Maryland has made it harder for the state's historically black universities to attract more-diverse student bodies, according to a federal judge in Baltimore, who demanded that the state do more to break down what she called racial inequality within its educational system.

In an opinion late Monday, District Judge Catherine C. Blake handed a partial win to plaintiffs made up of students and alumni of four historically black Maryland universities—Bowie State University, Coppin State University, Morgan State University and the University of Maryland, Eastern Shore.

The judge rejected the schools' claims that the formula used by the state to allocate funds to the schools was discriminatory. But she upheld the argument that the state had unnecessarily duplicated the educational offerings of the state's white schools in its historically black schools, effectively preventing the black schools from offering unique programs that would distinguish them academically from white schools and thus make them more likely to attract greater numbers of students from other races.

The historically black colleges were started in the early 20th century to provide educational opportunities to blacks, but they are now seeking to diversify.

Judge Blake said the finding amounted to a violation of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which forbids a state from denying its citizens the "equal protection of the laws," she said. The "dual system" was a vestige of an era of segregation in higher-education.

She cited statistics indicating that Maryland's white state schools have 296 "unique" programs, or an average of 42 per school, while the historically black schools have a total of 44, or an average of 11 per school.

The black schools "will not be able to increase their non-black enrollment if their offerings continue to be unnecessarily duplicated," she wrote.

Plaintiffs' lawyer Michael Jones said: "This decision will go a long way to remedying historic discrimination and marginalization against the state's historically black schools."

A spokeswoman for Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley, a Democrat, said that "we respectfully disagree with the court's conclusions regarding duplication," but noted the court's finding that the state's funding formula is fair.

Judge Blake didn't order a specific remedy, but called a "good starting point" a proposal to allow the black schools to develop "areas of excellence" such as computer sciences or health-care facilities management.

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