Since the Supreme Court struck down the legality of race-based affirmative action in college admissions last month, another unmeritocratic admissions process has faced increasing scrutiny: legacy admissions.

Legacy admissions are a corrupt, elitist practice that provides the children of alumni and wealthy donors an advantage in the admissions process. It is effectively a legal form of bribery that helps students get admitted into schools that would otherwise reject them.

So at elite schools such as Harvard University, why does this nepotistic practice, which makes students six times more likely to be admitted than their peers, persist? You can thank the Democrats for that one.

Harvard University is in Cambridge, Massachusetts, arguably the bluest city in one of the bluest states in the country. The Democratic Party dominates Massachusetts politics. While the state has a reputation for electing business-minded yet socially liberal Republican governors, these executives have had little power. Democrats have held a supermajority in both state legislative chambers for the past 30 years . They run the state and often override Republican governors when disagreements arise.

Yet, over those past 30 years, Democrats in the Massachusetts state legislature have allowed legacy admissions at the state’s elite schools to persist. The Senate presidents and House speakers have never prioritized this topic, and apparently, neither have rank-and-file Democrats in the legislature.

Even in nine of those years in which the state had a Democratic governor, the Democrats did nothing on this issue. Harvard graduate Deval Patrick, the state's first black governor, served from 2007 to 2015, and he never made ending legacy admissions a priority. Current Gov. Maura Healey (D-MA), another Harvard graduate, did not run on ending legacy admissions during her 2022 gubernatorial campaign. Instead, the practice continues at some of the state's best schools, such as Harvard, Tufts University, Williams College, and Wellesley College, among others.

If these politicians cared one-tenth as much about legacy admissions as conservatives do about opposing race-based affirmative action, they could have easily passed laws outlawing legacy admissions. While private colleges would have likely challenged them in court, that is something states will have to endure if they want to end the practice. Only Colorado has a law banning legacy admissions, and even that law merely affects public colleges and universities.

Other blue states have been complicit in legacy admissions, too. Most Ivy League schools are in blue states. Rhode Island Democrats could pass a law to bar legacy admissions at Brown, Connecticut Democrats could do the same for Yale, New York Democrats could follow suit for Columbia and Cornell, and New Jersey Democrats could end them at Princeton. Each of those states has a Democratic trifecta in state government. Not to mention, New Hampshire had a Democratic trifecta from 2007 to 2010 — yet legacies continue to receive preferential treatment at Dartmouth .

Since there seems to be bipartisan support for ending legacy admissions, hopefully both parties can come together and end the practice. However, one must wonder: Where was the Democratic outrage over legacy admissions before affirmative action went away?

Tom Joyce ( @TomJoyceSports ) is a political reporter for the New Boston Post in Massachusetts.