The foundational principle of taxpayer-supported higher education is that local tax dollars subsidize costs so that in-state residents get access to classes and degrees at a cheaper cost than people from elsewhere. The hope is that people receiving these credentials will then remain in the state, contributing to its economic growth and prosperity.

This logic does not appear to have translated to the Maryland Higher Education Commission (MHEC), which ruled on Wednesday night that in-state residents will not be able to take online courses toward a doctorate in community college administration offered at the University of Maryland University College (UMUC). It made this decision on the grounds that allowing the program “would be unreasonably duplicative of, and demonstrably harmful to” the existing program at Morgan State University–a Historically Black University located in Baltimore. As a result of this ruling, students residing outside of Maryland will have access to the online degree, but those within the state will be denied access to this program that is at least partially funded by their taxes. The decision will in fact ensure duplicative resource investment, as Morgan will be given priority in developing its own online version of the degree to launch in 2011.

Not surprisingly, Morgan’s latest challenge has provoked quite a backlash from state higher education officials, including this highly entertaining letter to the editor from the former chancellor of the Maryland system.

As Inside Higher Ed explains, Morgan’s ability to shut down the UMUC program for in-state residents is the result of a 1992 federal court ruling that “codified the notion that states should protect those historically under-financed institutions from competition from similar degree programs at nearby colleges.” Of course, the definition of nearby is pretty interesting. While not the largest state, Maryland is certainly no Rhode Island, with the westernmost reaches located more than 200 miles away from Morgan and the easternmost about 150 miles away. Respectively, that’s about four and three times greater than the distance between Russia and Alaska at the narrowest point.

Now obviously Morgan’s better argument is that you don’t want too much duplication within a state’s system of higher education. Indeed, turning each of the 13 public universities in Maryland (excluding the Naval Academy) into top-tier research universities would require significantly more resources than the state probably wants to spend. And maybe there is a case to be made that with only 50 students there is not enough demand to justify offering a second degree in community college administration. (The Baltimore Sun reported that UMUC expected to enroll 75 students in its first-year, with nine of them coming from in-state.)

But the same logic certainly does not apply to electrical engineering, education, and history–all of which are part of the roughly dozen courses Morgan has challenged under the same federal precedent. Certainly the last thing the state and country need are more engineers, right?

For many students, especially those in rural and outlying areas, online higher education provides them with access to postsecondary opportunities that never would have been available to them in the past. They also can provide a source of competition that can force colleges to increase quality. Unfortunately, this decision instead needlessly strangles an expansion of access for political reasons.