Officials at Harvard and Yale have both announced that they are not members of the FAIR alliance.

But members of HLS Lambda, a students’ civil rights group, said that Lifland’s ruling could encourage Harvard officials to publicly oppose the Solomon Amendment.

“I am hoping that it will spur the University to take action [against the statute] because they will see that it is a winnable issue,” said Amy R. Lawler, a second-year HLS student who is political co-chair of Lambda.

“Harvard can no longer hide behind the $328-million figure,” said Lambda secretary Holly S. Lewis, referring to the sum of federal funds that Harvard would have jeopardized if it had violated the Pentagon’s regulations in 2002.

Lewis said that if the University stays on the sidelines in the wake of Lifland’s ruling, “it is because Summers supported the military over the value of nondiscrimination.”

As HLS professors who penned the October letter to Summers await a response, opponents of the Pentagon policy hope that the 3rd Circuit will take prompt action to suspend the statute’s enforcement.

“The 3rd Circuit Court is widely thought of as being respectful of the First Amendment,” Greenfield said.

“Our First Amendment arguments will resonate even more with the Court of Appeals judges” than they have at the District Court level, he said.

Although the motion for a preliminary injunction is no longer as urgent now that the frantic fall recruiting season is finished, according to Lawler, Lambda hopes that the 3rd Circuit will move to suspend the statute before recruiting for HLS first-years begins in early spring.