In the 1983 case of Coveney v. President and Trustees of the College of Holy Cross, the court declared that it would not overturn school decisions "if school officials act in good faith and on reasonable grounds."

"The courts stated basically 'we're not going to second guess administrators as long as there is no race and gender bias...we're not going to get involved in these matters,'" MacLeish said.

Attorneys for the two students in the current challenge attempted to avoid this problem by claiming that the University had violated its contract with students. But on Tuesday a federal judge rejected the claim that suspending the students after they had completed their graduation requirements constitutes contract violation.

Attorneys for the students have also claimed the College violated its own administrative board rules during the investigation. But according to Harvard Law School Professor Bruce L. Hay, it would take a fairly significant breach of University protocol for the courts to step in.

"If the University did follow the procedures that it usually follows, whatever it decided would probably be considered final," he said. "If the University held a hearing and found misconduct occurred, a court would usually be reluctant to overrule it."

Still, administrative board critics hold out the hope that a court might find Harvard's system so unfair that it would be willing to step in.

"The 'arbitrary and capricious' [legal] standard is a very tough one, but if there is an institution that's arbitrary and capricious, it's the ad board," MacLeish said.

"You're seeing more and more cases go to court, and I can't wait for a good one to come up," he added. "This may not be the right one, but maybe this will break some ground."