Last week, for more than two hours inside a Boston courtroom, a federal judge heard oral arguments in Harvard University’s lawsuit challenging President Donald Trump’s restrictions on its federal research funding. Over $2 billion is at stake in the lawsuit, along with vital lines of scientific inquiry, research jobs and, most of all, the question of a private institution’s autonomy. The arguments heard were for summary judgment, which means both sides agree on the facts but disagree on how the law applies to those facts. Neither Harvard nor the Trump administration dispute that the president made certain unprecedented written demands...