Ex parte Endo
323 U.S. 283 (1944)
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Rule of Law:
The United States government cannot continue to detain a citizen who is concededly loyal under the authority granted by Executive Order 9066 and its ratifying statute. Once a citizen's loyalty is established, the power to detain them for the purpose of preventing espionage and sabotage is exhausted.
Facts:
- Following Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, President Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066, authorizing military commanders to exclude persons from designated areas to protect against espionage and sabotage.
- Mitsuye Endo, a U.S. citizen of Japanese ancestry and a California state employee, was determined to be a loyal and law-abiding citizen by the government.
- Pursuant to military orders, Endo was evacuated from her home in Sacramento, California, in May 1942.
- She was first confined in the Tule Lake Relocation Center and later transferred to the Central Utah Relocation Center.
- The War Relocation Authority (WRA) established a leave procedure that allowed evacuees to depart the centers only after their loyalty was confirmed and they secured approved employment and housing in an approved community.
- Although Endo was granted 'leave clearance,' certifying her loyalty, she remained in detention because she did not apply for conditional leave, instead seeking an unconditional release.
Procedural Posture:
- In July 1942, Mitsuye Endo filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, seeking her release from the Tule Lake Relocation Center.
- The District Court, as the court of first instance, denied her petition in July 1943.
- Endo, as appellant, appealed the denial to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in August 1943.
- While the appeal was pending, Endo was transferred to the Central Utah Relocation Center, outside the Ninth Circuit.
- The Court of Appeals certified questions of law from the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.
- The U.S. Supreme Court then ordered the entire record certified to it, bringing the case before it for a final decision.
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Issue:
Does the War Relocation Authority have the authority under Executive Order 9066 or the Act of March 21, 1942, to continue to detain a U.S. citizen of Japanese ancestry whose loyalty to the United States has been established?
Opinions:
Majority - Mr. Justice Douglas
No. The War Relocation Authority lacks the authority to detain a concededly loyal citizen. The power to detain under Executive Order 9066 and the Act of March 21, 1942, is implicitly derived from the express purpose of preventing espionage and sabotage. A citizen who is concededly loyal presents no such threat. Therefore, any authority to detain is exhausted once loyalty is established. The Court construed the executive order and statute narrowly to provide the 'greatest possible accommodation' between individual liberties and the exigencies of war, avoiding the underlying constitutional questions. Detention based on managing community hostility is not authorized by these measures, which were strictly aimed at national security threats.
Concurring - Mr. Justice Murphy
No. I agree with the result, but the Court should have reached the constitutional issue. The detention of persons of Japanese ancestry, regardless of loyalty, is an unconstitutional 'resort to racism' that bears no reasonable relation to military necessity. The entire evacuation and detention program is 'utterly foreign to the ideals and traditions of the American people.' An unconditional release for Ms. Endo must include the right to return to her home in California, invalidating the exclusion orders against her as well.
Concurring - Mr. Justice Roberts
No. I concur in the result but reject the majority's reasoning. The Court improperly avoids the constitutional question by claiming the detention was unauthorized. The executive branch clearly intended to detain evacuees, and Congress ratified this program by appropriating funds with full knowledge of the WRA's procedures. The Court is therefore squarely faced with the constitutional question of whether a loyal citizen can be detained without due process. The answer is unequivocally no; the detention is a clear violation of constitutional guarantees.
Analysis:
This decision marked a crucial limit on the executive branch's wartime powers over citizens, contrasting with the deference shown in Hirabayashi and Korematsu. By focusing on statutory interpretation rather than constitutional grounds, the Court skillfully ordered the release of loyal internees without directly overturning its prior decisions that had validated the initial evacuation and curfew. This ruling effectively began the process of dismantling the Japanese-American internment camps, establishing that once the government concedes a citizen's loyalty, the national security justification for their detention under the wartime orders evaporates.
