holds that American courts historically deferred to institutions of higher learning in most matters involving student conduct and access. Historian Scott M. Gelber upends this theory, arguing that colleges and universities never really enjoyed an overriding judicial privilege.

Focusing on admissions, expulsion, and tuition litigation, Courtrooms and Classrooms reveals that judicial scrutiny of college access was especi...