Immediately, a number of states throughout the nation will rejoice the legacy of Fred Korematsu. Though the Fred Korematsu Day of Civil Liberties and the Structure isn’t acknowledged in Washington state, I urge everybody to recollect the tales not solely of Korematsu, but additionally of Gordon Hirabayashi, Minoru “Min” Yasui, Mitsuye Endo and others who introduced authorized challenges to the World Conflict II incarceration of Japanese People.
To study extra about Korematsu’s life and wrestle for justice, you possibly can go to bodily websites, such because the Bainbridge Island Japanese American Exclusion Memorial, or learn “Enduring Conviction,” by Lorraine Bannai, a professor at Seattle College Faculty of Legislation who was a part of the authorized workforce that efficiently challenged Korematsu’s conviction.
After Japan bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Govt Order 9066, which granted U.S. Military Lt. Gen. John DeWitt the ability to take away individuals of Japanese ancestry from the West Coast and incarcerate them in camps. Of the virtually 120,000 Japanese people who have been incarcerated, two-thirds have been, like Korematsu, Americans. At 22, Korematsu defied the removing order in Oakland, Calif., and fought his felony conviction as much as the U.S. Supreme Court docket. The courtroom determined in a 6-3 choice that Korematsu’s constitutional rights could possibly be abridged in gentle of navy necessity. The bulk’s opinion drew three dissents, with Justice Frank Murphy writing that almost all opinion functioned as a “legalization of racism.”
Rising up, I by no means noticed myself in Korematsu, regardless of — or extra possible as a result of — of the truth that I’m Asian American. Being of Korean descent, I distanced myself from being related to Chinese language or Japanese People once I was youthful as a result of I felt it diminished my individuality. However as I realized extra about Korematsu’s story, I spotted that I had, to a point, dedicated the very flawed he had protested: viewing him as Japanese quite than American.
Like me, Korematsu grew up believing that he was American, and had, in his phrases, “nothin’ to do” along with his ancestral house. Whereas I’ve solely imagined what it is likely to be wish to have a non-Asian final identify or to have Western options, Korematsu was pressured to take actions to hide his ethnicity. After he violated the exclusion order, Korematsu modified his identify to “Clyde Sarah.” And after a lot hesitation, he finally walked as much as the door of a plastic surgeon who promised (however failed) to vary his facial options.
Though these acts have been, on the time, decried as proof of Korematsu’s disloyalty as a possible Japanese spy, they’re now acknowledged as proof of our nation’s disloyalty to its residents. These subtler harms metastasize out of the loneliness that comes from being pressured to face between two communities. Whereas I’ve solely skilled the occasional racial slight and disagreement in Asian American organizations, Korematsu was ostracized each by the group at giant and the Japanese American group. His family rejected him for defying the legislation. When the Supreme Court docket issued its choice, Korematsu requested himself, “Am I an American or not?” He recalled that, “After I came upon that I misplaced my choice, I assumed I misplaced my nation.”
However what makes somebody American? In awarding Korematsu the Presidential Medal of Freedom, President Invoice Clinton said that, by having his conviction overturned, Korematsu acquired what he needed most of all: “the prospect to really feel like an American, as soon as once more.” Korematsu was American earlier than, throughout, and after his case. The variations lie within the actions he took to really feel extra American, whether or not or not it’s so simple as serving as a volunteer with the Boy Scouts of America, or as daring as demonstrating solidarity with Arab People following 9/11. Immediately, I urge everybody to replicate on how and why we are able to see ourselves in Korematsu’s story, and what it means to be, and really feel, American.
