Publications
Suggested Readings and Additional Documentaries
Published Journals
Seattle Journal for Social Justice
Korematsu Overruled? Far From It: The Supreme Court Reloads the Loaded Weapon
By Lorraine K. Bannai
2018
WHAT DOES IT MEAN THAT THE COURT OVERRULED KOREMATSU? DOES IT MEAN ANYTHING AT ALL?
There is, of course, some importance to the fact that, at least in words, the Supreme Court expressly stated what so many have known for years: that Korematsu was “gravely wrong.” In so stating, it rightly said it erred 74 years earlier when it upheld the mass removal of an entire community. However, the Court’s purported overruling of Korematsu is hollow when, in the same breath, it affirmed a presidential proclamation born of branding a whole group of people as terrorists based on unfounded religious stereotypes. At the same time it said it disavowed Korematsu, the Court applied the same dangerous reasoning it used in that case: it abdicated its role as a check on its co-equal branches of government by accepting, without question, the government’s claim that its actions were required by national security; it turned a blind eye to the foundation of prejudice, stereotype, and hate upon which the challenged orders rested; and, as a consequence, it has now “reloaded” the loaded weapon Justice Jackson feared when he wrote his Korematsu dissent.
The Yale Law Journal
Trump v. Hawaii: How the Supreme Court Simultaneously Overturned and Revived Korematsu
By Neal Katyal
2019
For decades, Korematsu has been viewed as a cautionary tale. But until Hawaii, it had never been overturned—a fact that set it apart from its fellow antiprecedents. As a renounced decision still on the books, it served as a stark reminder of failed legal reasoning and the dangers of blindly adhering to the government’s assertions. Given this legacy, it seemed only natural that in overturning Korematsu, the Court would strictly adhere to these lessons. After all, as Richard Primus articulately put it, “the court is the chief narrator of American constitutional history, so an ugly chapter from the past can never be fully closed until the court itself writes the better ending.”
Seattle Journal for Social Justice
Gordon Hirabayashi v. United States: “This is an American case”
By Kathryn A. Bannai
2012
“My case stands for the precedent that it can happen again. This is not only my case. This is not only a Japanese American case. This is an American case. Since the answer to the question, “Can it happen again?” is yes, it is vitally important during relative periods of calm to ensure that ‘bizarre solutions’ have less opportunity to occur again.”
- Gordon Hirabayashi
Articles
The Atlantic
The Ghost of Chae Chan Ping: A Chinese-exclusion case from the 1880s set a precedent that haunts the legal fight over Trump’s travel ban.
January 20, 2018
“There is no question that the ghost of the Chinese Exclusion cases haunts the travel ban case and the travel ban policy. The courts have to figure out if these century-old cases are still good law, and the country has to figure out if our discriminatory immigration policy dating back to 1790 is consistent with our current values.” ”
— Jack Chin, Edward L. Barrett, Jr. Chair of Law, University of California, Davis School of Law
Books
Justice Delayed: The Record of the Japanese American Internment Cases
By: Peter Irons
Details the case of Fred Koremsatsu, a Japanese American arrested in 1942 because of his Japanese ancestry, who in 1982 launched a legal battle to clear his record.
Justice at War: The Story of the Japanese American Internment Cases
By: Peter Irons
A study of the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II offers an inside look at government suppression of civil liberties in spite of lack of evidence concerning espionage, sabotage, or treason.
Race, Rights, and Reparation: Law and the Japanese American Internment, Second Edition
By: Eric Yamamoto, Margaret Chon, Carol Izumi, Jerry Kang, and Frank Wu
The first comprehensive course book that provides critical examination of the Asian-American legal experience, and the legal, social and ethical ramifications of the internment of Japanese- Americans during World War II and the successful reparations movement of the 1980s.
In the Shadow of Korematsu: Democratic Liberties and National Security
By: Eric Yamamoto
This book discusses the broad civil liberties challenges posed by these past-into-the-future linkages highlighting pressing questions about the significance of judicial independence for a constitutional democracy committed both to security and to the rule of law. What will happen when those profiled, detained, harassed, or discriminated against under the mantle of national security turn to the courts for legal protection? How will the U.S. courts respond to the need to protect both society and fundamental democratic values of our political process? Will courts fall passively in line with the elective branches, as they did in Korematsu v. United States, or serve as the guardian of the Bill of Rights, scrutinizing claims of "pressing public necessity" as justification for curtailing fundamental liberties?
Films
Unfinished Business: The Japanese American Internment Cases
Director: Steven Okazaki
Featuring: Gordon Hirabayashi, Fred Korematsu, and Minoru Yasui
In the spring of 1942, more than 110,000 American citizens of Japanese ancestry were uprooted from their homes and businesses and incarcerated in desolate relocation camps. Without hearings or trials, men, women and children were evacuated under Executive Order 9066--the Wartime Relocation Act. UNFINISHED BUSINESS is the story of three Japanese-American resistors--Gorden Hirabayashi, Fred Korematsu, and Minoru Yasui--who courageously defied the government order and refused to go, resulting in their conviction and imprisonment. The film interweaves their personal stories with moving archival footage of wartime anti-Japanese hysteria, the evacuation and incarceration, and life at the camps. It captures the men 40 years later, fighting to overturn their original convictions in the final round of the battle against the act which shattered the lives of two generations of Japanese-Americans. Produced and directed by Academy Award-winner Steven Okazaki (Days of Waiting), UNFINISHED BUSINESS is a gripping study of one of the most tragic--and significant--periods in American history.
Of Civil Wrongs and Rights: The Fred Korematsu Story
Director: Eric Paul Fournier
Featuring: Fred Korematsu
In 1942, Fred Korematsu was an average 23-year-old California native working as a shipyard welder. But when he refused to obey Executive Order 9006, which sent 120,000 Americans of Japanese ancestry into internment camps, he became something extraordinary--a civil rights champion. Award-winning director Eric Paul Fournier follows Korematsus story from the moment he first resisted confinement to the hard-won victory he finally achieved 39 years later, with the help of a new generation of Japanese-American activists seeking vindication and the assurance that such a terrible injustice would never occur again.