Korematsu v. United States Case

I. Case brief and citation: Korematsu v. United States (323 US 214) II. Facts of the case: A. A Japanese-American man was convicted by a federal district court for remaining in his residency instead of relocating to the Japanese internment camps issued by then-president Franklin D. Roosevelt. His residency was located in San Leandro and that area was declared to be excluded from any person with Japanese ancestry. B. The man, Fred Korematsu, violated Executive Order 9066 which was issued by FDR. This executive order was issued in retaliation to the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Korematsu argued that this executive order violated the Fifth Amendment. However, the Ninth Circuit Court upheld his conviction which led to this case being handled in the Supreme Court. III. Constitutional questions: A. Does Executive Order 9066 violate the Fifth Amendment rights of AsianAmericans? B. Does security matter more than freedom if security, in this context, is more of a violation than a form of protection? C. What limits do the President have when regarding human rights? D. Should the Executive Order be reduced to people solely from Japan rather than any Japanese ancestry? IV. Holding: A. The court ruled 6-3 in favor of the United States, declaring that the executive order was not a violation. V. Reasoning: A. In the majority opinion delivered by Justice Hugo Black, the court states that the executive order was valid because an exclusion of a certain race in a certain area is only viable if it’s to prevent espionage. The majority of the court also determined that this executive order does not racially discriminate but is only in affect for strategic purposes. B. The court didn’t argue if the executive order was constitutionally valid. They only declared that because Korematsu broke the law, he ought to be convicted. The court argued that citizens had a duty that they needed to obey and that duty was to uphold national security. This executive order, as previously stated, is not a form of racial segregation but specifically an exclusion area. The excluded area was for military purposes. VI. Separate Opinions: A. Concurring: Justice Frankfurter concurred with the ruling. Frankfurter stated that it was an offense for Korematsu to be residing in that area. According to Frankfurter, “I find nothing in the Constitution which denies to Congress the power to enforce such a valid military order by making its violation an offense triable in the civil courts.” He states that the court is not up to discuss whether or not the morality of this order is valid because the Court only participates in judicial review and not review of the legality. B. Dissenting: Justices Roberts, Murphy, and Jackson dissented with the ruling. Justice Roberts explicitly states that this executive order is clearly a violation of constitutional rights. Justices Murphy and Jackson both argue that this executive order is not exclusion but merely “an ugly abyss of racism.” This form of racism violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. VII. Impact: A. This ruling of this case was deemed highly controversial as the Executive Order was seen by many as a form of racism rather than exclusion. Korematsu’s conviction was later overturned by a district court in California in 1983. This ruling was eventually overturned in 2018 with the case of President Donald Trump v. Hawaii which involved restricting travel into the United States for people without valid travel documents.