The Wilmington morning star., 1945-02-28
By WEsTBROOK PEGLER


of making people thinko
BY WEsTBROOK PEGLER
fCopyright, 1915, by King Features Syndicate) !
While the bleeding-heart or soclo-pohtlcal
personality of the Roosevelt government has
been insisting that are all brothers under
the skin and that discrimination among US on
grounds of race, creed or color is un-Ameri-
can the Supreme court has quietly given us
decision to the contrary. According to the
majority opinion Of Justice Hugo Black IN the
case of a native American named Fred Toy
asaburo Korematsu of San Leandro, Cal, 1t
is lawful and correct in certain circumstances,
to imprison in concentration camps native
Americans of good reputation who happen to
be descendants Of immigrants from coun-
try with which we are at war.
Nv the dctum of the majority opinion, up
holding the conviction of Korematsu, if now
we were at war with Russia, all children
and descendants of immigrants from old Rus
sia including many of our most influential
union leaders, could be rounded up and in
termed indefinitely in desert camps. Probably,
in the long run, they would lose not only
their liberty but their property as well through
inevitable neglect depreciation and sale at
distress values Ironically Felix Frankturter,
who concurred in a separate oplnloh pelng
native of Austria, country Win winch
we find ourselves at war, would seem TO Oh
fer himself for internment as an unreliable
person. However I say only that Mr.. FRANK
furter would SEEM to do this because, in
common with some of his brethren I have
difficulty understanding his opinions and am
ever mindful of his proviso that to draw
plain meanings with plain language is to in
dulge in pernicious r-simpification. Obvi-
ously it is even more hazardous TO draw
plain meanings from language which, what
ever its other virtues, certainly is not plain
Justice Black, an old Klansman, took note
of the contention, upheld by other Jusnces'
that Korematsu was sent to a concentration
camp ''solely because of his ancestry but,
with straight face, denied It,
''Korematsu, he says, for the court was
not excluded from the military area because
of hostility to him or his race he was eA-
Guided because we are at war with the Japa-
nese empire" and because the military au-
thorities on the West coast decided that mill
tarv urgency demanded that all citizens OF
japanese ancestry be temporarily segregated
from the West coast. From that, l believe
a logical mind would proceed to the conclu-
sion that if Adolf Hitler had not attacked
Russia and presently, this nation had gone
to war against both Germany and Russia,
all persons of German and Russian ancestry,
including many who were most active and
influential in the Political Action committee
in the late election, could be deported to con-
centration camps. At this very moment, in
deed, Senator Robert Wagner, not a descen-
dant of German immigrants but, like Frank
furter, an immigrant, himself, is at liberty
only by virtue of the forebearance of the mill
tary authorities, and F. Il. LaGuardia, too, if
it comes to that
Justice Murphy, dissenting, relied on an i'm
of diS1OVa1ty to kOrematSu,
strictly on the ground of undiluted racial
strain, by Lieut.-Gen. Dewitt, then command
or of the western defense command, who FUR
ther remarked informally, that "a Japs a
JAP" Mr. Murphy seemed to palter with the
majority momentarily when he noted the ao-
sence of evidence that individuals had so be-
|haved as to justify their Exclusion as
group Apparently, if some number OF them
had so behaved, he would have been willing
to consider the exclusion OF innocent among
the guilty.
| However, in a later paragraph, he pulls
himself together for he says:
| ITO infer that examples OF lno1Vloual us
LOYALTY prove group disloyalty is to deny
| that under our system of law, Individual gullt
lis the sole basis for the deprivation OF rights
This inference, which is at the very heart
of the evacuation orders, has been used IN
sunport of the abhorrent treatment OF MINOR
itv groups by the dictatorial tyrannles winch
this nation is now pledged to destroy.
Justice Jackson, also dissenting, scorneo
compromise entirely.
"A citizens presence in the locahty was
made a crime only if his parents were .,
{, Jananese birth he wrote. Korema1su hao
been convicted of an act not commonly
crime. to wit being present IN state "neie-
of he was citizen, near the place where
ha was born and where, all his life, ne hao
|1ived ;, German alien enemy, an Italian
alien eneuy. or even native son OF natlVe
ancestors with personal record OF treason
but out on parole, all were exempt from the
order while this loyal native was ordered
away and punished for his refusal to leave.
Thus. Mr. jackson finds that Korematsu
fault was nothing that he did but his racial
stock.
| eff any fundamental Assumption uhoerAes
our system" Mr.. Jackson further wrote'
| is that guilt is personal and not lnherltaple.
Here is an attempt to make an otherwise
innocent act a crime merely because tnlS
prisoner is the son of parents as to whonl
he had no choice and belongs to race from
which there is no way to resign. IL congress-
in peace-time legislation, should enact sucn
criminal law l should suppose thls coor'
would refuse to enforce it.
Where now does the prevailing opinion leave
us in the field of racial DETERMINATIONS az
cording to the Supreme court!