My interests center on how ordinary
Japanese-Americans had an impact on the Supreme Court’s
decision to award more than $1 billion as redress to Japanese-Americans
who were incarcerated during World War II.
I'm especially interested in Aiko Herzig-Yoshinaga, a woman
who had been in Manzanar as a young woman and gave birth to
her first child there. In the 1980s, she was able to unearth
major documents and prove that the prosecution had lied to
the Supreme Court during the war when it found the exclusion
and incarceration of Japanese-Americans to be constitutional.
I'm also interested in Fred Koematsu, a former draftsman,
who was convicted for violating the exclusion orders during
World War II. He was the first person in history to have a
Supreme Court decision set aside, using documents found by,
among others, Herzig-Yoshinaga.
Both of these individuals speak to my central concerns, demonstrating
that “ordinary folks” can make a difference and
hopefully inspire our students who tend to come from backgrounds
similar to Herzig-Yoshinaga and Korematsu. Cal State Fullerton
has a superb archive of materials on the World War II Japanese-American
experience. We are privileged also to have Arthur Hansen,
professor of history, who is one of the foremost scholars
in this field.
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