Update:
Wednesday, January 30, 2008 Amerasia Journal has published a special "wartime
edition" that refocuses attention on the Heart Mountain Fair
Play Committee, through the lens of the ongoing case involving
Lt. Ehren Watada. The issue is titled "World,
War, Watada," and features letters from Heart Mountain
resister Mits Koshiyama and supporter Paul Tsuneishi, both of whom
are featured
in our film. According to the UCLA
news release:
Koshiyama,
a Heart Mountain World War II draft resister, ends his personal
letter to Lt. Ehren Watada, as follows: "Do what your conscience
tells you what to do. We got punished by a prejudiced court but
in the end, we prevailed."
Writer
Frank Chin contributes "A Call to Resist," his take on
Watada and the World II resisters, which also appears
on his blog. Chin asks:
Lt. Ehren Watada,
a Hawaiian Japanese Chinese American, exercises the rights the
resisters defended, and brings the questions the Nisei heard
tossed about in the camp war years, back to the present day.
Will Japanese Americans react any differently than they did on
their 9/11, Dec. 7, 1941?
There's
also an interview with fimmaker Curtis Choy and the making of "Watada,
Resister," which is linked below. Thanks to editor Russell
C. Leong for referencing our film in his introductory editorial, "Is
Resistance Your Real Name?," and bringing some of you to this
site.
Thanks
for visiting if you've come here after viewing "Watada, Resister" on YouTube or MySpace,
or followed the link from Amerasia Journal. Watch the
video below to see the first part of what's billed as "The
historic meeting of young Lt. Ehren Watada, who refused to deploy
to Iraq, and WW2 resisters."
It was
shot in Seattle and edited by filmmaker Curtis Choy on Jan. 27 as
a way of connecting Lt. Watada with the Nisei draft resisters who
he describes as an "inspiration" and who in this video
express their pride in him and their support for Watada's own principled
stand. You will see and hear Heart Mountain resistance leader Frank
Emi, draft resister Yosh Kuromiya, and their friend Paul Tsuneishi.
If you look carefully you can see our poster for Conscience and
the Constitution in Frank Emi's living room behind Yosh.
Click on the second screen to see Part 2 of their conversation. Listen
in particular to Watada's measured and thoughtful challenge to all Americans
to decide where they stand on the war, and one's moral obligation to
act if you do have a stand. He emerges in the video as a remarkable young
man. Give it a listen.
As Yosh
says in his prepared statement, the judge in his case in 1944 ruled
that the 63 young Heart Mountain boys could not raise the unconstitutionality
of mass incarceration as a defense in their trial for draft resistance.
The jury could only rule on whether or not they failed to report
for induction, and convicted the lot.
In 2007,
although the cases are different, a military judge at Fort Lewis
south of Seattle ruled in January that Army 1st Lt. Ehren Watada
could not raise the legality of the war in Iraq as a defense for
his refusal to deploy there. The Seattle
Times article has links to court documents in Watada's court-martial
trial. See also the Seattle
P-I.
The
case of Watada, who has refused
deployment to Iraq in principled protest against what he believes
is an illegal war of occupation, has led many to compare his stand
to that of the WW2 Nisei draft resisters. He himself made the link
in his comments to Ben Hamamoto of the Nichi
Bei Times:
As a Japanese
American, Watada sees historical parallels between himself and
those who resisted the World War II incarceration. “(The
resisters) said ‘we’re Japanese American’ and
we are part of this country no matter what the president says.
They faced ostracization and imprisonment, but it was shown many
years later that they were correct… What I’m doing
is no different.” Read
more.
The
parallel is not precise. The Heart Mountain resisters did not object
to fighting in WW2, only to the unconstitutionality of the forced
incarceration of themselves and their families. But as I talked
last year with John Iwasaki when he called from the Seattle
Post-Intelligencer, it hit me that the resisters and Lt. Watada
do share this one similarity: both put themselves on the line to
object to actions by their government. Iwasaki was localizing a
wire story, "Japanese
Americans criticize Watada," reporting a
joint statement from 9 Japanese American veterans groups to
publicly denounce Watada for disrespecting "a legacy of military
service by Japanese American soldiers dating back to World War
II."
"No Japanese
Americans did anything like that, and that is why Japanese Americans
are so upset," (Robert) Wada said, (a charter president
of the Japanese American Korean War Veterans). "He is doing
something that has never been done by Japanese Americans."
That's not
exactly the case, said Seattle resident Frank Abe. He produced "Conscience
and the Constitution," a documentary about Japanese Americans
who resisted the World War II draft because they and their families
were held in internment camps for years after Japan attacked
Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.
Wada is "overlooking
the fact that 315 Japanese Americans in World War II resisted
the draft as a means of protesting the forced incarceration of
their families," Abe said Wednesday. Read
more.
Our
film continues to provide different points of entry and different
perspectives for audiences across the country, including university
students in Minnesota, a humanities program in a town north of
Denver, a Chicana/o cross-cultural and multi-disciplinary art organization
in San Diego, and the Seattle
City Council screened it during a brown bag luncheon, as a
supplement to their reading of Julie Otuska's fine novel, When
The Emperor Was Divine:
"There
were audible gasps during the showing --and many sat in silence
long after its completion. I'm so impressed with that work, Frank.
It's a great piece that will endlessly inform and educate. It
impressively communicates that there were heros fighting for
freedoms on our own soil when the nation was at war ostensibly
to defend freedom! I believe the ultimate outcome of their struggle
was to reveal that the fight for justice against oppression will
always be necessary. Your piece effectively shows the almost
overwhelming challenge these gentle people bravely faced when
they stepped forward with commitment to ethically respond to
their oppression with honesty. It's a simple story really, but
powerful. Thanks, so much Frank. I hope you know what you've
contributed. It's a great piece of work. Much admiration."
-- Jackie O'Ryan, Communications Specialist, The Seattle City Council
"I
am writing to request permission to screen Conscience and
the Constitution at the non-profit artspace Voz
Alta as part of a series I am curating there called Movies
That Matter … Because San Diego is a jumping off point
for the Marines and also the site of a growing resistance movement
(see the case of Pable Paredes, Ali Wassaf Hassoun, the Ya No
project, Guerreroazteca project), I feel that Conscience
and the Constitution has a very important message for people
here. In addition, as a subtext to the video, as you know, there
is a distinct parallel between the climate surrounding Japanese-Americans
and Japanese residents during WWII and that facing Middle Eastern
Americans today, and with San Diego as the location of a large
Middle Eastern population, as well as a decidedly red slice of
California, it would behoove us to think carefully abut what
national paranoia and political manipulation are capable of … I
am curating this series in an effort to get people to think about
issues of civil liberty, race, media representation, and national
conscience."
-- Rebecca Romani, Arabs Anonymous/No Hay Moros
"I
am the co-advisor for a student organization called Asian Students
in Action at St. Cloud State University. They are organizing
a week-long on-campus event in April called Social Activism in
Asian America. As part of the event, I wanted to show your film
on April 21 for a campus wide audience... I thought your film
was important in discussing not only the issue of what constitutes
an American and what it means to be loyal, but also the difficulties
of social activism especially when it creates a division within
the community. Moreover, your film itself is a perfect example
of social activism – the use of documentaries to educate
people."
-- Dr. Kyoko Kishimoto, Assistant Professor, Department of Ethnic Studies
"Just
wanted to let you know that Conscience and the Constitution is
a unit of a seven part series that the Estes
Park Public Library Foundation will be presenting this summer.
The Foundation has a We the People Grant from the Colorado Endowment
for the Humanities that is titled "Pivotal Events in American
Constitutional Hisotry: Their Impact on We the People." The
video will be presented on July 30th"
-- Catherine K. Speer, Estes Park Public Library Foundation
The
Seattle Times last year published a capsule
review of our film, in advance of our screening at the Seattle
Public Library as part of the "Seattle Reads" program
for Julie Otsuka's 2002 novel, When
the Emperor Was Divine. You can read the full article here but
this is book reviewer Michael Upchurch's take on our film:
First up is
Frank Abe's Conscience and the Constitution (2000),
about a group of draft-age internees who refused to volunteer
for military service or, later, to be drafted, until their and
their families' civil rights were restored. Abe, a former senior
reporter for KIRO Newsradio and KIRO-TV, does a fine job of tracing
how this draft-resistance arose, and how it became such a bitterly
divisive issue within the Japanese-American community. The Japanese
American Citizens League — which adapted more of a "my
country right or wrong" attitude to internment and military
service — was particularly harsh in its judgment of the
draft resisters.
It would be
more than 50 years before any reconciliation between the JACL
and the draft resisters was effected. The eyewitnesses in this
hourlong film are eloquent, wry and level-headed as they make
their case about the constitutional principles at stake. Abe
has done an admirable job of illuminating the issues behind the
divisiveness.
My review of
Frank Chin's book on the resistance, Born in the USA, is
now published in the special "A Tribute to Miné Okubo" issue
of Amerasia Journal, Volume 30:2, 2004. It is available
for $13 per issue plus tax and $4 handling from: UCLA Asian American
Studies Center Press, 3230 Campbell Hall, Box 951546, Los Angeles,
CA 90095-1546. For more information, call (310) 825-2968, e-mail aascpress@aasc.ucla.edu or
visit the center's Web
site. However, by special permission, you can also read it
here:
... Despite
its classification, this is not a dispassionate history without
an agenda. The author was unable to convince his publisher to
market the book as a “documentary novel” in the Dos
Passos mode. It does him no disservice to say that Frank Chin
despises JACL for betraying the Nisei Dream as much as he despises
Kingston, Tan, and Hwang for passing off faked Chinese folktales
as real. With his powers as a novelist, Chin shapes his material
to fit a single vision, with JACL as antagonist, so readers should
be aware of pieces that get left on the cutting room floor .... Read
the entire review....
Chin dismisses
the danger of Malkin's new book, In Defense of Internment,
and the traction it has gained among Fox News Channel devotees
and historical revisionists eager for a means to inflame racial
and cultural fears. For a full-bodied critique of the Malkin
book, see Professor Eric Muller's 18-post
blog revealing the flaws in her work. Read
the recent Seattle Times, "Debate
lingers over internment of Japanese-Americans," to see
how the ghost of Lillian Baker lives on in Malkin, her sleek
new clone, in the Bainbridge school system. Walt and Millie Woodward
would be ashamed.
See
our full page devoted to the JACL
apology to the Heart Mountain resistersand watch
a 70-second video clip of Heart Mountain resistance leader Frank
Emi's remarks on May 11, 2002. Even as the Japanese American
Citizens League was apologizing to Emi and others for its suppression
of wartime resistance, he was challenging the group to go further
and address the question of its wartime collaboration with incarceration [requires
free Quicktime Player].
For
homework help, please see our PBS Online site at www.pbs.org/conscience for
online documents and an online Classroom Guide, and send a comment,
compliment or complaint via the PBS Talkback page.
To preview the tape, see a QuickTime
Preview or see two short video clips from our film now online
in our STUDY CENTER. Teachers can download
our newly-updated Classroom Guide as a 328
KB Word document.
PBS
SYNOPSIS: CONSCIENCE AND THE CONSTITUTION: This
award-winning and controversial documentary reveals the untold
story of the largest organized resistance to the wartime incarceration
of Japanese Americans, and the suppression of that resistance
by Japanese-American leaders. (CC, Stereo, one hour)
In World
War II a handful of young Americans refused to be drafted from
the American concentration camp at Heart Mountain, Wyoming. Organized
under the banner of the Fair Play Committee, they were ready to
fight for their country, but not before the government restored
their rights as U.S. citizens and released their families from
camp.
It was
the largest organized resistance to incarceration, leading to the
largest trial for draft resistance in U.S. history. The government
prosecuted them as criminals; Japanese American leaders and veterans
ostracized them as traitors. The resisters served two years in
prison, and for the next 50 were written out of the official history
of Japanese America. Only recently have we rediscovered the resisters
and restored them to the community. Through their eyes we delve
into the heart of the Japanese American conscience and a public
debate that is still alive today.
AWARDS:
BEST FEATURE FILM: VC FilmFest 2000, Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film & Video
Festival
BEST DOCUMENTARY: San Luis Obispo International Film Festival
BEST DOCUMENTARY: New York International Independent Film & Video
Festival
BEST OF FESTIVAL: Vermont International Film Festival (War and Peace
category)
BEST MUSIC SCORE: Emerald City Awards, Seattle
NATIONAL JOURNALISM AWARD: Asian American Journalists Association
AMERICAN SCENE AWARD: American Federation of Television and Radio Artists
DARUMA CIVIL RIGHTS AWARD: Sacramento Asian American community
"Conscience
and the Constitution" is produced by Frank Abe in association
with the Independent Television
Service, with funding provided by the Corporation for Public
Broadcasting and the Civil
Liberties Public Education Fund, created by Congress to sponsor
research on the wartime incarceration of Japanese Americans.
Additional funding is provided by the Motoda Foundation of Seattle,
the Anheuser-Busch Companies,
Brooks and Sumi Iwakiri, and 45 individual Friends of the Fair
Play Committee.
This
Web site and the companion PBS
Online site are made possible by a grant from the California
Civil Liberties Public Education Program, created by the
California State Legislature and administered by the California
State Library. Additional support provided by Michi and Walter
Weglyn.
See
our full page devoted to the 
For
homework help, please see our PBS Online site at 
