The collection contains the files of the attorneys who assisted Mr. Korematsu in reopening his case. They chronicle both the events leading up to the 1944 Korematsu decision and the 1981 effort by a group of politically committed lawyers determined to challenge the judicial system and re-write history. The Korematsu litigation documents are the record of the Korematsu team's litigation work. Not only were they actively engaged in litigation and court affairs on behalf of Mr. Korematsu, but they also saw themselves equally engaged in community outreach, educational efforts, and the redress movement as a whole. Their legal and non-legal research and their involvement in related coram nobis cases, legislative initiatives, media projects testify to the breadth and depth of activities they viewed integral and essential to litigating this case. The 49 document cases of documents are a distillation of the personal attorneys' files of Dale Minami, Lorraine Bannai, Dennis Hayashi, Don Tamaki, the Asian Law Caucus, Robert Rusky, Karen Kai, and Ed Chen. Files were not received from Leigh-Ann Miyasato, Peter Irons, Eric Yamamoto, Akira Togasaki, or other individuals or organizations involved in the case. As each attorney maintained his or her personal files, there were numerous duplicates which have been subsequently removed. Selected materials were also duplicated and submitted to the California State Library in Sacramento, Calif., with funding from the California Civil Liberties Public Education Project.
