The Supreme Court finally rejected the Japanese internment—in the course of upholding Trump's Muslim travel ban
The decision says that Korematsu v. United States was wrong. Does it matter?
In 1944, when President Franklin Roosevelt’s order to single out Japanese Americans for detainment was upheld by the Supreme Court in Korematsu v. United States, Justice Frank Murphy issued a vehement dissent: “I dissent from this legalization of racism,” he wrote. “It is utterly revolting among a free people.” The Century editorialized that Murphy’s words “should be engraved in stone.”
This summer, Korematsu and the national shame it represents were cited in Trump v. Hawaii, in which the court upheld the president’s travel ban which targets several majority-Muslim nations. Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s dissent noted the striking similarities between the two cases: both involved a sweeping executive order plainly motivated by hostility toward a particular group, stereotypes about the alleged dangers that group poses, and appeals to a vaguely defined national security threat.
Writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts explicitly rejected the comparison to Korematsu while rejecting Korematsu itself. The Japanese internment was “morally repugnant,” and Korematsu “has no place in law,” Roberts wrote. But he insisted that the 1944 case “has nothing to do with this case,” which involved simply “a facially neutral policy” regarding security procedures, not any animus toward a religion or group.
