Coram Nobis and the Continuum of Activism

              Nikkei Heritage • Spring 1999
Coram Nobis Timeline (cont'd from p. 5)
April 5: The Supreme Court agrees to
hear the three cases, and schedules a
May 10 hearing.
April 13: Testifying at House Naval
Affairs Subcommittee hearings in San
Francisco, DeWitt makes a notorious
remark: "A Jap's a Jap. You can't change
him by giving him a piece of paper."
April 19: DeWitt's Final Report on
Japanese Evacuation from the West
Coast, 1942 is transmitted to the War
Department. Contradicting a prior
statement opposing mass eviction,
DeWitt claims in the Report that "military necessity" requires the mass
removal of Japanese Americans from
the West Coast. The Final Report also
contains unsubstantiated allegations of
espionage and sabotage while omitting
information from the FBI, Federal
Communications Commission (FCC)
and Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI)
refuting these allegations by the Army.
May 3: Upon review of the Final Report,
Asst. Secty. of War John L. McCloy decides that it should not be shown to
Justice Dept. lawyers working on government briefs for Supreme Court
hearings. DeWitt's racial bias is clearly
apparent in statements that 1) it was
"impossible" to separate the loyal from
the disloyal "with any degree of safety,"
and 2) "it was not that there was insufficient time... it was simply a matter of
facing the realities that a positive determination [of loyalty] could not be
made." The implication was that the
Japanese Americans were such a "tightly knit racial group" that no amount of
time would be sufficient to determine
their loyalties.
Since the Final Report contradicts arguments already made by the Justice
Dept. to the Court of Appeals, McCloy
orders the document revised. More
than fifty changes are made to obscure
DeWitt's overt racism and alter references to the time  factor.  He then
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promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our
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instructs DeWitt to submit a revised
and reprinted version of the Final
Report with a second transmittal letter,
as if the first had never existed. The
tampering is concealed from the
Justice Dept.
June 5: Dewitt submits the revised
Final Report, which McCloy continues
to withhold from Justice Dept. lawyers.
June 7: At McCloy's direction, Col. Karl
R. Bendetsen orders the destruction of
all ten copies of the original Final
Report and the removal of every trace
of the original submission, including
transmittal letters and receipts, and the
burning of all galley proofs, galley
pages, drafts and memoranda. By these
actions nothing is left in the Pentagon
to show that the earlier version ever existed.
June 21: The U.S. Supreme Court issues its ruling on Hirabayashi and
Yasui, upholding the constitutionality
of the curfew order and the convictions of both men for curfew
violations. A ruling on the constitutionality of the exclusion order is
delayed until the Korematsu vs. U.S.
hearing the next year.
«■>■ '1 ——■
Jan: The War Dept finally releases the
revised Final Report.
Late Jan: The director of the Justice
Dept. Alien Enemy Control Unit,
Edward J. Ennis, who is also working
on the government brief opposing
Korematsu's Supreme Court appeal,
persuades Atty. Gen. Francis Biddle to
ask the FBI and the FCC to review the
espionage allegations contained in the
Final Report.
Feb. 7: FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover reports to Biddle that: "Every complaint
in this regard (i.e. Japanese espionage
activity on the West Coast) has been
investigated, but in no case has any information been obtained which would
substantiate the allegations that there
has been illicit signaling from shore-
to-ship since the beginning of the war."
April 1: The FCC report to Biddle includes memos by George Sterling, head
of the FCC's Radio Intelligence
Division, who notes that DeWitt
seemed to believe that "the woods were
full of Japs with transmitters." Labeling
the Army's radio monitoring operation
"pathetic," Sterling asserts that Army
"personnel [who] know nothing of
technical subjects... essential to radio
intelligence procedures" had mistakenly assumed that Japanese language
signals originating in Tokyo were coming from "Jap agents" transmitting
from the West Coast. Also in April,
Ennis hears about the exculpatory material in the Ringle report, but is denied
access to it for security reasons.
Sept. 11: With John L. Burling, another
Justice Dept. lawyer on the Korematsu
case, Ennis inserts a footnote in the
Justice Dept. brief, pointing out: "The
recital [in the Final Report] of circumstances justifying the evacuation as a
military necessity...is in several respects, particularly with reference to
the use of illegal radio transmitters and
shore-to-ship signaling by persons of
Japanese ancestry, in conflict with information    in    possession    of   the
12
Japanese American Historical Society