Despite Victories, Justice is Elusive

Here in Washington D.C., the sun is not too hot, the wind is not too strong and the mosquitoes have not yet taken wing. Cherry blossoms have pretty much had their day, but trees and flowers all over the world are bursting with brilliant colors along streets and highways.

But attention is focused on uglier scenes. Politicos anr fixated on Kosovo, and here in Washington, the Asian American advocates are attending to ongoing issues like Japanese Latin American redress and mourning the loss of INS attorney Joyce Chiang, whose body was positively identified last week.

Chiang, who was only 28, disappeared in January after being dropped off at her home near Dupont Circle. On April 1, her corpse was discovered near the Potomac River. The Washington Post noted that, because of effects of nature on the body over time the identification was delayed, and the cause of death may never be determined.

While it is scary to think that violence may have overtaken Chiang so close to her home, statistics show that we are in greater danger near where we live. For example, the National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium’s annual Audit of Anti-Asian Violence, released in December, shows a 10 percent decrease in incidents reported. But the report continued: “In 1997, there were 481 reported anti-Asian incidents. Though the numbers dropped from 1997 to 1996, the 1997 numbers are higher than the numbers reported from 1993 to 1995. This overall trend in anti-Asian violence over the last five years is contrary to the national drop in crime. ”

Meanwhile, though Japanese American redress program administered by the Office of Redress Administration (ORA) under the Civil Liberties Act of 1988 closed in February, some who applied for redress had not been compensated. As of last week, 586 Japanese Latin Americans who accepted a 1998 class-action settlement in Mochizuki v. United States and 79 Japanese Americans who were eligible under the 1988 Civil Liberties Act cannot be paid because funds are no longer available.

The Campaign for Justice, including former internees and supporters from the National Coalition for Redress/Reparations, American Civil Liberties Union and other groups, met with members of the Justice Department and Congress to urge full compensation, whether legislative or executive action.

According to the Campaign for Justice, the Justice Department has sent letters of apology signed by the president and $5,000 reparations to roughly 145 of the 731 Japanese Latin American former internees who applied. Carmen Mochizuki, the named plaintiff in the class-action suit challenging the denial of redress to Japanese Latin Americans, fought hard to achieve inclusion. She settled in June 1996 for a partial measure with the belief that, in so doing, all of the Japanese Latin Americans would receive at least the $5,000 in token compensation.

This month, Mochizuki received her reparation. However, she says she cannot enjoy it knowing that her older sister, who lives in Okinawa and should have received reparations before her under the settlement, did not.

As Grace Shimizu of the Japanese American Oral History Project stated, “Although the number of people still fighting for their redress rights is few when compared to the 82,219 who received the presidential letter of apology and $20,000 compensation, we cannot allow the U.S. government to deny them justice. Those most closely involved with redress knew that if getting the Civil Liberties Act passed was just the beginning of redress efforts.”

To help in this next phase of the redress struggle, call Campaign for Justice at 310-473-6134.