State courts must adhere to decisions of United States Supreme Court to extent that they are decisive of questions involving application of federal Constitution to any given situation.
The first question presented by the answer is not a new one. It has long been settled by the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States -- to which the state courts must adhere to the extent that such decisions are decisive of questions involving the application of the Federal Constitution to any given situation -- that the requirements of the equal protection clause of the Fourteeth Amendment to the Federal Constitution are not *612 satisfied by a plan offered by a state to its Negro citizens to obtain legal education outside the state, where the state furnishes legal education within the state to its white citizens who desire to pursue such a course of study.
The first of the cases in which the issue was decided was Missouri ex rel. Gaines v. Canada, Registrar of the University of Missouri, decided in 1938 and reported in 305 U.S. 337, 59 S.Ct. 232, 83 L.Ed. 208. The essential facts of the case were that pursuant to the State's policy of separating the races in its educational institutions, the curators of the University of Missouri, a tax-supported and maintained institution of higher learning in the State of Missouri, refused to admit a Negro citizen of the State as a student in the law school of the University solely because of his race, and, there being no tax-supported university or college in the state where Negro students were eligible for courses in law, offered to the applicant in lieu of admittance to the University law school the opportunity to obtain his legal education at a law school in an adjacent state wherein Negroes were acceptable for admission. The Supreme Court of the State of Missouri upheld the plan offered by the State of Missouri for the education of its Negro citizens outside the state, finding that the provision for legal education in other states of Negroes resident in Missouri satisfied the constitutional requirement of equal protection. State ex rel. Gaines v. Canada, 342 Mo. 121, 113 S.W.2d 783. Upon appeal the Supreme Court of the United States reversed the holding of the state court, saying:
'The basic consideration is not as to what sort of opportunities other States provide, or whether they are as good as those in Missouri, but as to what opportunities Missouri itself furnishes to white students and denies to negroes solely upon the ground of color. The admissibility of laws separating the races in the enjoyment of privileges afforded by the State rests wholly upon the equality of the privileges which the laws give to the separated groups within the State. The question here is not of a duty of the State to supply legal training, or of the quality of the training which it does supply, but of its duty when it provides such training to furnish it to the residents of the State upon the basis of an equality of right. By the operation of the laws of Missouri a privilege has been created for white law students which is denied to negroes by reason of their race. The white resident is afforded legal education within the State; the negro resident having the same qualifications is refused it there and must go outside the State to obtain it. That is a denial of the equality of legal right to the enjoyment of the privilege which the State has set up, and the provision for the payment of tuition fees in another State does not remove the discrimination. * * Nor can we regard the fact that there is but a limited demand in Missouri for the legal education of negroes as excusing the discrimination in favor of whites. * * * Whether or not particular facilities shall be provided may doubtless be conditioned upon there being a reasonable demand therefor; but, if facilities are provided, substantial equality of treatment of persons * * * under like conditions cannot be refused. * * *
'Here, petitioner's right was a personal one. It was as an individual that he was entitled to the equal protection of the laws, and the State was bound to furnish him within its borders facilities for legal education substantially equal to those which the State there afforded for persons of the white race, whether or not other negroes sought the same opportunity.
'It is urged, however, that the provision for tuition outside the State is a temporary one,--that it is intended to operate merely pending the establishment of a law department for negroes at Lincoln University. While in that sense the discrimination may be termed temporary, it may nevertheless continue for an indefinite period by reason of the discretion given to the curators of Lincoln University and the alternative of arranging for tuition in other States, as permitted by the state law as construed by the state court, so long as the curators find *613 it unnecessary and impracticable to provide facilities for the legal instruction of negroes within the State. In that view, we cannot regard the discrimination as excused by what is called its temporary character.'
(Italics supplied.) [305 U.S. 337, 59 S.Ct. 236.] See also Sipuel v. Board of Regents, 332 U.S. 631, 68 S.Ct. 299, 92 L.Ed. 247, rev'g. 199 Okl. 36, 180 P.2d 135; and McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Ed., D.C., 87 F.Supp. 526.