This case involves four Black students who applied to The University of Tennessee. Gray and Alexander applied for admission to the graduate school. Blakeney and Patterson applied to the college of law. They all qualified for admission but were denied because they were Black. The Board of Trustees said they denied the students because Tennessee’s state constitution and statutes required segregated schools. The case was taken to the Circuit Court of the Eastern District of Tennessee, which held that the situation was "unjust discrimination" against the students under the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The court made two important rulings.  First, there were no other institutions in the state where the students could obtain the graduate or legal education they sought. Second, segregation by law may be a valid exercise, but when it denies members of a race their rights, it is denounced. Ultimately, the court recognized that the U.S. Supreme Court, under other similar cases (Gaines, Sipuel, Sweatt, and McLaurin), had ruled that these students were being denied their right to the equal protection of the laws as granted by the Fourteenth Amendment. Therefore, the students won their case.