Allegiance (31 page)

“What are you talking about?”

“You're prosecuting people who were drafted out of a concentration camp. Do you feel good about that?”

I didn't join Justice to prosecute them
, I want to say.
It's an accident. I have other reasons for being where I am.
For a moment I think about telling her this, but I'm sure she'll only say that my reasons don't matter. “It's the law,” I say. “I didn't send them the draft notices. It may be unfair, but you've got to serve when you're called.”

“Even when you've been put in a camp and stripped of all your rights?”

“I don't see anything in the Constitution that says otherwise.”

“We'll see about that,” says Eleanor. Color has risen to her cheeks; firelight glints off her dark hair.

“You know what the law is,” I say. “But you want to do what's right and the law be damned, is that it?”

“And what if I do?”

She looks like an avenging angel, terrible and beautiful, youthful and ageless all at once. I feel surprisingly tired and a little sad at my answer. “You realize that's the kind of thinking that put them in the camps in the first place. That we'll do what has to be done.”

Her face grows even fiercer. “You know what I'm saying is right.”

“That's the problem, Eleanor. Everyone knows they're right. We have law to protect us from our best instincts as well as our worst.”

“What rubbish. Who told you that?”

“Hugo Black.”

Eleanor tosses her hair. “You listen to their stories and tell me again that everyone's right.”

“I know the stories. I just came from Tule Lake. Where I was telling people not to renounce their citizenship, by the way. But if these men beat the draft, the country will hate them even more.”

“You beat it, didn't you?” I can feel my face flush. “That looks like a hit,” Eleanor says. “The army wasn't for you, then. How do they put it? You were called to serve your country in another place.”

“I flunked the physical.”

Eleanor looks me up and down. “A disease of the wealthy, I expect. They had that in the Civil War. Did you hire a substitute?”

“No.” I cannot keep the outrage from my voice.

“Well, someone's there in your place. Maybe one of them.”

“You think I don't know that?” Josephine's haunted face comes before my mind, Billy Fitch shorn like a lamb.

Eleanor tilts her head. “More that you don't care.”

“Of course I care.” Other diners turn their heads. I lower my voice. “It wasn't my choice. I never said no.”

“What would you say, if they took everything you had?”

“That's not the point. Letting these men go will get the Californians more stirred up. Who does that help?”

“So you'd sacrifice them for the greater good?”

“If you have to put it that way, yes.”

She folds her arms triumphantly. “
That's
the kind of thinking that put them in the camps.”

I shake my head. “I'm not the bad guy, Eleanor.”

“Keep telling yourself that.”

“You think different?”

“It's a democracy,” says Eleanor. “If we don't do something about this, we're all bad guys.”

• • • • 

The next day we have Joe Imihara on the stand. Seawell asks him the same four questions and gets the same answers. He received a notice to report for a physical; he ignored it; he will not serve. Then McGowan takes him through the full story. When Imihara is done, Carl Suzuki follows; after him Pat Noguchi, and then more.

There are some differences. Imihara is angry; Suzuki is scared. From Bainbridge Island, we hear, pet dogs followed the army trucks to the ferries and children carried clumps of grass to remember their homes. In Hood River the soldiers wept, too; they were a local battalion and knew the people they were putting on the trains.

But the general story is the same. They were given days to dispose of their belongings and offered insultingly low prices. Many destroyed property rather than sell it. “If I hear one more time about wedding china,” Seawell whispers to me. They were sent to assembly centers and then relocation camps. And after answering no to the loyalty questionnaire, they took the train to Tule Lake.

At the end, McGowan always asks them if they have anything more to say. “Good-bye, America” says Imihara. “Don't do this again.”

“This is my contribution to the war,” says Suzuki. “I am defending your principles.” But mostly they follow Kuwabara, and what I assume is McGowan's coaching. They look me and Seawell in the eyes, nod to the gallery, and say they forgive us. The crowd goes crazy each time, but McGowan doesn't need them. He needs Judge Goodman, and the crowd's reaction probably helps.

The next day is the same. When the fifth resister says that his mother smashed a tea set, Seawell stands up. “Your honor,” he says. “This is getting ridiculous. I'm willing to stipulate that every one of these men saw their family china broken. Can we move it along?”

“I will let the defense develop the facts as it deems them necessary,” says Judge Goodman.

“I'm not going to sit around and waste my time listening to this again,” says Seawell. He turns to leave.

“You
will
listen, Mr. Seawell,” Judge Goodman says. He gestures to the federal marshal in the corner of the courtroom, who takes a step forward. Goodman speaks more quietly. “Would God I could make you hear.”

I catch Seawell by the arm and pull him back down. “Wow,” he says, settling into his chair. “This really isn't going well.”

• • • • 

By Friday evening the testimony has concluded. I eat alone in the hotel restaurant. I am finishing an excellent grilled Pacific salmon when Eleanor comes to my table.

“What do you think now?” she asks.

“Will you sit down this time?” She does. “So you're determined to let them go,” I say.

“Yes.”

“You sure your judge agrees? He thought enough of my argument that he wouldn't dismiss the indictment.”

“He did that because we're here till the end of the week. If he set them free the first day he thought we'd be lynched. That's one reason we're hearing every defendant's story.”

“Are you serious?”

“You don't know Eureka very well, do you? I guess you got here too late for the tour. They drove their Chinese out by mob in 1885 and haven't allowed any Orientals back since. They're very proud of it.”

“So this trial's just for show, huh? You always knew how it was going to come out.”

“We knew what was right. These aren't the people who attacked us. They look like them, but that's not enough. We can't punish them just to make ourselves feel better.”

“So how are you going to do it? They refused the draft; you can't get around that.”

For the first time Eleanor seems less sure of herself. “To be honest, we don't know. Got any expert advice?”

“They said no,” I tell her. “They knew what they were doing. There's no way around it.” But even as I speak I wonder. That first day McGowan argued that the conditions of confinement were such that the resisters could not make a real choice. It was a ploy to get his evidence in, but it is an argument for acquittal, too. If there is no choice, there is no crime. Law forgives the helpless. “Unless you buy the idea that they had no choice.”

“We'll buy it if there's nothing else for sale,” says Eleanor. She rises to leave and hesitates, two fingers on the table. “Mr. Harrison, did a military driver bring you here?”

“Yes.”

“Is he armed?”

“Armed? He's got a sidearm, I suppose.”

“Could you arrange to have him present in the courtroom when the judge hands down his opinion tomorrow?”

“Why?”

“These people are expecting one sort of show, and we're going to give them quite another.”

I think of the comforting brawn of Andrew Rosen. “I'll have him there. He won't need his gun, though.”

“I hope not,” says Eleanor.

“If you're so worried, why don't you leave early?”

“We'd like to. But it's not our choice. The cars all go together.”

I think for a moment. “You know what,” I say, “you can have my driver.”

“Really?”

“Sure. If you don't mind a jeep. He's from the Presidio motor pool in the first place. Put your stuff in the back now; he'll have it waiting behind the courthouse tomorrow morning, and you can just hand down your opinion and drive off into the sunset.”

“Sunrise,” says Eleanor. “Well, that's generous of you. But how will you get back?”

“Emmett Seawell is headed that way, too. I can ride with him. I'm sure we'll have plenty to talk about.”

• • • • 

Like our hotel, the Humboldt County courthouse occupies a full block. It is impressive, with gray-sanded zinc statues of Justice on the roof and a clock tower crowned by Minerva. It reminds me a good deal of Philadelphia's City Hall with William Penn above the clock face.

Judge Goodman's courtroom is large, but it is filled to capacity when he takes the bench Saturday morning. There are the twenty-seven resisters, for one thing, shackled together in the front two rows. The remainder of the seats are filled by curious citizens. Andrew Rosen stands by the door that leads back to the judge's chambers, thick arms crossed in front of him. He sports an olive drab cap now. When worn indoors, he has explained, a cover indicates that he is bearing arms. I think the significance of the hat may be lost on some in the audience, but they will not miss the pistol at his hip.

Judge Goodman looks slightly pale, as does Eleanor. Neither appears to have slept much. “The uncontroverted facts are as follows,” he reads. “Tule Lake Segregation Center was initially constructed and used for a time as a
permanent relocation center to which Japanese and Japanese Americans were sent from temporary assembly centers. Sometime in 1943, the Relocation Authority decided to segregate loyal and disloyal internees. Tule Lake was chosen as a concentration center for those whose disloyalty was determined either by the government or by their own declarations. Defendants were evacuated from Pacific states to various relocation centers and removed as disloyal Nisei to Tule Lake Center. There they have been forcibly detained since their arrival.”

At “forcibly detained” Seawell nudges me. I shrug.

“It is not controverted that the defendants have refused a summons to military service,” Goodman says. “It is not questioned that Tule Lake Center is an area surrounded by barricades and patrolled by armed guards, and that immediately beyond the barricades, armed forces of the United States prevent the departure of any persons confined in the center.”

Seawell slumps in his chair and shakes his head. “Good lord,” he whispers.

“Whether such confinement is lawful or not is beside the question,” Goodman continues. “Dangers to the security of the West Coast may justify the evacuation and confinement. No such dangers, however, can be cited to justify the prosecution of these defendants for refusing to be inducted. The fact that the war power may support detention does not mean that the Constitution does not apply at Tule Lake, as Mr. Justice Murphy's concurring opinion in the
Hirabayashi
case observes.”

There are Gene Gressman's words, I think. The images come to me so strongly that I can almost feel his presence. Gene drafting that opinion by lamplight, falling to the ground under Haynes's fist, looking up in puzzled hurt. And me punching back for him. I am so wrapped in memory that I almost miss Goodman's next sentence. “Citizens confined on the grounds of disloyalty are under sufficient duress and restraint that they are unable to make a meaningful choice between serving in the armed forces or being prosecuted for not yielding to such compulsion. The social contract imposes obligations on citizens, but it does so in exchange for rights, and the government may not deny the rights while it insists on the obligations.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” asks Seawell.

“It means we lost,” I say. To my surprise, I feel the corners of my lips lifting in a smile.

“The defendants are remanded to the custody of the marshal, to be returned to the custody of the Relocation Authority,” says Goodman. He brings down his gavel. “Judgment for defendants; case dismissed; court adjourned.” The last sentence comes out fast. Andrew Rosen has the door open, and Goodman and Eleanor are moving toward it. The crowd hisses uncertainly; the resisters sit quietly in their shackles. I get up and walk over to Masaaki Kuwabara.

“What do you think now?”

“What do you mean?”

“About your rights as a citizen. They kept you out of jail.”

“I was drafted and brought into this court because I am a citizen,” he says. “And I am going back to jail.”

I sigh. “Would you do me a favor and tell your friends not to renounce? Not for any piece of paper someone offers them. The paper is nothing. Your citizenship protects you.”

Kuwabara nods to me. His expression is the same one Harry Nakamura showed me with his farewell bow, courtly and ironic. The tone of his voice is the same, too. “I will spread that good news around Tule Lake.”

EMMETT SEAWELL DOES
not travel by jeep. His car is long and black; his driver sits alone up front. In back, the seats are plush, but the air is close. As we pull out along the bay, I envy Judge Goodman and Eleanor, speeding down the highway ahead of us with Andrew Rosen at the wheel. I imagine them laughing together in the aftermath of danger, feeling the thrill of success. Seawell settles himself into the cushions and stares straight ahead. For the first few miles he says nothing. Then he looks abruptly at me. “So the judge took your jeep.”