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Chapter 3: The Internment Cases
We now turn to the heart of the book: the actual experience of internment. Chapter 3 covers the legal dimensions of the internment
decision, with attention to the equal protection jurisprudence introduced in Part I. It also brings the national security law element into the analysis. Organized both chronologically and conceptually,
the early curfew cases form a stepping stone to the later exclusion case and finally to the case squarely confronting the legality of detention.
The “Overview: From Pearl Harbor to the Assembly Centers” provides a brief chronology of the congressional, presidential and military decisions leading
to the internment. It also introduces key players, including government officials responsible for these decisions as well as the ordinary individuals dramatically affected by them.
The chapter then takes up the four “internment cases” decided by the U.S. Supreme Court—Hirabayashi, Yasui, Korematsu, and Endo.
Each of these cases is preceded by a brief biography of the individuals who resisted the internment through legal means.
Chapter 4: The Internment Camps
Chapter 4 describes the experience that lies at the heart of the injustice
visited upon Americans of Japanese descent. The chapter raises fundamental questions of what it means to be American, to be Asian American, to be a
loyal citizen or alien in wartime and to disagree with one’s country at the same time one professes loyalty. It is a key bridge to Part III of the book, for one
cannot discuss whether reparations are appropriate without discussing the actual injury inflicted.
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