Justice at War: The Story of the Japanese-American Internment Cases [Paperback]

Peter Irons (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 10, 1993

Justice at War irrevocably alters the reader's perception of one of the most disturbing events in U.S. history--the internment during World War II of American citizens of Japanese descent. Peter Irons' exhaustive research has uncovered a government campaign of suppression, alteration, and destruction of crucial evidence that could have persuaded the Supreme Court to strike down the internment order. Irons documents the debates that took place before the internment order and the legal response during and after the internment.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Justice at War is a major contribution to the history of governmental oppression and demonstrates how good men sometimes do evil deeds." -- Roger Daniels, American Historical Review

"Justice at War throws welcome light upon a dark chapter in our history." -- Henry Mayer, New York Newsday

"Not only has [Irons'] brilliant job of historical research set right one of the great miscarriages of American justice but in the process he has provided us with a superbly written and spellbinding book." -- Orville Schell, New York Times Book Review

"Ought to be required reading in law schools. . . . It's a must, too, for anyone interested in the nature of justice, and in whether reparations can ever redress the great wrong done to Japanese Americans some 40 years ago." -- Michael Stern, Los Angeles Times Book Review

"The significance of this book goes beyond Japanese Americans. The author raises fundamental questions regarding the failure of leadership at the highest level of government and of the legal system to protect the constitutional rights of a racial minority. . . . All Americans should read this book." -- Yuji Ichioka, Journal of American History

"This is a portrait of justice at the breaking point. . . . Irons's exhaustive account of the Supreme Court's deliberations will be of interest primarily to legal scholars. But his broader findings (on the racism of public officials and the government's suppression of evidence (make his book relevant reading for anyone concerned with civil liberties." -- Jim Miller, Newsweek

About the Author

Peter Irons is Professor of Political Science and Director of the Earl Warren Bill of Rights Project at the University of California, San Diego, and the author of The Courage of Their Convictions: Sixteen Americans Who Fought Their Way to the Supreme Court (1988).

Product Details

• Paperback: 415 pages
• Publisher: University of California Press (June 10, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0520083121
• ISBN-13: 978-0520083127
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.9 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #597,509 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Little Known but Important Historical Episode in U.S. History, March 30, 2006

By 

James E. Egolf "James E. Egolf, MA" (Florida) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Justice at War: The Story of the Japanese-American Internment Cases (Paperback)

Peter Irons' book titled JUSTICE AT WAR is an important book regarding the forced internment of Americans of Japanese Ancestry (AJAs)during World War II. His book is an important work as Irons shows the "inner workings" of the "Jusitce Department" and the U.S. Supreme Court. Irons investigation of of these events demonstrates just unfair and unjust the "legal" system can when dealing with innocent victims whose only crime was their ancestry.

Irons does a good job in exposing the "evidence" to sustain Executive Order 9066 which Pres. Roosevelt issue early in 1942 to place AJA's in concentration camps stretching from California to Arkansas. When this order was challenged in court, government witnesses were so stupid that they initially used race as a legal reason for this unjust action. However, they soon had to change their lying as race is not a legal consideration in arrest and detention.

One example of such government witness lying included DeWitt who claimed that the concentration camps were necessary as there must have been shore to ship signalling on the Pacific Coast soon after the Pearl Harbor attack. However, the FCC lads undermined this lying by stating that no such radio or visual signals were ever given. Readers should note that J. Edgar Hoover, the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, was clear that the AJA's were not any threat to the United States and were remarkably loyal to the U.S.

A facinating if disturbing section of this book involves the Supreme Court Justices some of whom refuted the judicial canon of ethics regarding civil liberties, rules of due process, and rules of evidence. The inscription of one of the chapters was that the Supreme Court blew up. One should note that Supreme Court Justice, Robert Jackson, ruled against the placing of AJAs in concentration camps, and this was a well reasoned articulate opinion which compares to his opinion in the Supreme Court Case titled THE WEST VIRGINIA STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION VS. BARNETTE (1943). Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black who became something of a libertarian upheld Excutive Order 9066. While this reviewer disagrees with Black's decision, Justice Black at least had the honesty to admit that he could not tell one Japanese from another. While this was not a good response, this was better than the hyocrisy shown by others who avoided the obvious racism in these cases.

One reviewer correctly commented that Peter Irons involved himself too much in this book. This reviewer thinks this may have been a plus in this book. While one may argue that Irons may have reduced his "objectivity," sometimes a passionate presentation can embellish the book.

A few minor criticisms of this book are in order. For example, Peter Irons could have exploited the "Munson Report" which was issued on November 7, 1941. This report was based on years of U.S. Government spying on AJAs by federal agenceis and military intelligence snooping. The report stated that the AJAs were remarkably loyal to the United States. Yet, this report was never offered at the legal hearings, and Mr. Irons could have used this report to bolster his case. Another criticism of Irons' book was his lack of material on the rare courage of all AJA units during World War II which would have further enhance his work.

Peter Irons' book is well written and informative. Companion volumes that should be read are Michi Weylyn's YEARS OF INFAMY and Harrington's YANKEE SAMURAI. These two books bolster Irons' thesis, and perhaps some historian will take advantage and write a more comprehensive book.

4 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Historical characters come alive...., January 19, 2003

By 

Martin P. McCarthy (North Chili, New York) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Justice at War: The Story of the Japanese-American Internment Cases (Paperback)

Peter Irons' book, "Justice at War" is not the most balanced piece of scholarship. Nor does Irons separate himself from the topic. Indeed, Irons interjects himself at every turn even to the point in his "Justice Delayed" (his follow-up book on the coram nobis proceedings of Korematsu and Hirabayashi) of self-aggradanizement.

Yet, Irons also has a knack for bringing out the personalities of the historical actors he writes about. Gordon Hirabayashi, Fred Korematsu, Mitsuye Endo - names that are merely captions for the Supreme Court cases dealing with the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II - become humanized people with their own distinct personalities.

When one reads this book, one is immediately confronted with Irons' "rah-rah" approach. If one can get through that unscathed, one is left with a highly accessible piece of scholarship that is both breathtaking and maddening at the same time.

0 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars The Injustice to Fellow Human Beings., February 16, 2007

By 

Betty Burks "Betty Burks" (Knoxville, TN) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Justice at War: The Story of the Japanese-American Internment Cases (Paperback)

On February 19, 1942, due to the pending war against Japan, FDR developed "camps" west of the Mississippi River. A year later, on April 23, 1943, Eleanor Roosevelt who did his legwork "visited" the lovely children who'd been born in America, who now lived in the miserably hot Gila, Arizona. It was the only "humane" camp with no barbed-wire fence or manned watchtower as was needed to contain the inhabitants of the other nine detention camps. The children walked miles to swim in the River; the men and older boys walked the same distance to fish for food. "We had to walk everywhere."

Ten WRA locations housed 120,000 people where each family had to live in one room of cheaply-constructed barracks which looked like those in the new town of Oak Ridge, not far from my hometown. Each family had a number appointed to them instead of using their real names.

Classified "a historical event," these concentration camps contained Americans whose sin was "looking like the enemy"; like in Germany they were herded into trains with blackened windows with only a week's notice. They were allowed one suitcase per person; Hitler denied the Jews any possessions and they were transported in boxcars to their deaths. The American equivalent was not to kill these peace-loving people but to contain them until World War II was over. President Roosevelt used the excuse: the Japanese proclivity to espionage."

At the other locations, barbed wire was used and the watchtowers complete with armed guards pointing their guns toward the imprisoned who were enclosed on the premises. In effect, these Americans long the target of racial hatred, were prisoners of the country where they were born. I know a person who was born on a military reservation in Japan. When he gets me too upset, I ask him "How would you like to live where you were forn?" Four years ago, I wrote about a movie I did not understand that "the characters did not fit their voices which upset some Californians. I, like Earl Warren did, feel the need to apologize. I'd love to sound like them. I was almost killed for looking like a Polock; my brother was call that sneer in school. And we're part-Cherokee.

If you want to visit the memorial in Arizona at the Gila River to see Canal and Butte, there is a minimum entry fee of $100 as it is located on an Indian reservation. Visitors without bona fide business at this location are discouraged and subject to arrest by the NA Security officer and must appear before the tribal court. At Cherokee one evening, I trespassed (didn't ask permission) to take photos of their strange monument, army tank, and other military accoutred equipment. I was closely observed but not approached. I didn't look like a spy.

Earl Warren, attorney general of California then (later chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court) admitted that he was wrong to react so impulsively without proof of disloyalty, and regretted the government's get-touch military psycholoty, propaganda and racial antagonism. He was conscience-striken (like me about the actors in B.L.T.) for the government misconduct. Our government had lied about the military necessity of relocation, and now the record has been set straight.

At the Fresno camp, the youth recited Lincoln's "Gettysburg Address," as their heart's cry. They revered Abraham Lincoln and what he stood up for almost a hundred years earlier when the North and South killed each other in the Civil War. The Japanese-Americans suffered the humiliation of imprisonment and need reparation. Senator Daniel Inouye of Hawaii showed us on television what a gentle, intelligent human being they are (as the ticket taker at Regal theater in Knoxville Center), just like a Southern gentleman. We owe them for what FDR did out of ignorance and fear. Now, 65 years later, it's time for more than an apology.