Detention of People of Japanese Descent

  Detention of People of Japanese Descent

The Pearl Harbor attack in December 1941 led President Roosevelt to sign Executive Order 9066, granting the Secretary of Defense the authority to place American citizens of Japanese descent in internment camps. Among the men who were forced into these camps was Fred Korematsu, although he did not go of his own free will, and he chose to fight this injustice on the courthouse steps. According to Korematsu the orders, proclamations, and congressional statutes were unconstitutional because they deprived him of his 5th Amendment right to due process of law, a right that all US citizens are guaranteed. As such this paper seeks to respond to the question of how did Justice Black, in his decision for the court majority, justify the detention of people of Japanese descent? And on what grounds did the dissenting justices object to this decision? 

Roosevelt ordered the internment of all Japanese-American citizens during the war against Japan. The reason for this action was their ethnicity. Despite his refusal to follow the orders given to Japan's army, Mr Korematsu fought to protect his rights. As the government's representative to the court, Justice Hugo Black stated that “Exclusion of those of Japanese origin was deemed necessary because of the presence of an unascertained number of disloyal members of the group.” He continues by saying that Korematsu was not excluded from the Military Area as a result of hostility toward him or due to his race. Instead, Black claimed he was excluded from Military Area because of the war with Japan. While most Japanese are loyal to the United States, he says, “but it is impossible to bring about an immediate segregation of the disloyal from the loyal… ‘’ Therefore, they ought to be put into these camps so that they can be assured that the Japanese citizens won't harm them. 

Judge Hugo Black explains to the court why the government was justified in its decision to build internment camps for Japanese Americans. He thereafter goes on to say that the camps are necessary since the United States is at war and their use would protect the country against "espionage and against sabotage to national-defence material, national-defence premises, and national-defence utilities. . .” As Mr. Black says that no one should question the government about its actions regarding the segregation of Japanese since no one can be certain which side the government is on. While it is possible to check to make sure they are supporting America's welfare, the time involved would be way too much, therefore the government decided to protect itself from any Japanese men or women who do not agree with their actions by putting them all in different camps for a certain amount of time. 

While continuing his defence of the government's actions, Mr. Black insisted that the internment order was not a violation of the constitution. He saw no wrongdoing in the segregation camps. The U.S. citizens' safety must be ensured during a time of war, according to Mr. Black. His point of clarification to the court is that “It should be noted, to begin with, that all legal restrictions which curtail the civil rights of a single racial group are immediately suspect. That is not to say that all such restrictions are unconstitutional. It is to say that courts must subject them to the most rigid scrutiny.” 

Frank Murphy however opposed what the government had done to Korematsu and other Japanese Americans. The dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Frank Murphy, who is against Hugo Black, states that the “exclusion of all persons of Japanese ancestry, both alien and non-alien from the Pacific Coast area on a plea of military necessity in the absence of martial law ought not to be approved.” According to him, such exclusion violates the constitution, and should not be permitted to continue.  He further upholds that the government act on Korematsu and other People of Japanese ancestry as an “obvious racial discrimination, the order deprives all those within its scope of the equal protection of the laws as guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment.” He as well dissents that “the judicial test of whether the Government, on a plea of military necessity, can validly deprive an individual of any of his constitutional rights is whether the deprivation is reasonably related to a public danger.” In his view, the government's actions are unconstitutional because Murphy is of the opinion that citizens are not endangered, therefore their cause cannot be justified. According to him, Order No. 3 does not grant authority to remove all Japanese-Americans from the country, whether they are born here or arrived from abroad. He adds that “What are the allowable limits of military discretion, and whether or not they have been overstepped in a particular case, are judicial questions.” 

Additionally, Fred Korematsu and other Japanese citizens are being defended by Mr. Justice Owen Roberts, who disagrees with the government's actions.  In addition, Roberts asserts this was an example of racial profiling caused by the war, and claims the orders enacted by the Secretary of Defense were not written to keep Japanese citizens safe from other ethnic groups, or even to just keep them safe at home during the night “on the contrary, it is the case of convicting a citizen as a punishment for not submitting to imprisonment in a concentration camp, based on his ancestry, and solely because of his ancestry.” Mr. Owens also asserts that Korematsu, although Japanese by descent, was born and raised in the United States and is, therefore, a citizen and there is no proof showing he is disloyal to the United States.