Fred Korematsu, one of the over 125,000 people of Japanese ancestry unjustly incarcerated during WWII, is famous for his 1944 U.S. Supreme Court case challenging the constitutionality of President Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9066.
When faced with criminal charges for violating the military orders to leave his home without due process, the U.S. citizen poignantly asked…
Am I An American Or Am I Not?
This project started as an extension of the successful exhibit, "Then They Came For Me: Incarceration of Japanese Americans During WWII and the Demise of Civil Liberties," which was on display in the Presidio of San Francisco in 2019.
Both exhibits center on powerful images of the Japanese American incarceration taken by such notable photographers as Dorothea Lange and Ansel Adams.
What's Next?
This project represents a major step towards the Korematsu Institute’s vision for its next phase to inspire equity, inclusion and civic participation while bringing to life the courageous legacy of Fred Korematsu for generations to come: The Fred Korematsu Interpretive Center for Social Justice.
Located in the historic Presidio of San Francisco, it will serve as a place-based interpretive center that educates students, educators, and people from all walks of life about the history of the forced removal of Japanese Americans to concentration camps, Fred Korematsu’s fight for freedom, and the importance of standing up for justice for all.
While there are other notable museums and historical sites preserving the history of Japanese American mass incarceration, this new center will focus on applying the lessons from Fred Korematsu's American story, inspiring new generations to stand against racism and discrimination, consider different viewpoints and life experiences, and take action to protect our democracy and Constitutional rights.
The history of Japanese American Incarceration and Fred Korematsu’s legal cases challenging it are intertwined with that of the Presidio, a National Park Service site and former U.S. Army post on the northern tip of the San Francisco Peninsula.
General John D. DeWitt issued over 100 Japanese exclusion orders from the Presidio-based Western Defense Command, and it was where Fred Korematsu was first incarcerated after he was arrested for defying the order to leave his home.