## Facts

- Massachusetts School of Law at Andover, Inc. (MSL) operated a nontraditional law school model, including lower tuition, less emphasis on LSAT metrics, and increased skills training and adjunct instruction.
- The American Bar Association (ABA), through its legal education accreditation function, denied MSL accreditation after concluding MSL did not meet multiple ABA standards.
- Because many states condition bar eligibility on graduation from an ABA-approved law school, MSL alleged that denial of accreditation substantially impaired its ability to compete for students and harmed its reputation.
- MSL further alleged that ABA standards forced cost increases (including higher faculty salary expectations) and imposed structural requirements inconsistent with MSL’s model.
- MSL claimed that the ABA, the Association of American Law Schools (AALS), and the Law School Admission Council/Law School Admission Services (LSAC/LSAS), along with individual officials, coordinated to exclude MSL from the market for legal education.
- MSL pointed to, among other things, LSAC’s refusal to treat MSL like ABA-approved schools for certain services and AALS-related policies that allegedly marginalized nonaccredited schools.
- MSL sued in federal court alleging a § 1 Sherman Act conspiracy and related state-law torts; the district court granted summary judgment to defendants on the federal claims and dismissed or declined supplemental jurisdiction over the state claims.

## Issues

1. Whether MSL showed antitrust injury sufficient for standing under § 4 of the Clayton Act to pursue its § 1 Sherman Act claims.
2. Whether the evidence supported a reasonable inference of concerted action among the ABA, AALS, LSAC/LSAS, and individual defendants to restrain trade.
3. Whether the alleged exclusionary conduct constituted a per se unlawful group boycott or instead required rule-of-reason analysis, and whether MSL’s evidence satisfied the applicable standard.
4. Whether the claims against individual defendants and the disposition of related state-law claims could stand once the federal antitrust theories failed.

## Decision

- The Third Circuit affirmed summary judgment for all defendants on the federal antitrust claims.
- The court held that MSL failed to establish antitrust injury and therefore lacked antitrust standing for its core theory.
- The court further held that, even assuming standing, MSL did not produce sufficient evidence of an agreement among defendants to support a § 1 conspiracy claim.
- The court rejected per se treatment and analyzed the challenged accreditation and related practices under the rule of reason, finding MSL’s proof of anticompetitive effects inadequate.
- The court left undisturbed the district court’s dismissal or nonexercise of supplemental jurisdiction over the state-law claims.

## Legal Principles

- Antitrust standing requires “antitrust injury”: harm of the type the antitrust laws address that flows from anticompetitive effects on the market, not merely harm to a competitor.
- Denial of professional accreditation, without market-wide harm to competition, generally does not by itself establish antitrust injury.
- § 1 liability requires proof of concerted action; overlapping memberships, parallel policies, or participation in standard-setting organizations does not alone establish an unlawful agreement.
- Professional accreditation and standard-setting typically are evaluated under the rule of reason when the challenged conduct plausibly serves quality-control or related nonpretextual objectives.
- Under the rule of reason, a plaintiff must present evidence of harm to competition in a properly defined relevant market (such as reduced output, supracompetitive pricing, or diminished consumer choice), not only institutional or reputational injury.

## Conclusion

The Third Circuit held that MSL’s challenge to denial of accreditation and related practices failed because MSL did not show antitrust injury or sufficient evidence of a § 1 agreement, and because accreditation-related conduct was properly assessed under the rule of reason, under which MSL did not demonstrate anticompetitive effects in a defined market.


Massachusetts School of Law at Andover, Inc. v. American Bar Ass’n, 107 F.3d 1026 (3d Cir. 1997)