<p>I've read that Boalt quote before and I find that a shading of the truth. The fact is, the pool of in-state applicants is of lower quality than the pool of out-of-state applicants, chiefly because a lot of decent, but not great, instaters will apply to Berkeley hoping to get in and get instate tuition, whereas generally, only relatively strong out-of-staters will apply to Berkeley. </p>
<p>I think the real way to resolve the issue is to look at the qualifications of the instate vs. out-of-state admittees. I believe that LSDAS publishes a book that shows the GPA's and LSAT scores of instate and out-of-state admittees for all public schools (and the stats for all the private schools as well).</p>