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"Loyalty ... is a Covenant" Archives Specialist at the National Archives - Rocky Mountain Region Published in Prologue: Quarterly of the National Archives Fall 1991, Vol. 23, No. 3 ON JUNE 26, 1944, Allied forces struggled to maintain a foothold in Europe against the occupying German troops, and a bloody campaign was being waged in the Pacific to reverse the tide of Japanese aggression. On that same day, Shigeru Fujii and sixty-two other American citizens, all residents at the Heart Mountain Relocation Center in Wyoming, began serving three-year sentences for refusing to report for physical examinations prior to being inducted into military service. Were they draft dodgers or civil rights martyrs? The answer would depend on whom you asked, and when you asked them. However, the facts of the cases are preserved for the judgment of history among the records of the U.S. District Courts now maintained by the National Archives - Rocky Mountain Region. The defendants in Wyoming Criminal Cases 4928 and 4931-4992 were all men between the ages of eighteen and thirty-three, and like thousands of other young Americans during the Second World War, they received notices from their local Selective Service boards informing them of their eligibility for induction into the armed forces of the United States. Unlike the vast majority of selectees across the nation, however, Shigeru Fujii and the other sixty-two men were drafted while already essentially prisoners of war in their own country. When they failed to report for their physicals, they embarked on a personal and legal struggle that lasted well past the end of the shooting war in Europe and the Pacific. The Heart Mountain camp in northern Wyoming was one of ten major Japanese-American relocation centers across the western and central United States. The Rocky Mountain area had three such camps: at Topaz, Utah; Granada, Colorado; and at Heart Mountain, which was named for the 8,123-foot mountain in whose shadow it was built. Situated halfway between Cody and Powell, Wyoming (towns of 1,800 and 1,600 people respectively in the early 1940s), on government land, it eventually became home to over 11,000 internees, or "colonists," as they sometimes referred to themselves.2 Like the other relocation camps, Heart Mountain was surrounded by barbed wire, dotted with guard towers, and patrolled by armed military personnel. Internees were given work passes to tend the crops and gardens bordering the camp and in some instances to seek employment during the day in nearby communities. Nevertheless, passage in and out of the grounds was highly restricted. The camps were built to hold the nearly 112,000 Japanese-Americans who were evacuated from California, Oregon, and Washington in the months following the attack on Pearl Harbor. On February 19, 1942, President Franklin Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, authorizing the U.S. Army to remove "any and all persons" from the portions of these states that had been declared "military' areas and to provide the transportation, food, shelter, and other accommodations necessary to purge the western coast of possible enemy sympathizers.3 Deemed potential espionage threats, or simply untrustworthy in the event of a Japanese invasion, entire populations of first- and second-generation (issei and nisei) families of Japanese descent were hastily removed from their businesses, farms, and homes, and herded into temporary "assembly centers," such as the famed Santa Anita racetrack in California. The assembly centers gave the internees their first taste of living under constant military scrutiny but did little to prepare them for the isolation they would face in communities such as Heart Mountain, which have come to be referred to as "America's Concentration Camps."4 The first contingent of internees arrived at Heart Mountain in August 1942 from the Pomona, California, assembly center. Selected for the services that they were expected to render for their ensuing campmates, the 292 arrivals included doctors, nurses, cooks, and skilled construction workers.5 The camp population increased steadily throughout 1942, with up to six hundred people arriving in a single day. By the time the camp reached its peak, it was the third largest community in the state of Wyoming. The camp contained over eighty buildings, and internees were housed in 120-by-20-foot tar paper barracks that did little to alleviate the extremes in weather. Up to six families shared a single barrack, and showers, sinks, and latrine facilities were in separate buildings and shared by many residents at the same time. The fact that the camp was built on Bureau of Reclamation land that was part of the Shoshone Irrigation Project was not by accident. Internees who volunteered to work were paid seven to twelve cents an hour by the War Relocation Authority (WRA), the agency responsible for relocating and housing the evacuees. In addition to this, internees were granted "furloughs" to work in the local beet fields when war manpower shortages left many harvests in danger of rotting in the fields during the fall of 1943.6 Unrest at Heart Mountain was present almost from the very beginning. When the first evacuees arrived, the barbed wire fences had not yet been erected, and their construction caused understandable dismay to the internees. Morale suffered further when disputes arose over the discrepancies in wages between residents and the higher paid nonresident workers who were employed in construction and hospital positions. Residents organized and made their complaints known to camp administrators. Some organizations, such as the Heart Mountain branch of the "Fair Play Committee,"7 took fellow residents to task for submitting too easily to administration policies. This organized resistance met with success when demands to replace the head of the internal security police were accepted following a strike by nisei security personnel. But after other strikes, particularly one that threatened the camp coal supply, instigators were transferred to other relocation centers to stem further trouble. Against this backdrop of forced relocation and confinement, and suspicions of being security threats to their fellow citizens, nisei internees were surprised to read in January 1943 an announcement by the WRA that it would seek volunteers from among camp populations to serve in the army. Before Pearl Harbor, nisei were found in all levels of the U.S. military, but following the outbreak of war, those who attempted to enlist were turned away, and those already serving were transferred to noncombat posts. But now soldiers were needed, and the army set quotas for the number of volunteers it sought from the various relocation camps. Despite the urging of such groups as the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL) that nisei use the opportunity to prove their loyalty, and much to the embarrassment of the WRA, less than half of the quotas were met. In fact, the call for volunteers caused an increase in applications from camp members to expatriate or repatriate (in the case of issei who wanted to remove their service-age children from the country) to Japan. Then came the draft. During the massive relocation effort, nisei of military service age were classified by the Selective Service as "4C," the designation for those of alien or dual citizenship. Suddenly many of those same men were upgraded to "1A" --eligible for service -- and ordered to report to their local Selective Service board for pre-induction examinations. Many went dutifully, answering the nation's call in the hope that it would prove unequivocally their loyalty to the United States. Others wished to be allowed to report to their original Selective Service boards on the West Coast and fight alongside friends and neighbors. But when the Heart Mountain chapter of the Fair Play Committee and sixty-three selectees decided to test the constitutionality of the internee draft program, the stage was set for U.S. v. Fujii.. During March and April 1944, the defendants systematically ignored the order to report to the Powell Selective Service board. They were in turn arrested by Deputy U.S. Marshal George Smith. Because of the large number of cells needed, he placed them in jails as far away as Casper while they awaited trial. On May 15, at 10:00 A.M., the defendants, their lawyers, and District Attorney Carl Sackett appeared in district court in Cheyenne before Judge T. Blake Kennedy. Abruptly denying the defense's plea to drop the charges, Kennedy set a trial date for the following month. Under advice from attorneys Samuel D. Menin of Denver, Colorado, and Clyde M. Watts of Cheyenne, each of the defendants pleaded not guilty and agreed to waive his right to a jury trial and to allow Judge Kennedy to make his ruling binding for all sixty-three men. Trial was set for June 12, and in what was to become Wyoming's largest mass trial, the defendants were returned to their cells with bond set at $1,500 each. Court documents filed in the original cases of the sixty-three defendants provide interesting insights into the events that followed. The defendants were tried as a group, with a single verdict being binding for all. Shigeru Fujii, by virtue of the fact that his name appeared first alphabetically, was chosen as the first case number. Fujii had originally registered with his draft board in Palo Alto, California, and had been designated "4C." Like the others, he had later been changed to "1A" and told to report for induction. It appears from the documents that the defendants did not have the court's sympathy from the very beginning. In the judge's memorandum, Kennedy downplayed the isolated and restrictive conditions in the relocation camps, which of course had been the basis for the discontent of the draft objectors. In Kennedy's opinion, the evacuees had been: removed to various relocation centers and away from the danger zones presumed to be existing along the west coast. . . . Here the defendants and others of their class were housed and fed in a satisfactory manner and were permitted to live in families and enjoy the ordinary family relations.8 However, he did admit that: A portion of the Center was surrounded by barbed wire fences and various entrances and exits were provided at which guards were stationed. No one was permitted to enter or leave the Center, whether of Japanese ancestry or otherwise, without receiving a permit from the Director.9 Kennedy cited a recent ruling by the Supreme Court, Hirabayshi v. U.S. (320 U.S. 81), which upheld the constitutionality of curfew laws based on the exigencies of war, and in seeming contradiction to the defendants' status as "1A," he noted that the Japanese government recognizes dual citizenship and maintains that children of Japanese Nationals are citizens of the Japanese Empire whatever may be their place of birth [and] that there might be logic in the conclusions that in a case of war these would hold their attachment to Japan.10 Further on in his memorandum he states: It has been seen that the discrimination exercised by the Government on account of their Japanese ancestry was legitimate, justified and legal as being within the Power of Congress and the President in the war emergency . The Courts have repeatedly asserted that the orders of the Boards of Selective Service have the substance of Congressional Acts and must be obeyed. It is evident that what they asserted in the matter of the clarification of their citizenship was in fact accomplished by the effect of the order which they disobeyed. . . . When, therefore, they were placed in 1-A and ordered to report for pre-induction physical examination, their pure American citizenship was established beyond question.11 Kennedy then re-stated what many nisei had urged their brethren to do when the question of military service for internees first surfaced: If they are truly loyal American citizens they should . . . embrace the opportunity to discharge the duties of citizens by offering themselves in the cause of our National defense.12 In response, the defendants argued that if they were indeed loyal citizens they should not have been confined to relocation camps in the first place. The statement of Takeshi Hori (Case No. 4934) given at the time of his arrest spoke eloquently for all sixty-three men: I feel that I want something to fight for when and if I enter the Army; I haven't the full rights of a citizen under the constitution; I have seen and felt many acts of discrimination against myself and other Japanese-Americans; I believe that the Government should clarify my citizenship status and restore full citizenship rights. . . . I am not evading the draft and the call to the Army. I consider myself loyal to the United States and when my full rights are restored I am willing to go into the Army.13 Another defendant, Yoshito Kuromiya (Case No.4956) said that by not protesting his induction I would be just as responsible as those who made the decision. . . . A citizen who will accept bad government without protest is not a good citizen.14 The support of the Japanese-American community for the defendants appeared to be divided. Among the exhibits filed in court were copies of the Rocky Shimpo, a newspaper published in both Japanese and English that billed itself as the "Largest Circulated Nisei Vernacular in Continental U.S.A." Through the editorials of English section editor James Omura, regional Japanese Americans were kept apprised of the tension at Heart Mountain and the subsequent trial in Cheyenne. As can be seen from the following excerpt from an editorial dated April 7, 1944, Omura voiced strong support for the sixty-three defendants: In our mind, we hold serious doubt that the Army can legally subject to military obligations citizens whose constitutional guarantees are under technical suspension and denial in the same manner as those whose rights are recognized and fully granted. . . . We think we have been most fair in our presentation. We are not one bit worried about sedition, for we see no seditious implication in our editorial demand for full restoration of constitutional rights as a prelude to military service.15 Other Japanese-American supporters of the defendants included Kiyoshi Okamoto, chairman of the local Fair Play Committee. In a letter sent to the Shimpo, Okamoto stated: Loyalty towards a country or a nation is a matter of sentiment. It is nurtured from a knowledge of justice received. It is a covenant of faith between a party of the People on the one hand and a Party of the Government on the other. We believe the issue forced upon us is sufficiently vital as to warrant a decided attitude . . . not only for our benefit but, as a safeguard to our hitherto free and democratic form of government.16 In contrast to this support the Japanese American Citizens League took a stance in opposition to the sixty-three defendants. Okamoto, in a letter dated March 10, 1944, charged that the JACL and others are asleep to the fact that Democracy is threatened within the heart of the very country where democracy, freedom, and justice are supposed to exist. Either this or they must be playing the role of the goats that are used in the slaughterhouses.17 It is of interest that both James Omura and Kiyoshi Okamoto were later indicted for "aiding and abetting persons to evade registration or service" and "conspiracy."18 Tried in October 1944, Okamoto was found guilty and sentenced to four years in prison. James Omura was acquitted. Their district court cases are also preserved in the National Archives Rocky Mountain Region. Despite the pleas of individuals like Omura and organizations like the Fair Play Committee, Judge Kennedy ruled on June 26 that Shigeru Fujii and the other sixty-two defendants were guilty of violating Section 311, Title 50, U.S.C.A., Selective Training and Service Act of 1940. A notice of appeal was filed on June 29, but Fujii and the rest began serving their sentences on July 1.19 In October 1944, while incarcerated at McNeil Island Federal Penitentiary in Washington State and at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas, the men received notice that their appeal was denied, and the original verdicts of guilty were upheld.20 An attempt to file a writ of certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court in order to force a review of the case failed, as shown in the records of their appeal which are also held by the Rocky Mountain regional archives. The sixty-three men remained in prison until receiving conditional releases on an individual basis in 1946. In December 1947 they were officially pardoned by President Harry Truman, and their full citizenship rights were formally restored. Only recently has the national conscience forced officials to make amends to thousands of Japanese Americans who lost their homes, businesses, and freedom during the period of relocation. In a February 1983 report to Congress, the Commission on Wartime Relocation condemned the "grave injustice ..conceived in haste and executed in an atmosphere of fear and anger at Japan."21 In August 1988, President Ronald Reagan signed Public Law 100-383, which granted financial reparations and an official apology to survivors of the camps. Jack Tono (Case No.4985), now a resident of Chicago, is an occasional visitor to the National Archives-Rocky Mountain Region. He makes use of the records of his case and those of his sixty-two former co-defendants in his work writing and lecturing about the events at Heart Mountain and Cheyenne. The regional archives holdings enable him to sift through the lower and appeal court cases and document these pivotal events of his youth. Heart Mountain is one of many diverse stories of the "home front" during World War II that can be researched using records held by the regional archives system. Records of District Courts of the United States (Record Group 21) contain original indictments and initial proceedings for cases involving refusal to report for induction, changing residences to avoid the reaches of the local draft boards, and fraudulently posing as a member of the military, among many others. Those of the U.S. Court of Appeals (Record Group 276) contain transcripts and final outcomes of cases that were reviewed following verdicts by the lower courts. In addition to court cases, information regarding relocation camps and other wartime activities can he found in the records of the Bureau of Reclamation (Record Group 115), including postwar use of the land and buildings that made up places like Heart Mountain. By using these original sources found at the National Archives regions, the researcher can shed light on many aspects of the domestic scene during the great struggle that was the Second World War and evolve a deeper understanding of the American psyche during wartime. reprinted with permission HOME | DOCUMENTS | STUDY CENTER | NEWS | LINKS | ABOUT US | E-MAIL Updated: June 28, 2000 |