Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff production of iHeart Radio. Hey brain Stuff,
Speaker 1: Lauren vog Obam here. It should be an unthinkable scenario,
Speaker 1: but it's happened time and time again. People born in
Speaker 1: the United States are treated as national security threats because
Speaker 1: of their families countries of origin. In late for example,
Speaker 1: the Washington Post reported on the story of Peter Sewan Brown,
Speaker 1: Philadelphia born citizen who says US Immigration and Customs Enforcement
Speaker 1: or ICE, held him for deportation to Jamaica. The same
Speaker 1: article cited Syracuse University study the determined ICE had placed
Speaker 1: detainers on eight hundred and thirty four U S citizens
Speaker 1: over just a four year period. And while ICE related
Speaker 1: incidents have made lots of headlines in our post nine
Speaker 1: eleven society, the issue has occurred throughout our country's history.
Speaker 1: Case in point the incarceration of Mizzier Endo born in Sacramento, California,
Speaker 1: in Endo was one of four children born to her
Speaker 1: parents who were Japanese immigrants. In her early twenties, Endo
Speaker 1: worked as secretary for the state's Department of Employment, but
Speaker 1: life as Japanese Americans knew it changed dramatically. On December
Speaker 1: seventh of nineteen forty one, the day Japan attacked Pearl Harbor.
Speaker 1: Within a few months, the U S had dismissed all
Speaker 1: Japanese American state employees, including Endo. Of the hundreds of
Speaker 1: employees affected, sixty three banded together to challenge the firings.
Speaker 1: Backed by the Japanese American Citizens League, Endo and her
Speaker 1: peers hired attorney James C. Purcell to defend their rights.
Speaker 1: But fighting against the prevailing authoritative rule wasn't easy, and
Speaker 1: as Purcell took on the case, circumstances continued to worsen
Speaker 1: for Japanese Americans. At the order of President Franklin D. Roosevelt,
Speaker 1: more than a hundred and twenty thousand Japanese Americans were
Speaker 1: forcibly relocated and incarcerated. Along with her family, Endo was
Speaker 1: sent first to the Sacramento Assembly Center and then to
Speaker 1: the Tulei Lake, California Internment Camp. We spoke with the
Speaker 1: University of California Berkeley School of Law professor Amanda L. Tyler.
Speaker 1: She's written extensively about Purcell and Endo, both in her
Speaker 1: book Happiest Corpus in Wartime From the Tower of London
Speaker 1: to Guantanamo Bay and in the sixteen op ed for
Speaker 1: the Sacramento b titled Unsung World War Two Hero Deserves
Speaker 1: the Medal of Freedom. Tyler said, ms Endo was summarily
Speaker 1: fired from her job as a California State employee, forced
Speaker 1: to leave her home, sent two different internment camps, eventually
Speaker 1: separated from her parents, and all the while her brother
Speaker 1: was serving in the United States military. Roosevelt's extreme measure
Speaker 1: was Executive Order nine zero six six, a World War
Speaker 1: Two policy that prescribed quote regulations for the conduct and
Speaker 1: control of alien enemies. As Purcell built a case against
Speaker 1: the government's actions, he began searching for a plaintiff to
Speaker 1: challenge the incarceration through a habeas corpus petition dating back
Speaker 1: to twelve fifteen. Abas corpus as a court order that
Speaker 1: empowers individuals and or those representing them to dispute the
Speaker 1: legality of their imprisonment. Purcell decided Endo was an ideal candidate,
Speaker 1: and not only was she a Methodist citizen with a
Speaker 1: brother in the U. S. Army, but should never even
Speaker 1: been to Japan. While she initially hesitated to act as plaintiff,
Speaker 1: Endo eventually agreed and Priscell filed the petition on July
Speaker 1: twelfth in San Francisco Federal District Court. Tyler explained, during
Speaker 1: the course of her case, the government realized that it
Speaker 1: posed a serious challenge to all the policies directed at
Speaker 1: persons of Japanese ancestry that the military instituted under the
Speaker 1: auspices of Executive Order nine zero six six. So the
Speaker 1: government offered her release in order to make her case
Speaker 1: effectively go away. She resisted, in her later words, because
Speaker 1: quote the fact that I wanted to prove that we
Speaker 1: of Japanese ancestry were not guilty of any crime and
Speaker 1: that we were loyal American citizens kept me from abandoning
Speaker 1: the suit. Endo remained in confinement from as her case progressed.
Speaker 1: When it eventually reached the Supreme Court in April of
Speaker 1: nineteen forty four, the court unanimously ruled in favor of Endo,
Speaker 1: stating that quote, the government cannot detain a citizen without
Speaker 1: charge when the government itself concedes she is loyal to
Speaker 1: the United States. While Endo's on wavering commitment to the
Speaker 1: larger cause was certainly central to the eventual outcome, Tyler
Speaker 1: credits Percell for his tireless efforts quote he recognized the
Speaker 1: serious constitutional problems with what the government was doing, and
Speaker 1: he felt compelled to use his skills to give a
Speaker 1: voice to a community that was unfairly targeted and unconstitutionally
Speaker 1: treated during the war. I've heard many survivors of the
Speaker 1: camps refer to Mr Purcell as the man who set
Speaker 1: us free. According to Tyler, the case is left more
Speaker 1: of a cultural legacy than a legal one. She said,
Speaker 1: Endo's case is not so significant for the precedent it's
Speaker 1: set because it was decided very narrowly on non constitutional grounds,
Speaker 1: but it is instead enormously significant. Were being the driving
Speaker 1: force behind the closing of the Japanese American internment camps.
Speaker 1: In the lead up to the decision coming down, President
Speaker 1: Roosevelt had resisted pressure from advisors to close the camps
Speaker 1: after the election, and upon purportedly being tipped off that
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court was going to decide in favor of
Speaker 1: and does claim that she could not be detained in
Speaker 1: the camps as a conceitedly loyal citizen, the administration changed
Speaker 1: course and proclaimed that it would begin closing the camps.
Speaker 1: The day after making that announcement, the Supreme Court handed
Speaker 1: down its decision, and there are larger effects of the
Speaker 1: case that still influence legal proceedings today. Tyler referred to
Speaker 1: the ongoing argument over whether the judiciary branch of government
Speaker 1: of the Supreme Court and other federal courts should yield
Speaker 1: all decisions about national security to the executive branch the president,
Speaker 1: vice president, and cabinet. She said, the larger relevance of
Speaker 1: all the Japanese American cases that went before the Supreme
Speaker 1: Court during World War Two, to my mind, is that
Speaker 1: they show how dangerous deference to the executive in wartime
Speaker 1: can be USA today, op ed. Tyler referred to Japanese
Speaker 1: American internment as a cautionary tale for President Trump's proposed
Speaker 1: travel ban. Quote. This connects to modern day because it
Speaker 1: means that the Court should be hesitant to defer to
Speaker 1: the executive with respect the assertations about the needs of
Speaker 1: national security as a blanket matter. To underscore her point,
Speaker 1: Tyler refers to the Supreme Court's decision last year to
Speaker 1: overturn the nineteen forty four ruling in the case of
Speaker 1: Kurimatsu versus the United States, in which American citizen Fred
Speaker 1: Karmatsu refused to leave the West Coast following President Roosevelt's
Speaker 1: executive order and was subsequently convicted of disobeying a military order.
Speaker 1: While the ruling was technically overruled in dicta A, meaning
Speaker 1: it may hold more symbolic value than actuabal impact, Tyler
Speaker 1: says it's still a meaningful move. She said, had the
Speaker 1: court in Karnamatsu, among other cases, actually asked to see
Speaker 1: a factual basis supporting the need for the policies that
Speaker 1: were put in place by the military under Executive Order
Speaker 1: nine zero six six, the government could not have provided
Speaker 1: any evidence this fact and the court's recent overruling of Kamatsu,
Speaker 1: albeit NDICTA, should give pause to any court inclined to
Speaker 1: take the executive at its word when individual rights are
Speaker 1: at stake. While the US continues to face complex issues
Speaker 1: around national security, immigration, citizenship, and ingrained institutional prejudices, many
Speaker 1: continue to look to Endo and Purcell as trailblazers Following
Speaker 1: the landmark case. Purcell went on to work on a
Speaker 1: number of Japanese immigration lawsuits and practiced law into his eighties,
Speaker 1: and although Endo kept a low profile for the remainder
Speaker 1: of her life, apparently her own daughter didn't know about
Speaker 1: Endo's historic impact until she was in her twenties. She
Speaker 1: continues to be an important figure in the continued fight
Speaker 1: for fair and equal rights. Today's episode was written by
Speaker 1: Michel Konstantinovski and produced by Tyler Clong. For more in
Speaker 1: this and lots of other topics, is it how stuff
Speaker 1: works dot com. Brain Stuff is production of I Heart
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