DGDevin wrote:
"HeyBub" wrote in message
...


Your point is well-taken, but you forget that individuals can be
"rounded up" and placed in detention/jail without being crimnals.
Here are a few: * Juveniles
* Those standing in civil contempt
* Infectious disease carriers
* Illegal aliens
* Those judeged, or felt to be, mentally incompetent
* Unlawful enemy combatants

Point is, one does not have to be a criminal - or charged with being
a criminal - to be jailed.

I'm sorry, I missed the category of belonging to a particular ethnic
group, did you forget to list that one? And since when are illegal
aliens not committing a crime?

Most illegal aliens are handled in the civil courts system.

Nor are juveniles rounded up simply
for being juveniles, they have to be doing something like breaking
curfew and then they are turned over to their parents, not confined
for years on end.

Four years ago, I think, two teen-agers broke into a boat shed in Maine
during the night. Their plan was to steal radios from some of the boats.
Part way through their escapade they noticed the security cameras.

Nothing for it but to burn the boat shed down!

Of course the recording apparatus was located nowhere near the shed and it
took the local cops about five minutes to identify the culprits.

One of the boys was seventeen and handled as an adult. He got a five year
probated sentence plus restitution.

The other boy was fifteen. The Secret Service nabbed him. Oh, did I neglect
to mention one of the destroyed boats was owned by George H.W. Bush? Anyway,
charged in federal court with "Terroristic Destruction" or some such, he was
ordered confined until he was twenty-one at the only maximum security
federal facility for juvenilies in Pennsylvania.

So, he will be locked up, with 250 other high-risk juveniles (mostly drunk
Indians), for six years.



Those in contempt have been found by a judge to be
disrespectful of a court's authority--they have done something to
justify being confined. Infectious disease carriers pose a public
health risk, the mentally incompetent are a danger to themselves or
others, unlawful combatants or POWs have engaged in combat against
U.S. forces--they have *done something* to justify being confined. So what
exactly did someone born to parents originally from Japan do
to justify being locked up in tarpaper shacks in the desert for
several years?


Your observation is spot-on. Since the early '60s, the Supreme Court has
knocked down almost all laws of "status." That is, it is no longer a crime
to "be" something (drug addict, prostitute, vagrant, etc.), you must DO
something. However, in 1942, laws regarding status were not uncommon.

However, all this does not mitigate the fact that you got exercised over
people being locked up without being judged guilty of a crime. I was simply
making the point that people CAN be locked up where no crime is involved.
And if there is no crime involved, those people are not entitled to the
constitutional protections afforded criminals (indictment by a grand jury,
legal representation, procurement of witnesses, right to remain silent, and
so forth).



Oh, and I agree with you, but you are the one who brought up the
argument "How would you feel...?"

If you were properly convicted of a crime you had committed and were
imprisoned you'd feel bad but that is part of the point of sending
people to prison. However if you had not committed the crime the
issue wouldn't be your feelings, it would be the injustice. Americans of
German or Italian descent were locked up in WWII if they
retained German or Italian citizenship--hundreds of German-Americans
returned to Germany to join the military prior to America joining the
war, and groups like the German-American Bund openly supported Nazi
goals, so there was some legitimate cause for concern. But Americans
of Japanese descent were locked up simply because of where their
parents came from rather than because of their actions--that was an
injustice.

Flash: The Americans of Japanese descent living in Hawaii were not locked up
(or at least not many).

I agree with you - there was certainly something wrong regarding the
treatment of the Japanese. But I still say how I or anybody else would
"feel" about ANY situation is irrelevant. Not only are "feelings"
irrelevant, they should NEVER be the touchstone regarding whether justice is
being served.

Secondly: There was no "injustice" in locking up the Japanese - at least not
in the legal sense. The president's executive order (# 9066) was issued in
February 1942. It remained on the books for over 30 years until it was
rescinded by President Ford in 1966. Executive Order 9066 was never
challenged in court.